Bioarchaeology/Skeletal Analysis (Other Keyword)
76-100 (823 Records)
During the Colonial era, numerous "trophy skulls" from various Indo-Pacific cultures entered Western museum and private collections, and continue to be sought as "authentic" collector’s items. However, very little bioarchaeological research exists investigating their provenience, intra-cultural variation in decoration and manufacture, and how examples created for Indigenous ritual use differed from those created for sale to Colonial explorers at the beginning of ‘curio’ trade, let alone what...
Bioarchaeological Ethics and Considerations for the Deceased (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The last few decades have brought changes to archaeology through the establishment of ethics codes, repatriation, and community-based, participatory research. However, established ethical codes are often unfamiliar to researchers and the treatment of human remains continues to be unequal, while scientific justifications for doing bioarchaeological research are...
Bioarchaeological Evidence of Occupational Stress and Specialized Task Activity at Spiro Mounds, Oklahoma (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The archaeological site of Spiro Mounds was a ceremonial complex with an associated village of artisans and priests. Located on the Arkansas River, a tributary of the Mississippi River, the site is situated in a natural corridor between the Southeast, the Plains, and the Southwestern United States. Long considered a quintessential Mississippian site (AD...
Bioarchaeological Insights into Social Resilience and Change during the Postclassic at the Ancient Purépecha City of Angamuco, Michoacán, Mexico (2018)
Little is known about the impact of Purépecha Empire formation on the skeletal health and well being of communities within the core zone of the Lake Pátzcuaro Basin, Michoacán, during the Postclassic period (AD 1000-1500). Here we report on recent bioarchaeological investigation of 19 mortuary contexts from the ancient Purépecha city of Angamuco located within the imperial heartland. We have identified at least seven different mortuary treatments from Angamuco and we compare these contexts with...
A Bioarchaeological Study of a Weaver Mummy from Hualmay, Peru (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 2010, the archaeological research project in the Los Huacos area of Hualmay discovered a funerary bundle that was named "The Weaver of Hualmay". It is believed that it corresponds to an adult woman, since associated with the bundle there was a reed basket filled with spinning tools, needles and cotton, among other items for textile production. The study...
A Bioarchaeological View on Long-Term Development in Prehistoric Central Thailand (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Paradigms Shift: New Interpretations in Mainland Southeast Asian Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeologically, Metal Age sites in northeast and central Thailand exhibit different patterns in site formation, size, and mortuary practice. With geophysical characteristics of each region in mind, these differences have led to an on-going discussion on, for example, the origin of metallurgy and cultigens,...
Bioarchaeology and Bioethos (2019)
This is an abstract from the "The Future of Bioarchaeology in Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The future of bioarchaeology requires a robust sub-disciplinary bioethos. The concept refers to consolidation of a habit that gives rise to moral, normative practices related to exhumation, documentation, analysis, and posthumous treatment of dead bodies. Conversations in bioethics—about consent, anonymity, vulnerable populations, legislation...
Bioarchaeology as Archaeology: Past Practices and Future Prospects (2019)
This is an abstract from the "The Future of Bioarchaeology in Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper reflects on bioarchaeology as archaeology (after Armelagos 2003) by tracing the discipline’s past and identifying current research trends. Bioarchaeology’s roots run deep into the 20th century, but it was only in the late 1970s that it received its name in the U.S. and began to blossom as a discipline. The first generation of...
Bioarchaeology Legacy Collections: Varying Perspectives, Perceptions, and Challenges (2019)
This is an abstract from the ""Re-excavating" Legacy Collections" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Legacy collections can prove quite valuable in research, but may bring with them additional ethical and legal concerns and challenges. Known for the intricate wooden effigy carvings on a mortuary platform above a charnel pond, the site of Fort Center, 8GL13, also contains more than 24 earthworks dating from 800 BCE to 1700 CE. This paper explores the...
The Bioarchaeology of a Ceremonial Depository in the Petexbatun Area of Guatemala (2025)
This is an abstract from the "Black as Night, Dark as Death: Bioarchaeology of the Mesoamerican Subterranean" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Between 1990 and 1993, the Petexbatun Regional Cave Survey investigated more than 20 caves surrounding the site of Dos Pilas, with six caves producing substantial human skeletal assemblages. This presentation focuses on Cueva de los Quetzales, the only one of the six not directly associated with Dos Pilas....
Bioarchaeology of Care in Three San Francisco Bay Area Muwekma Ohlone Ancestral Sites (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This presentation applies Tilley and Cameron’s 2014 Index of Care to the mortuary population of three ancestral Muwekma Ohlone sites that were excavated in the San Francisco Bay Area between 2016- 2022 (CA-ALA-565/H, CA-ALA-677/H, and CA-ALA-704/H). These sites include the remains of 147 individuals dating between approximately 2200-110 cal BP. This...
Bioarchaeology of Care of Fishing Community at Tzintzuntzan, Western Mexico: A Multimethod Approach (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Tzintzuntzan, Capital of the Tarascan Empire: New Perspectives" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Otitis and mastoiditis are conditions that produce deafness and disability in the pre-antibiotic era, especially in the fishing community. This study describes lesions on temporal bones in the Western Culture from Mexico living near Lake Pátzcuaro, Michoacán. A sample (n = 41) of temporal bones from Tzintzuntzan sites was...
The Bioarchaeology of Diversity: A Case Study in the Roman Empire (2018)
This poster presents a new project to explore migration—the geographic movement of people—and diversity—the intersection of different types of people—in imperial Rome. In Bioanthropology, migration is often perceived in oversimplified terms. Researchers seek to determine if an individual or group migrated, and when in their lifetime this occurred. Furthermore, many scholars treat diversity in equally simplified terms. Traditionally, individuals are assigned to an ancestral population of "best...
The Bioarchaeology of Greater Chiriquí: Challenges, Finds, and Future Directions (2018)
Greater Chiriquí, the pre-Columbian cultural sphere encompassing western Panama and southern Costa Rica, has been subjected to intense looting activities since the mid-19th century. Nevertheless, archaeological exploration of the area to date has successfully contextualized the nature and transitions of non-perishable material culture. However, organic remains rarely survive in funerary contexts due to the high acidity of the soil, high humidity, and high precipitation in this region. Human...
Bioarchaeology of Imperial Relations: Chanka and Inca Interactions at Sondor (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. An empire expanding into a previously established community can have significant impacts on the identity and culture of the conquered, depending on the negotiations set into place between the invaders and native communities. A prominent example of these negotiations of imperial control occurred in the prehistoric highlands when the Inca rose to power...
The Bioarchaeology of La Corona, Guatemala (2018)
Analysis of human skeletal remains has made significant contributions to the understanding of the history of La Corona and its interaction with the wider Maya world. The skeletal sample has now grown to include nearly thirty individuals, and includes single and multiples burials, non-burial deposits, and individuals from the site center and outlying sites. The study, one of the most comprehensive in northwest Peten, has focused on establishing demographic information and examining osteological...
Bioarchaeology of Madness: A biocultural perspective on transgression, strangeness, folly, and delirium in the past (2019)
This is an abstract from the "The Future of Bioarchaeology in Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The invention of the Ospedale (hospital) in fourteenth-century Italy marked a turning point in human relations. The othering process of medicalization began as an attempt to provide respite for incurable strangeness, delirium, or transgressive and foolish behavior, particularly for those without family to care for them. The disordered mind...
Bioarchaeology of Postclassic West Mexico: A Research Framework and Preliminary Results (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Over the past three millennia, West Mexico’s complex cultural developments and social transformations have characterized it as a unique entity pivotal in the histories of population admixture and cultural transmission, producing long-lasting effects still evident in Mesoamerica. During the Early to Middle Postclassic periods (850/900–1350s CE), polities in...
Bioarchaeology of the Little Bear Creek Site: New Insights into Health, Violence, Mortuary Behavior, and Identity in Prehistoric North Alabama (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Although many prehistoric shell burial mound sites within the Pickwick Basin of the Tennessee River Valley of Alabama have been the subject of extensive archaeological and osteological analyses, The Little Bear Creek Site (1CT8) was excluded from such modern study until recently. However, the most recent skeletal inventory of the site revealed high levels of...
Bioarchaeology of the Mongol Empire (2025)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2025: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Mongol Empire of the thirteenth to fourteenth centuries was a time of great interconnectedness, characterized by the widespread movement of people, goods, technologies, and practices across Eurasia. Our knowledge of this period comes from a variety of sources, including texts, a rich array of material culture, and archaeological investigations of...
A Bioarcheological Study of a Trepanation Case with Special Reference to the Medical Care System during the Western Zhou Dynasty China (1045–771 BCE) (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Therapeutic craniotomy is a kind of artificial trepanation used for treating head injuries. In this study, a skull with signs of trauma and trepanation from a young adult female who lived 3,000 years ago was assessed in the context of medical care systems and a policy of benevolence during the time. A blunt force assault on the left temporal bone induced a...
Bioarqueología del cuidado en Maltrata, Veracruz, México: El caso de las enfermedades treponémicas en la infancia. (2025)
This is an abstract from the "(De)Pathologizing the Past: New Perspectives on Intervention and Modification as Care in the Americas" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this work, we propose to know the type of care received by a girl between eight and ten years of age, who suffered from possible congenital syphilis in the chronic stage in the pre-Hispanic population of the Maltrata valley. To do this, we are based on the postulates of the...
Biocultural Analysis of Atypical Mortuary Pattern Symbolism in Three Medieval Transylvanian Millstone Burials (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Unusual treatments of the dead frequently merit extensive archaeological attention as they provide windows on a society’s concepts of personhood, use and manipulation of symbolic representations, and cosmology. In this work, we examine the use of millstones placed atop funerary contexts at the Papdomb site located in Văleni, Romania (A.D. 1100-1800). The site...
A Biocultural Analysis of the Impacts of Interactions between West Africans and Europeans during the Transatlantic Trade at Elmina, Ghana (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This project utilizes a biocultural approach to assess the demographics and health of the West African population from Elmina, Ghana. Elmina, selected by the Portuguese in 1482 as the site of the first European trade fort in sub-Saharan Africa, grew from a small coastal fishing village to a large settlement over the course of more than 400 years. This...
Biodistance Comparisons for the Chimú-Era (AD 1000–1450) Child Sacrificial Remains from Pampa la Cruz, Huanchaco, North Coast of Peru: A Preliminary Report (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Here we report dentally derived biodistance results for 120 Chimú-era (AD 1000–1450) children from three of six temporally discrete sacrificial events—specifically events 1, 4, and 5, at Pampa la Cruz (PLC), Huanchaco, Perú, which we compare with a late Chimú-Inka affiliated skeletal sample (n = 44) from the nearby cemetery at Iglesia Colonial, Huanchaco,...