At the Sungir site in Russia, around 34,000 years ago, two boys who appear to have had physical impairments were buried head to head, accompanied by more than 10,000 mammoth-ivory beads (each estimated to take about 45 minutes to make), some 300 fox-tooth ornaments, and 16 ivory spears. Researchers Trinkaus and Buzhilova (2018) argue the burial shows the community extended deep respect even to its most vulnerable members — not mere mourning, but deliberate honor. In Greek tradition, a coin was placed in the mouth of the dead to pay the ferryman Charon for passage across the river to the underworld; in Chinese and Korean tradition, paper money is burned so the departed will have currency to use in the afterlife, a custom that continues today. Tending to someone who can never repay you is the first evidence that humanity valued something beyond immediate gain.