The Saxe–Goldstein hypothesis is a prediction in archaeology about the relationship between a society's funerary practices and its social organization. It predicts a correlation between two phenomena: the use of specific areas to dispose of the dead, and the legitimation of control over restricted resources through claims of descent from dead ancestors. The hypothesis was first formulated by the anthropologist Arthur Saxe in 1970 and was later refined by Lynne Goldstein. Saxe predicted that societies would be more likely to use formal areas for the disposal of the dead, such as cemeteries, if they contained social groups that legitimized their claims to important, restricted resources by claiming ties to ancestors. The Saxe–Goldstein hypothesis was credited with revitalizing interest in funerary archaeology. It was particularly adopted by adherents of processual archaeology, a body of theory that sought to bring archaeology closer to the natural sciences. From the 1980s, it increasingly fell from favor, and was criticized by post-processual archaeologists as an overgeneralization that oversimplified the different factors that influence funerary practices. (Full article...)