The Neolithic court tombs of Ireland display variation in the ways that their component parts – concave courts, linear galleries and individual cells – were combined and arranged. This variation has been interpreted in the past in terms of both the diffusion of ideas and the design requirements of their builders. In this article it is suggested that the analysis of these formalized components points to central themes of the social and ritual discourse that accompanied the tombs' construction and use, the symbolism of the tombs expressing alleged lineage relationships between the living community, its ancestors and the land. It is suggested that these communities were based on one or more corporate descent groups, in some cases combining with other social units to appropriate and exploit territory, the relationships between them being symbolized and idealized in the spatial layout of the tombs' orthostatic structures.

This article looks at the non-utilitarian functions of writing in Crete during the Palatial period. It argues that writing was used as a marker of status and prestige and that it was also used for communication with the divine. It also attempts to interpret what have usually been seen as isolated examples of writing systems as pseudo-writing.

Epitaphs inscribed on stone record biographical information about the deceased, and in certain cases, the age at death. However, it has been demonstrated that these ages on Roman epitaphs are not an accurate reflection of the demographics of death, but are subject to cultural bias. Using the idea of the ‘life course’, this article explores these cultural biases and their relationship to age and gender structures. Material from Italy suggests that these are tied into ideologies of gender, with adulthood defined by the transition to magistrate for men and wife for women. Material from other areas demonstrates different patterns, and in the case of Etruria, these are shown to be a negotiation between pre-Roman and Romanized customs. The phenomenon of ‘age-rounding’ is also argued to be part of these ideas of correct age.