Death as part of life is always accompanied makkinney. Since ancient times, in the form of the teeth of predators and natural disasters, and in more recent times.

Primitive makkinney every day met with the dangers of the outside world, so they were ready to meet her. This does not mean that they were not afraid to die, on the contrary, these small creatures want to live and love life. But the harsh environment did not allow to forget about their vulnerability and that they are all mortal.

Most then die from the teeth and claws of predators, many have been swallowed whole, others died from disease and accidents. If makkinney died, all in the settlement was going to for conducting postmortem rituals.
Usually a dead body decapitated. The corpse was left away from the settlements, due to the dead because his flesh can pacify briefly nearest predators.

The head is considered the seat of the soul and mind. It was believed that the spirit of the deceased for some time will be next to his former receptacle of, and therefore relatives left the skull of the deceased, to talk to him and say the last word.
Skulls were processed: first, head ritually burned (often putting on them posthumous wooden masks), and then treated with various compounds for better safety. Have information that some tribes are not burned the head, and was boiled it in the hot springs.

The skulls of ancestors played an important role in the beliefs about death and life of the ancient makkinney. The skull was communication with the spirit of an ancestor with which they can communicate and ask for advice. In addition, the skull allowed the souls of ancestors remain near their home, and not to leave with Ronata.

Ronata - the spirit of death. Appeared as in the form of a large shadowy or glowing figure of makkinney with wings. In some tribes through the light stood out outlines of the skull or even depicted a skull instead of a head.
Ronata was not responsible for the death as such - makkinney does not give it the right to take away life, he appeared as a conductor between the dead and the living, which protects the souls of dead and allows them to be reborn again in the newborn.

In later periods of development when makkinney began to build stone houses and rings of high walls, skulls of their ancestors began to decorate the gates of the city, as a reminder for outgoing in external world creatures of the proximity of death. Makkinney asked the ancestors for protect and that to get back alive to their home.
While the number of deaths from predators and disease was gradually reduced, were built underground catacombs, which kept the skull of ancestors. Each family usually had his own tomb, but, given the close family ties of makkinney, it does not play a critical role, so the entrance to the catacombs was free and everyone can find the skull of one of his ancestors and talk to him.

With the growth of the technical and cultural level, makkinney stopped providing the bodies of their dead relatives as a gift for predators, and began to burn the body on the funeral pyres. Gradually, the cult of ancestors, with which contact symbolized skull, began to weaken. Although many continue to ask to leave the skull of the deceased, many prefer full makkinney cremation ritual to dispel the chaff of the warm spring wind.

Gradually real skull in architecture superseded them stylized analogues of metal and stone, but makkinney still use this symbol of death in the city walls and thematic subjects, not giving yourself forget that they are mortal.

Used damn machine translator.