ABSTRACT
This chapter seeks to summarize body of inferences regarding cremation practices that seem to be relatively secure and to use La Ciudad data to systematically consider those that appear not so secure. Archaeologists have paid considerable attention to the reconstruction of Colonial and Sedentary cremation practices. Throughout the Colonial and Sedentary periods in the Phoenix basin, the Hohokam overwhelmingly practiced secondary cremation, burning the body at one location and then burying the remains and grave goods in a separate pit. One of the most important questions about Hohokam cremation practices is what was done with the burned bone once incineration was complete. The destruction of artifacts accompanying Hohokam funerals affects analyses of the grave lots in several different ways. The intense burning of Hohokam cremations makes the survival of perishable items a most fortuitous event. Intense incineration would produce lower bone weights, especially if Hohokam funeral pyres attained temperatures sufficient to totally consume the bone.
