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Barrows are a prominent feature of Britain's Bronze Age landscape. While they originated as burial monuments, they also appear to have acquired other roles in prehistory. British prehistorians, however, have been hampered in their interpretations of these monuments, as they are wary of speculating about how Bronze Age people might have conceptualised their dead. Here, the authors suggest that a recurring pattern of inversion is significant. They use Conceptual Metaphor Theory to argue that Bronze Age people in Britain saw their dead inhabiting an inverted underworld directly beneath the surface of the earth. This interpretation would explain not only burial practices, but also some of the barrows’ other apparent functions, such as guarding boundaries and controlling routeways.

A Late Antique burial in central-western France contained the skull and long bones of two individuals, overlaid by the parts of an equid carcass. What are we to make of such a deposit? Clearly it does not relate to an ethnic or ritual norm. The authors lead us through the ways that such a rite might be decoded.

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The inverted dead of Britain's Bronze Age barrows: a perspective from Conceptual Metaphor Theory

An unusual Late Antique funerary deposit with equid remains (Usseau, France)

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The inverted dead of Britain's Bronze Age barrows: a perspective from Conceptual Metaphor Theory

An unusual Late Antique funerary deposit with equid remains (Usseau, France)