Hmmm... a couple of times I have found what appeared to be two headstones for a villager, one an Elder and one not. In the past I thought I had perhaps two villagers with the same name, as often happens, and I'd forgotten somehow about one of them. Perhaps those were in fact instances of the bug. What do the stats say about the number of Elders? Do they agree with the number of totems you have?
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To err is human; to arr is pirate.