Of Clues and Signs: The Dead Body and Its Evidential Traces

Abstract

Taking the conflict over the remains of Ned Kelly as a starting point, in this article I trace the various conceptions of the, body as evidence within the intertwined histories of anthropology, criminology, and medicine to explore how anthropological practice brings the dead into being through exhumation and analysis. I outline the popular rhetorical tropes within which evidentiary claims are situated, exploring how the agency of people after death is understood within the framework of present-day forensic anthropological practice and how this is underwritten by a particular heritage of anatomical analysis. [Keywords: archaeology, forensic anthropology, materiality, semiotics of the body]

Identification, politics, disciplines

“…This is part of a growing interest in these latter bodies, the disciplinary knowledge that they bring to bear and the body produced through practices of exhumation and reburial, thus bringing to view the 'disciplines of the dead' -anthropology and archaeology, and more recently the genetics field. 6 While the politics of dead bodies has come to refer to the potency of dead bodies in articulating certain kinds of politics, 'disciplines of the dead' indexes those scholarly disciplines associated with the dead human body. Rather than counterpose politics and disciplines, my interest here is to extend these concepts to include the politics that arise within and between individuals, disciplines, and institutions concerned with exhumation and the ways in which the dead body (or, depending on one's view, those speaking in the name of the dead) compels, 'disciplines' , those around it to react in certain ways, calling forth particular practices or rituals.…”

The Golden and Ghoulish Age of the Gibbet in Britain

“…25 Whatever the case, The Prelude is not an accurate historical record but, for our present purposes, a good indicator of the response of a sensitive Romantic spirit to the presence of gibbets in the landscape: Wordsworth "fled/Faltering and fain, and Ignorant of the road". 21 …”

“…However, by the eighteenth century, it had become normal practice to kill traitors first by hanging (for men) or strangling (for women), so that then being burned or disembowelled became a post-execution punishment. 21 The traditional fate of the traitor's body was for his quarters to be disposed "At the King's pleasure". Until the eighteenth century, this generally meant displaying the heads of traitors at city gates or on prominent public buildings.…”

“…22 20 Jarvis recorded the event in a commonplace book which is still kept at the hall in the possession of Jarvis's descendant Claire Birch. 21 London Evening Post, 29 June-2 July 1745, issue 2754. 22 Public Advertiser, 10 January 1761, issue 8170.…”

“…, 90 ,5,21,46,50,111 Liminality,60 M Murder Act,6,8,9,11,12,[21][22][23]25,27,36,102,103,105,108,117 P Phrenology,[95][96][97]11,17,20,23,36,104,106,112,117 decapitation,12,14 dismemberment,15 profane burial (Staking at a crossroad), 17, 19 Sheriffs' cravings,5,18,34,43,61,63,68,69,73,101 State power,44,46,103,104,115,116 punish...…”