'Ancestral Geographies of the Neolithic'.....

"Bones before him and open tomb behind, the shaman faced the living. All but the youngest knew the pattern of what would follow. He began with the invocation of names, the chain of generations that tied past to present. As he talked, he mapped the tale across the land that stretched away in front of them...
spoken in full, the litany of names charted the histories of families who cut back and forth across each other's paths... the tale knew few boundaries. It dwelt on recent years and it travelled outside time and the circle of seasons. Those who listened heard of the first people born from river and forest and of the forms and place each clan had taken. When the old ones died, they turned again to the forms and places each clan had taken. . . Those who came after built tombs in their honour, raising stone and earth to hold their essence.."

There's a good story to tell round the bonfire on Wednesday, especially the bit, which I have omitted, regarding the sorting of the body into bones ready for burial in the tomb.....