Editing Shamanism (section)

===Historical origins===
Shamanic practices may originate as early as the [[Paleolithic]], predating all organized religions,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/clottes/page7.php |title=Shamanism in Prehistory |author=Jean Clottes |access-date=2008-03-11 |work=Bradshaw foundation |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080430093540/http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/clottes/page7.php |archive-date=2008-04-30 }}</ref><ref name=Narr>{{cite encyclopedia |url=http://concise.britannica.com/oscar/print?articleId=109434&fullArticle=true&tocId=52333 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080409074119/http://concise.britannica.com/oscar/print?articleId=109434&fullArticle=true&tocId=52333 |url-status=dead |archive-date=2008-04-09 |author=Karl J. Narr |title=Prehistoric religion |access-date=2008-03-28 |encyclopedia=Britannica online encyclopedia 2008 }}</ref> and certainly as early as the [[Neolithic]] period.<ref name=Narr/> The earliest known undisputed burial of a shaman (and by extension the earliest undisputed evidence of shamans and shamanic practices) dates back to the early [[Upper Paleolithic|Upper Paleolithic era]] (c. 30,000 BP) in what is now the Czech Republic.<ref>Tedlock, Barbara. 2005. The Woman in the Shaman's Body: Reclaiming the Feminine in Religion and Medicine. New York: Bantam</ref>

Sanskrit scholar and comparative mythologist [[Michael Witzel]] proposes that all of the world's mythologies, and also the concepts and practices of shamans, can be traced to the migrations of two prehistoric populations: the "[[Gondwana]]" type (of circa 65,000 years ago) and the "[[Laurasia]]n" type (of circa 40,000 years ago).{{sfn|Witzel|2011}}

In November 2008, researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem announced the discovery of a 12,000-year-old site in [[Pre-history of the Southern Levant|Israel]] that is perceived as one of the earliest-known shaman burials. The elderly woman had been arranged on her side, with her legs apart and folded inward at the knee. Ten large stones were placed on the head, pelvis, and arms. Among her unusual [[grave goods]] were 50 complete tortoise shells, a human foot, and certain body parts from animals such as a cow tail and eagle wings. Other animal remains came from a boar, leopard, and two martens. "It seems that the woman … was perceived as being in a close relationship with these animal spirits", researchers noted. The grave was one of at least 28 graves at the site, located in a cave in lower [[Galilee]] and belonging to the [[Natufian culture]], but is said to be unlike any other among the Epipaleolithic Natufians or in the Paleolithic period.<ref>"Earliest known shaman grave site found: study", reported by [[Reuters]] via [[Yahoo! News]], November 4, 2008, [https://archive.today/20191216202317/https://www.webcitation.org/5c5MCHK7R?url=http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081104/sc_nm/us_shaman_israel/print archived.] see ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences''.</ref>