Physical Anthropology

This is the second volume reporting on our research project entitled "The Origins of the Civilization of Angkor". In 1992, when one of us (RT) was appointed to the Phimai office of the Fine Arts Department, we resolved to consider the enigma presented by the many large, moated ...

The re-examination of human remains from Asine is part of the MH Argolid Project (www.MHArgolid.nl). Preliminary results from examination of dental remains will be presented here. The MH graves at Barbouna and the East cemetery were excavated by the Swedish archaeologists in 1970’s and in 1989 and most skeletons were examined by J. L. Angel. Since Angel’s report was concentrated on osteometric variation and bone pathology, only a mean figure for “lesions per mouth” was stated. Apart from being useful in age determinations, teeth and jaws can provide information about living conditions, disease prevalence, dietary and cultural behaviour of prehistoric populations. Enamel defects (ED) reveal information about metabolic stress suffered by the individual during tooth development. Caries and ante mortem tooth loss (AMTL) are generally indicative of diet composition and oral hygiene after tooth eruption.

In this pilot study, stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes from bone collagen and apatite of skeletons from the 11th and 12th century cemetery in Giecz, Poland are interpreted. Isotope values from a small number of fish and animal bones from the same archaeological site are also examined. The goal of this research is to provide preliminary evidence of diet for a group of medieval Polish peasants, with particular emphasis on sex-based differences in diet. Results of isotope analyses suggest diet of this early medieval population was omnivorous and terrestrial-based. Fish bones sampled exhibit low d13C ratios, and in half of the cases are significantly enriched in 15N, indicating they are freshwater species. Human bones do not reflect these signatures, suggesting freshwater fish were not a significant source of dietary protein at Giecz. The 13Ccoll from some human bones is enriched beyond what might be expected from an exclusively C3 diet. Associated mammal bones do not exhibit similarly elevated d13Ccoll ratios, suggesting enrichment among humans is not due to consumption of animals foddered on C4 plants. Two possible sources of 13Ccoll enrichment are marine fish in diet and direct consumption of a C4 plant, such as millet. The d13C values obtained from bone apatite of a small subset of humans suggest that millet contributes to 13Ccoll enrichment, although at least three individuals may have also consumed small amounts of marine fish. Sex-based differences in d15N ratios indicate that men consumed relatively more animal products (meat or dairy) than did women. There is also a correlation between d13Ccoll and d15N values in skeletons of men that is absent in women. These carbon and nitrogen isotope data are the first reported for any Polish population and contribute to a more complete picture of dietary adaptation and social organization in medieval Europe.

"The extinction of large-bodied taxa from the Pleistocene in Southeast Asia is examined. Although the chronological resolution of these extinctions is poor, and number of excavations in the region relatively few, broad characteristics of these extinctions can be
described. Many taxa which became extinct appear to have been endemic to regions within Southeast Asia, while some taxa which experienced extinction or severe range reduction occurred in several regions. Members of the latter group include proboscideans (Stegodon and Palaeloxodon), the pygmy hippopotamus  Hexaprotodon), the orangutan (Pongo), hyenas (Crocuta and Hyaena), the giant panda (Ailuropoda), tapirs (Tapirus and Megatapirus), rhinoceroses (Rhinoceros), and the giant Asian ape Gigantopithecus. The loss of these species cannot be assigned to a single cause. Rather their disappearance is likely tied to both climatic
and human agents. Unlike other regions which experienced megafauna extinctions, eustatic changes in sea level in Southeast Asia seems to have been an important factor."

We have carried out a comprehensive ESR and U-series dating study on the Lake Mungo 3 (LM3) human skeleton. The isotopic Th/U and Pa/U ratios indicate that some minor uranium mobilization may have occurred in the past. Taking such effects into account, the best age estimate for the human skeleton is obtained through the combination of U-series and ESR analyses yielding 62,000±6000 years. This age is in close agreement with OSL age estimates on the sediment into which the skeleton was buried of 61,000±2000 years. Furthermore, we obtained a U-series age of 81,000±21,000 years for the calcitic matrix that was precipitated on the bones after burial. All age results are considerably older than the previously assumed age of LM3 and demonstrate the necessity for directly dating hominid remains. We conclude that the Lake Mungo 3 burial documents the earliest known human presence on the Australian continent. The age implies that people who were skeletally within the range of the present Australian indigenous population colonized the continent during or before oxygen isotope stage 4 (57,000–71,000 years).

Archaeologists have often taken it for granted that death is a taboo topic in modern society. However, the fear of death hypothesis is contested within the social sciences, so does it still follow that the display of the ancient dead is in some way shameful or unacceptable? In this paper it is argued that death is not taboo and that modern death scholars use archaeological source material as a way to understand the subtlety of the human experience. Funerary archaeology is not a dangerous topic; rather it makes a very real and valuable contribution to modern society, providing one of the few ways that people can experience a corpse and so explore their own mortality and with it their place within the larger human story.

The present study addresses two primary questions: 1) how reliably can sex be estimated using measurements of the cranial base and the atlanto-axial complex? and 2) how do age-related changes affect this reliability?.  In addressing these questions, two previous studies, Holland's (1985) analysis of the occipital bone and Marino's (1993) analysis of the first cervical vertebra, are examined.
    A White sample consisting of 409 skeletal remains, divided into four age groups (i.e., 20-34 years of age, 35-49 years of age, 50-64 years of age, and 65-79 years of age), from the Hamann-Todd and Terry collections was utilized in the present study.  Ten dimensions of the occipital bone and eight dimensions of the first cervical vertebra were measured on each specimen.  Eight dimensions of the second cervical vertebra were measured on 100 females and 100 males only.
    The results of this study demonstrate that the occipital bone exhibits no significant age related changes, but age-related changes are observable in the inferior facet breadth and maximum fovea breadth of the first cervical vertebra.  Also, the dimensions of the second cervical vertebra are more reliable at discriminating sex than dimensions of the occipital bone and first cervical vertebra in Whites.  Dimensions of the occipital are the least accurate.

"Determining the ancestry of unidentified human remains is a major task for bioarchaeologists and forensic anthropologists. Here, we report an assessment of the computer program that has become the main tool for accomplishing this task. Called FORDISC, the program determines ancestry through discriminant function analysis of cranial measurements. We evaluated the utility of FORDISC with 200 specimens of known ancestry. We ran the analyses with and without the test specimen’s source population included in the program’s reference sample, and with and without specifying the sex of the test specimen. We also controlled for the possibility that the number of variables employed affects the program’s ability to attribute ancestry. The results of the analyses suggest that FORDISC’s utility in research and medico-legal contexts is limited. FORDISC will only return a correct ancestry attribution when an unidentified specimen is more or less complete, and belongs to one of the populations represented in the program’s reference samples. Even then FORDISC can be expected to classify no more than 1 per cent of specimens
with confidence."

Temporal bone shape has been shown to reflect molecular phylogenetic relationships among hominoids and offers significant morphological detail for distinguishing taxa. Although it is generally accepted that temporal bone shape, like other aspects of morphology, has an underlying genetic component, the relative influence of genetic and environmental factors is unclear. To determine the impact of genetic differentiation and environmental variation on temporal bone morphology, we used threedimensional geometric morphometric techniques to evaluate temporal bone variation in 11 modern human populations. Population differences were investigated by Discriminant function analysis, and the strength of the relationships between morphology, neutral molecular distance, geographic distribution, and environmental variables were assessed by matrix correlation comparisons. Significant differences were found in temporal bone shape among all populations, and classification rates using cross-validation were relatively high. Comparisons of morphological distances to molecular distances based on short tandem repeats (STRs) revealed a significant correlation between temporal bone shape and neutral molecular distance among Old World populations, but not when Native Americans were included. Further analyses suggested a similar pattern for morphological variation and geographic distribution. No significant correlations were found between temporal bone shape and environmental variables: temperature, annual rainfall, latitude, or altitude. Significant correlations were found between temporal bone size and both temperature and latitude, presumably reflecting Bergmann’s rule. Thus, temporal bone morphology appears to partially follow an isolation by distance model of evolution among human populations, although levels of correlation show that a substantial component of variation is unexplained by factors considered here.

This paper presents the preliminary results obtained from morphoscopic analysis of the remains of an ossuary found in La Quemada, Zacatecas. Through this analysis we could detect ritual and ceremonial practices performed in individuals deposited in a pit as an ossuary. This information can contribute to a better understanding of ancient individuals from the north of Mesoamerica

"Recently two research teams have made use of the relative length of the 2nd (index) to 4th (ring) digit ratio or 2D:4D to sex hands represented in cave art. There are currently two articles addressing this; a published news item (Chazine & Noury 2006) and a journal article (Snow 2006). Here we comment on the news item by Jean-Michel Chazine and Arnaud Noury that considers their preliminary results for determining sexual identity of hand stencils from Gua Masri II Cave, East Kalimantan in Borneo dated at over 9,900 years BP.

Publsihed in Before Farming (on-line version), 2006/1. Article 6:1-7"

This study proposes a new way to use metatarsals to identify locomotor behavior of fossil hominins. Metatarsal head articular dimensions and diaphyseal strength in a sample of chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and humans (n = 76) are used to explore the relationships of these parameters with different locomotor modes. Results show that ratios between metatarsal head articular proportions and diaphyseal strength of the hallucal and fifth metatarsal discriminate among extant great apes and humans based on their different locomotor modes. In particular, the hallucal and fifth metatarsal characteristics of humans are functionally related to the different ranges of motion and load patterns during stance phase in the forefoot of humans in bipedal locomotion. This method may be applicable to isolated fossil hominin metatarsals to provide new information relevant to debates regarding the evolution of human bipedal locomotion. The second to fourth metatarsals are not useful in distinguishing among hominoids. Further studies should concentrate on measuring other important qualitative and quantitative differences in the shape of the metatarsal head of hominoids that are not reflected in simple geometric reconstructions of
the articulation, and gathering more forefoot kinematic data on great apes to better understand differences in range of motion and loading patterns of the metatarsals.

"This paper reports on a case of massive
hyperostotic alterations observed in the skeleton of an
adult woman from the necropolis of Montescaglioso Belvedere
(Basilicata, Southern Italy) attributed to the Enotrian
culture and dated to the 6th century BC. Hyperostotic
changes involve joints, the vertebral column, and the
lower limbs. In particular, the large flowing ossification in
both the thoracic (T6–T10) and lumbar (L2–L5) tracts, the
sacralization of L5, accompanied by sacroiliac fusion on
the left side, and the proliferative bone production on both
the metaphyseal portion of the left tibia and the left third
metatarsal are described. The vertebral antero-lateral ossification and the sacroiliac fusion support a diagnosis of
diffuse idiopathic skeletal hyperostosis (DISH), while the
flowing bone formation on the lower limbs supports a
diagnosis of melorheostosis. The pathological conditions
described here were already described in the literature,
but this is the first reported case of the coexistence of
DISH and the very rare melorheostosis. Furthermore, the
skeleton from Montescaglioso Belvedere represents the
first case of this disease described for ancient Europe,
therefore adding a valuable contribution to the reconstruction
of the antiquity and distribution of skeletal dysplasias."

The contact of inland and coastal prehistoric groups in Brazil is believed to have been restricted to regions with no geographical barrier, involving the Southeast. The only inland osteological collection from this region derives from the riverine shellmound Moraes (5800-4500yBP). Although there are cultural similarities between riverine and coastal shellmounds there are important, ecological site distribution differences are expected to impact on lifestyle. The purpose of this study is to document and interpret health and lifestyle indicators in Moraes in comparison to coastal  shellmound groups.  More specifically we test if the people from Moraes show a)higher caries rates and lower frequencies of  b)auditory exostoses as well as c)communicable infectious diseases than coastal dwellers.
Of the three hypothesis a)was confirmed, b)was rejected and c)was partly rejected. Caries frequency is indeed high suggesting cariogenic diet, but auditory exostoses are unexpectedly high whereas the single evidence of treponematosis may point to higher demographic densities or contact with groups living in conditions where treponemes could thrive.
Bioanthropological similarities between Moraes and coastal shellmounds include auditory exostosis with equally high frequencies; significantly more frequent osteoarthrosis in upper than in lower limbs; cranial and dental morphological affinities and low frequencies of violent trauma.  However, there are also important differences: Moraes subsisted on a much broader protein diet and consumed more cariogenic food, but showed a stature even smaller than the coastal groups. Thus, despite the suggested contact there was time enough for the people at the riverine site to adapt to local conditions.

Dental microwear and dental pathology in Bronze Age in Alella (Barcelona) In 1947, a Bronze Age necropolis was discovered in “Mar i Munyanya”, located in Alella village (El Maresme, Barcelona). Since now, only 33 remains have been well preserved, mainly belonging to mandibles, maxilla and neurocranium. The present work has been focused in recovered teeth, principally in dental pathology from the same period, and dental microwear pattern in comparison to other human populations. Results show a similar prevalence in several dental pathologies between all these populations, including “Mar i Muntanya”, and dental microwear pattern indicate that this population may had a more abrasive diet than modern hunter-gatherer populations, and similar to other Bronze-Age populations. Key words: dental microwear, Bronze Age, SEM, feeding ecology

Historically, the Assiniboine are thought to have split from the Yanktonai Sioux some time around the early part of the 17th century, but this view has been challenged by some linguists, archaeologists, and skeletal biologists.  The purpose of this paper is to examine the population structure of the Sioux and Assiniboine as reflected in six head and six body anthropometric dimensions, and investigate the hypothesis that the Assiniboine diverged relatively recently from the Yanktonai Sioux.
  For both males and females there is an overall significant division effect, and the Fst value indicates a fair amount of differentiation among these closely related groups.  The Assiniboine are clearly distinct from all three Sioux divisions.  The Assiniboine also exhibit a higher within-group phenotypic variance than expected, indicating their differentiation is due to time and gene flow from outside groups.  Among the Sioux divisions, the Santee and Yankton-Yanktonai are the most similar, especially in head and face dimensions.
  The results of this study do not support the historical account of Assiniboine origins.  The high degree of differentiation between the Yanktonai and Assiniboine suggests a much more distant split between the Assiniboine and Sioux than has been traditionally put forth.

The second cervical vertebra can be used to estimate sex with 83% accuracy in unidentified human skeletal remains. Reported here are the necessary statistics, based on 8 dimensions taken on 400 second cervical vertebrae, for the computation of customized discriminant functions. Discriminant function equations developed using variable selected in a stepwise procedure are also presented here as an example of the usefullness of this bone in estimating sex.

Sex and race variation of the occipital bone has been previously investigated, but particular examination of the effect of age and ancestry on sexual dimorphism has not been addressed.  This paper examines morphological variation associated with sex and ancestry in the condylar region of the occipital bone, and the effect of age and ancestry on the estimation of sex.  Models previously published by Holland (1, 2) are also tested, and methodological problems are addressed.  The results indicate that age does not have an effect on sexual dimorphism, but that whites exhibit greater, although not significantly, more sexual dimorphism than blacks. Significant sex and ancestry variation is present in the condylar region of the occipital bone, but neither sex nor ancestry could be estimated accurately using measurements of this anatomical region defined by Holland (1,2).

Differentiating between perimortem and postmortem skeletal injuries is a critical, but often extremely difficult, task for forensic anthropologists. Sixty porcine long bones were exposed to natural taphonomic conditions and fractured every 28 days throughout a 141 day period. Differences between macroscopic blunt force trauma fracture characteristics were documented and examined to determine if they varied over time.  Changes in fracture characteristics were also examined in relationship to bone moisture content – measured by percent ash weight. There is a significant relationship between 1) postmortem interval and percent ash weight, fracture surface, and fracture angle and 2) the percent ash weight and fracture surface and fracture angle. Bone moisture content correlates significantly with fracture morphology and other characteristics commonly used by forensic anthropologists to determine the timing of traumatic injuries. However, fracture characteristics normally associated with perimortem trauma can persist long into the postmortem interval.

Age-at-death estimation of an individual skeleton is important  to forensic and biological anthropologists for identification and demographic analysis, but it has been shown that the current aging methods are often unreliable because of skeletal variation and taphonomic factors. Multifactorial methods have been shown to produce better results when determining age-at-death than single indicator methods. However, ultifactorial methods are difficult to apply to single or poorly preserved skeletons, and they rarely provide the investigator with information about the reliability of the estimate. The goal of this research is to examine the validity of the Sugeno fuzzy integral as a multifactorial method for modeling age-at-death of an individual skeleton. This approach is novel because it produces an informed decision of age-at-death utilizing multiple age indicators while also taking into consideration the accuracies of the methods and the condition of the bone being examined. Additionally, the Sugeno fuzzy integral does not require the use of a population and it qualitatively produces easily interpreted graphical results. Examples are presented applying three commonly used aging methods on a known-age skeletal sample from the Terry Anatomical Collection. This method produces results that are more accurate and with smaller intervals than single indicator methods.

For over twenty years, the young, male Homo erectus specimen KNM-WT 15000 has been the focus of studies on growth and development, locomotion, size, sexual dimorphism, skeletal morphology, and encephalization, often serving as the standard for his species. Prior research on KNMWT 15000 suggests that Homo erectus may have experienced a modern human life history, including an adolescent growth spurt. However, recent fossil discoveries, improvements in research methods, and new insights into modern human ontogeny indicate that this may not have been the case. In this study, we examine alternative life history trajectories in Homo erectus to re-evaluate adult stature
estimates for KNM-WT 15000. We constructed a series of growth curves by modifying known human and chimpanzee curves, calculating intermediate growth velocities, and shifting the age of onset and completion of growth in stature. We recalculated adult stature for Nariokotome by increasing stature-at-death by the percentage of growth remaining according to each curve. The curve that most closely matches the life history events experienced by KNM-WT 15000 prior to death suggests that growth in this specimen would have been completed by 12.3 years-of-age. These results suggest that KNM-WT 15000 would have experienced a growth spurt that had a lower peak velocity and shorter duration than the adolescent growth spurt in modern humans. As a result, it is likely that KNM-WT 15000 would have only attained a maximum adult stature of 168 cm (~5'6"), not 185 cm (~6'1") as previously reported. The smaller stature of KNM-WT 15000 may have important implications for evolutionary
scenarios involving early genus Homo.

Variation in cranial robusticity among modern human populations is widely acknowledged but not well-understood. While the use of “robust” cranial traits in hominin systematics and phylogeny suggests that these characters are strongly heritable, this hypothesis has not been tested. Alternatively, cranial robusticity may be a response to differences in diet/mastication or it may be an adaptation to cold, harsh environments. This study quantifies the distribution of cranial robusticity in 14 geographically widespread human populations, and correlates this variation with climatic variables, neutral genetic distances, cranial size, and cranial shape. With the exception of the occipital torus region, all traits were positively correlated with each other, suggesting that they should not be treated as individual characters. While males are more robust than females within each of the populations, among the independent variables (cranial shape, size, climate, and neutral genetic distances), only shape is significantly correlated with inter-population differences in robusticity. Two-block partial least-squares analysis was used to explore the relationship between cranial shape (captured by three-dimensional landmark data) and robusticity across individuals. Weak support was found for the hypothesis that robusticity was related to mastication as the shape associated with greater robusticity was similar to that described for groups that ate harder-to-process diets. Specifically, crania with more prognathic faces, expanded glabellar and occipital regions, and (slightly) longer skulls were more robust than those with rounder vaults and more orthognathic faces. However, groups with more mechanically demanding diets (hunter-gatherers) were not always more robust than groups practicing some form of agriculture.

The cranial and postcranial remains found in Liujiang are the most complete and well-preserved Late Pleistocene human fossils ever unearthed in South China. Wu Rukang, who conducted the original study, suggested that even though the Liujiang fossils preserve some primitive, Late Pleistocene features, a suite of modern Mongoloid features were also present. Wu considered the Liujiang human as proto-Mongoloid. However, because the exact layer that yielded the fossils is unclear and different radiometric dates exist, the age of the Liujiang fossils remains uncertain. Since the Liujiang discovery (A.D. 1958) many advances have been made in paleoanthropology, with more detailed understanding of geographical and morphological variation, and the mechanisms and possible environmental influences on the evolution of our species. New hypotheses on Late Pleistocene human evolution, and the formation and differentiation of modern East Asian populations have been proposed. With these new insights, the Liujiang fossils were re-examined. We proposed the following questions related to Liujiang and Late Pleistocene human evolution in East Asia: (1) Does Liujiang’s morphological pattern fit with its suggested minimal age of 67 Ka B.P.; (2) Compared with modern East Asian populations, how morphologically modern are the Liujiang fossils, and how many derived traits do the Liujiang fossils still exhibit; (3) How different morphologically are the Liujiang fossils compared to the northern Zhoukoudian (ZKD) Upper Cave specimens (i.e., Upper Cave 102 and 103), or to the modern southern Mongoloid populations? With these questions in mind, we analyzed and compared the crania of Liujiang and ZKD Upper Cave to 1114 modern Chinese crania of various geographic affinities. Our results show: (1) The expressions of most cranial features on Liujiang fall within the modern range of variation, but there are a few exceptions; (2) Several primitive features like lower orbit can be observed on Liujiang, indicating that it still preserves some Late Pleistocene features. However, compared to the Late Pleistocene specimens from ZKD Upper Cave, the Liujiang cranium is more modern; (3) The variation between Liujiang and ZKD Upper Cave are mainly in the retention of primitive and robust features on the ZKD Upper Cave crania. We believe that a small number of these differences may be environmental adaptations, which include the deep depressed nasion on ZKD Upper Cave and the broad nasal bones on Liujiang. Based on these findings, we suggest that the cranial morphology of Liujiang is very close to those of modern Chinese and very few differences exist between them. Concomitantly, our study does not support the supposition that the Liujiang cranium is more primitive than ZKD Upper Cave and Ziyang. Since uncertainty exists of the exact provenience of the human fossils from Liujiang, and due to the similarity of the cranial morphology between Liujiang and modern Chinese, we suggest that the current morphological analysis does not support the earlier age (67 Ka B.P.) for the Liujiang human fossils.

We examined the affect of tissue depth variation on the reconstruction of facial form, through the application of the American method, utilizing published tissue depth measurements for emaciated, normal, and obese faces. In this preliminary study, three reconstructions were created on reproductions of the same skull for each set of tissue depth measurements. The resulting morphological variation was measured quantitatively using the anthropometric craniofacial variability index (CVI). This method employs 16 standard craniofacial anthropometric measurements and the results reflect ‘‘pattern variation’’ or facial harmony. We report no appreciable variation in the quantitative measure of the pattern facial form obtained from the three different sets of tissue depths. Facial similarity was assessed qualitatively utilizing surveys of photographs of the three reconstructions. Surveys indicated that subjects frequently perceived the reconstructions as representing different individuals. This disagreement indicates that size of the face may blind observers to similarities in facial form. This research is significant because it illustrates the confounding effect that normal human variation contributes in the successful recognition of individuals from a representational three-dimensional facial reconstruction. Research results suggest that successful identification could be increased if multiple reconstructions were created which reflect a wide range of possible outcomes for facial form. The creation of multiple facial images, from a single skull, will be facilitated as computerized versions of facial reconstruction are further developed and refined.