Compromised health: Examining growth and health in a late antique Roman infant and child cemetery.

OBJECTIVES: Combining research from infant and child development, public health, anthropology, and history, this research examines the relationship between growth, growth disruption, and skeletal indicators of chronic and/or episodic physiological stress (stress) among juvenile individuals (n = 60) interred at the late antique infant and child cemetery at Poggio Gramignano (PG) (ca. 5th century CE), associated with a rural agricultural community. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Growth disruption-evidenced by decreased long bone length compared to dental age-and stress experience-evidenced by skeletal stress indicators-within these individuals are compared to those within juveniles from a comparative sample (n = 66) from two urban Roman-era cemeteries, Villa Rustica (VR) (0-250 CE) and Tragurium City Necropolis (TCN) (0-700 CE). RESULTS: Results indicate that individuals from PG had significantly smaller femoral lengths-for-age than those from VR and TCN; however, the frequency of skeletal stress indicators was higher among juveniles from VR and TCN. DISCUSSION: These differences in growth and stress experience are likely related to the different biosocial and ecological environments present in these two regions. For the community at PG, internal and external violent conflicts, as well as social, political, and economic turmoil, and subsistence shortages, endemic and epidemic infectious disease, nutritional deficiencies, and inherited or acquired anemia may have synergized to create chronically and/or episodically deleterious conditions for its juveniles.

A genetic history of the Balkans from Roman frontier to Slavic migrations.

The rise and fall of the Roman Empire was a socio-political process with enormous ramifications for human history. The Middle Danube was a crucial frontier and a crossroads for population and cultural movement. Here, we present genome-wide data from 136 Balkan individuals dated to the 1st millennium CE. Despite extensive militarization and cultural influence, we find little ancestry contribution from peoples of Italic descent. However, we trace a large-scale influx of people of Anatolian ancestry during the Imperial period. Between ∼250 and 550 CE, we detect migrants with ancestry from Central/Northern Europe and the Steppe, confirming that "barbarian" migrations were propelled by ethnically diverse confederations. Following the end of Roman control, we detect the large-scale arrival of individuals who were genetically similar to modern Eastern European Slavic-speaking populations, who contributed 30%-60% of the ancestry of Balkan people, representing one of the largest permanent demographic changes anywhere in Europe during the Migration Period.

Battered and abused: Analysis of trauma at Grasshopper Pueblo (AD 1275-1400).

Increasing violence and inter-group conflict in the American Southwest is prevalent into the 13th and 14th centuries AD. In the northern Mogollon region during this time period, the site of Grasshopper Pueblo experienced a shift in social organization as population movements occurred in response to regional stressors. The skeletal remains of 187 adult individuals from the site are analyzed for nonlethal and lethal trauma, musculoskeletal stress markers, and pathology as indicators of changing social dynamics. Nonlethal, healed trauma is present in all adult age groups and both sexes. Approximately one-third (n=63) of the population has healed cranial depression fractures. Females and males are fairly equal in the proportion of cranial injuries incurred; however more females are injured overall when post-cranial injuries are added. Musculoskeletal stress markers do not differ substantially among age groups or between sexes. Heavy musculature development is also similar for groups with and without cranial depression fractures. The results of this study suggest that interpersonal violence was ubiquitous within the pueblo and may have escalated as the community grew in size. Immigrants from other parts of the Southwest may have sought refuge at Grasshopper only to find that the community was experiencing its own social stress.

The social role of hobbling and torture: Violence in the prehistoric Southwest.

Violent interaction as a form of non-verbal communication has three distinct actors: aggressors, victims and witnesses. Social identities of individuals within these groups are negotiated and enforced through performative violence such as hobbling or torture. Sacred Ridge site is a habitation site occupied during the Pueblo I period, sometime between AD 710 and 825. An assemblage consisting of 14,882 bone commingled fragments representing at least 33 individuals was discovered during excavation. The hobbling of some individuals in the form of blows to the ankle is suggested by damage to the lateral and medial areas of the calcaneus. Torture in the form of blows to the bottoms of feet is evidenced by damage to the plantar surfaces of various other foot bones. These performative acts might have formed the basis for social control of victims and witnesses by aggressors. Taphonomic analysis of human remains can be used to examine behaviors of each group creating the assemblage.