Abstract The presence of sacred space and the preservation of heirlooms has been identified in archaeological works of many cultures, historic and prehistoric, ancient and modern. Research has also identified psychosocial processes linking the older American to home-place. This paper examines the common occurrence of sacra as heirlooms and their features as articles of incorporation of the living elder American with living and deceased family members and history. Identified are commonalties in the processes of the sacraliza-tion of ordinary objects and the totemic qualities of these sacra in marking membership, status, social roles and family-claimed talents. In a sense these sacralized objects come to be regarded as having a blood relationship to a specific family group. Postulated for further study is the metonymic properties of the sacra and the tremenos as adjunctive to health maintenance through their function in status and identity definition in socially marginalized elders.