ancient DNA (Other Keyword)
126-150 (239 Records)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Paquimé, located in the Casas Grandes region of Northern Mexico, presents a rich cultural tradition with ties to populations to the South and North. Ancient mitochondrial DNA from Paquime’s occupants has not provided evidence of large-scale in-migration that led to the fluorescence of the site, as some scholars have hypothesized. This paper focuses on...
The Genomic Formation of Central and South Asia (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Ancient DNA in Service of Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper serves as an example of how ancient DNA (aDNA) data can provide new insight into large-scale population transformations of archaeological cultures. The details of population transformation through time in Central and South Asia have been unclear due to the lack of aDNA. To address this gap, we generated genome-wide data from 500 ancient...
Ghost of the Navigator: Tracking Initial Human Population Dispersal to the Palauan Archipelago (2016)
While Micronesia was one of the last geographical areas to be colonized by humans prehistorically, the timing, direction, and origins of initial settlement in many ways still remains unclear. The Chelechol ra Orrak site in Palau, which contains the oldest known human remains in Micronesia, (dating back to at least 2800 BP)—and that is one of only two burial sites in the Pacific Islands to pre-date 2500 BP —provides an excellent opportunity for direct study of population dispersals into the...
Hidden Hybrids: Camels and Cultural Blending in Ancient Near East (WGF - Dissertation Fieldwork Grant) (2017)
This resource is an application for the Dissertation Fieldwork Grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation. Two species from different domestication centres – the Bactrian camel from central Asia and the Dromedary from Arabia – were deliberately brought together and bred to create new, more powerful, animals. Larger than both parents and double the strength of its contributory species, the hybrid camel was the world’s first engineered hybrid transportation. Creating the hybrid camel required...
HistoGenes: Integrating genetic, archaeological and historical perspectives on Eastern Central Europe of the 1st millennium CE (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. I will present the ERC-sponsored project HistoGenes, an interdisciplinary project that engages archaeologists, geneticists, anthropologists, and historians in a fine-grained analysis of more than 6,000 burials in the Carpathian Basin between 400 and 900 CE in order to understand population changes, mobility, social structures, and cultural practices in...
Historic Genome from the First Baptist Church on Nassau Street: Reflections on Process and Product (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Individuals Known and Unknown: Case Studies from Two Burial Contexts at Colonial Williamsburg" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Community members, stakeholders, and congregation members expressed interest in pursuing DNA testing of the Ancestral Individuals from the Historic First Baptist Church. In collaboration with the Let Freedom Ring! Foundation, successive community engagement meetings were held to explain the...
Homenaje a Clavos: Reflections on My and Other's Use of the Work of Charles Standish (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Thinking Big in the Andes: Papers in Honor of Charles Stanish" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this talk, I reflect on the work of Charles Vandalay Stanish, and how his work has been imported and exported by scholars around the world. I focus in particular on how I have utilized Chip's obra in my own life.
How to Choose Samples for aDNA: Bioarchaeological Best Practices for Sampling Human Remains (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Ancient DNA in Service of Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Recent methodological advances have rapidly increased the pace and scale of ancient DNA (aDNA) studies, prompting widespread sampling in museum collections and raising ethical concerns about inter-lab competition, treatment of human remains, and the research questions being addressed. Another key issue is selection of material that will be destroyed...
Identifying Seventeenth-Century Africans and High-Status Englishmen at Jamestown, Virginia (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Increasing the Accessibility of Ancient DNA within Archaeology" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Emerging investigative techniques and access to reference skeletal series and comparative databases allow enhanced interpretation and recognition of individuals in the seventeenth-century Chesapeake region for which few documentary sources or identifying artifacts exist. As part of a pilot study of burials from Jamestown,...
The Impact of Climate Dynamics and Cultural Change on the Demography and Population Structure of Pre-Columbian Populations in the Atacama (2017)
Archaeological studies in the Central Andes have pointed at the temporal coincidence of climatic fluctuations and episodes of cultural transition throughout the pre-Columbian period. Although most scholars explain the connection between environmental and cultural changes by the impact of climatic alterations on the capacities of the ecosystems inhabited by pre-Columbian cultures, direct evidence for assumed demographic consequences has been missing so far. Desert margin areas, as we find them at...
Imperial Impact: Population Dynamics and Political Landscapes of Inner Asia under the First Steppe Empire (2023)
This is an abstract from the "From the Altai to the Arctic: New Results and New Directions in the Archaeology of North and Inner Asia" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper integrates survey, mortuary, and genetic research into a multidisciplinary and multiscalar consideration of the impact that large political regimes like empires have on the social landscapes of individual communities and whole regions. In the case of the first steppe empire...
Importation of Salted Atlantic Cod (Gadus morhua) into San Francisco, California during the Gold Rush-Era (ca. 1849-1855) (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Records from the Gold Rush San Francisco Bay Area indicate that food items were imported to offset the depletion of once abundant wild food sources. Fish were a large part of human diets during the Gold Rush, and while we know that Pacific cod (Gadus macrocephalus) were fished later in the 19th century, it is unclear whether they were fished during the Gold...
Improving Radiocarbon Dating with Ancient DNA Analysis (2017)
Recent advances in ancient DNA (aDNA) analysis have helped to shed new light on long-standing archaeological questions. Researchers can now study how elites and commoners may have been genetically related, the genetic heritage of the first migrants to a particular area, how ancient populations are related to modern groups, and more. While such revelations have been of critical importance to archaeology, results from recent analyses have implicated that ancient DNA analyses can also be applied to...
In Support of a Holistic Approach to Bioarchaeology: The Distribution of Bacterial Genera by Presence of Material Culture in the Milwaukee County Poor Farm Cemetery (2024)
This is an abstract from the "There and Back Again: Celebrating the Career and Ongoing Contributions of Patricia B. Richards" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Complicating the narrative of the traditional poor farm cemetery, the work of Patricia B. Richards has led to a more humanistic approach to interpreting archaeological data. This study presents oral microbiome data from twenty-five female individuals from the Milwaukee County Poor Farm...
Inferences about Class Structure from Burial Form and Mitochondrial DNA Relationships at Tall Šēḫ Ḥamad, Syria (2018)
The Roman/Parthian period (200 BCE - 300 CE) at the site of Tall Šēḫ Ḥamad, Syria existed during a period in the region characterized by political instability and military movement. This "borderland," existing at the extremities of both empires, created a unique sphere of potential interactions both on the individual level and broader scale. A cemetery from this period shows four distinct burial forms (mud-brick graves, earthen graves, amphora graves and clay sarcophagi). In an effort to better...
The Influence of Diet on the Ancient Dog Gut Microbiome (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Coprolites are recognized as an important source of archaeological data; they contain biological remains from the organism’s diet, as well as genetic material from microorganisms, dietary components, and the host. Modern studies have shown that the gut microbiome reflects dietary trends; as microbial remains are also present in coprolites, these provide...
Integrating Grapevine Palaeogenomics with Archaeobotanical Methods to Explore the History of Winemaking (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Increasing the Accessibility of Ancient DNA within Archaeology" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Genomic analyses of archaeological seeds and other plant remains are playing an increasingly important role in unravelling domestication histories. In some cases, these findings are revising longstanding interpretations developed from archaeobotanical methods, and questions remain on how archaeological and genomic methods...
The Integrity of Biomolecules across the Oral Matrix from Histria, Romania (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During the Archaic period (seventh century–sixth century BCE), Greek colonists from Miletus founded the city of Histria. Located near the mouth of the Danube, this urban center experienced 13 centuries of environmental and demographic changes. Archaeological investigations over the past century have yielded a rich skeletal collection that is housed in the Fr....
Introducing The Ancient Maya Kinship Project Consultation, Engagement, and Outreach Program (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. New archaeological aDNA approaches have the potential to dramatically change our understanding of the ancient Maya but it is important that living Maya people are aware of the research, provide their thoughts and input, and give their consent given the involvement of ancestral human remains. This poster presents the ongoing interview based consultation...
Investigating Genetic Structure and Dietary Ecology through Ancient DNA and Stable Isotopic Analysis of Prehistoric Dogs from San Nicolas Island, California (2015)
The study of prehistoric dogs has become a global trend. Not only did they fulfill a variety of roles and were an important part of past human societies, but they can be used to understand human-modified environments and human movement. On the California Channel Islands the domestic dog has been shown to be a significant component of the archaeological record. Dogs are uncovered in a variety of cultural contexts and their presence on the islands dates to the middle Holocene. Despite their...
Investigating the Sex Selectivity of Middle Iroquoian Salmonid Fisheries through Ancient DNA Analysis (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Lake Ontario once supported large populations of Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) and lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush). However, by the mid-19th century populations of these salmonid species had collapsed as a result of overharvesting and habitat alteration by European settlers. Prior to this collapse, it has been hypothesized Indigenous peoples were able to...
Isotopic and Paleogenomic Evidence of Maya Persistence at Late Postclassic and Early Colonial Chactemal (Santa Rita Corozal), Belize. (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Santa Rita Corozal, hereafter known as Chactemal, is a Maya site located in what is now northern Belize on the coast of Chetumal Bay. Chactemal was home to some of the earliest known Maya peoples in northern Belize during the Middle Preclassic (~800-300 BCE), was continuously occupied throughout all subsequent phases of Maya chronology, grew to become an...
Kiva B Internments at the Mine Canyon Site, New Mexico: a bioarchaeology and ancient DNA approach (2016)
Excavations at the Mine Canyon site, a PIII Chaco outlier near Farmington, New Mexico, revealed a cluster of thirteen individuals interred within Kiva B. Ancient DNA analysis of the individuals from the site demonstrated that six of the Kiva B internments belonged to the same derived form of Haplogroup A, suggesting a matrilineal relationship. Recent analysis of their burial positions suggests the Kiva B individuals are distinct from others at the site, further supported by a lack of grave...
Lauricocha v2.0: Ancient highlanders grant new insights into the pre-Columbian population history of South America (2015)
The Lauricocha caves in Peru were the first known evidence for an Early Holocene presence of humans in the high altitude Andes. However, critical examination of the excavation reports cast doubts on the status and significance of Lauricocha in the archaeological record of South America. Here, we present a thorough revision of site including new radiocarbon dates, as well as morphological, craniometric, and genome-wide genetic data obtained from the human remains found at the site. Our results...
Leveraging DNA Capabilities for Lithic Analysis: Experimental Results and Best Practices (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Old Technology, New Methodology" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper outlines the results of a multipart experiment in obtaining DNA deposited on lithics to address questions regarding localized resource use. Previous publications hypothesize that DNA molecules can be preserved in microcracks in lithics and suggest that questions regarding resource exploitation can be addressed with lithics. The goal of this...