The identification of metabolic diseases is a crucial aspect of osteoarchaeological analysis and of paleopathological studies. This study is specifically concerned with the study of scurvy and its bony manifestation. This investigation considers the recognition of the bony lesions of scurvy in adult skeletons that originate from English archaeological contexts dating to the Post Medieval period. In order to identify scorbutic bony lesions, assemblages were analysed that derived from the Georgian period Navy that were known to suffer from endemic scurvy, namely Haslar hospital near Portsmouth and Stonehouse hospital in Plymouth. These assemblages were complemented by two Non-Naval skeletal collections of a broadly contemporaneous time period, one of which was a prison assemblage from Oxford Castle in Oxford and the other was from Darwen, Lancashire and consisted of a Primitive Methodist cemetery. For the purpose of this study, an extensive literature review was carried out and a specially modified scurvy recording form was created. In total three hundred and fifty-eight skeletons were analysed using the scurvy recording form on which a total of twenty-one potential scorbutic indicators were scored. The data was then subject to statistical analysis and a set of primary and secondary scorbutic indicators was established. The primary scorbutic lesions were femur, sphenoid, posterior maxilla, scapula, endocranial and mandible. Nine secondary lesions were also established and these were lesions of the foot, humerus, ulna, radius, hand, clavicle, innominate, fibula and the ectocranial surface of the skull. In total, 66.7% of the Haslar assemblage was found to have suffered from scurvy, followed by Plymouth with 20.6%, Darwen with 16.4% and Oxford Castle with 7.9%. It was found that scurvy could be identified in adult skeletal material through the recognition of a number of lesions that could not be attributed to any other disease process. The results indicated that scurvy was present in all of the skeletal collections studied but was more common in the Naval assemblages. This is an important development in the detection of scurvy in the archaeological record and is crucial in the reconstruction of past diets and metabolic disease patterns.

This dissertation investigates the emergence and development of cause-of-death registration in nineteenth-century Massachusetts. I examine the historical, demographic, sociopolitical, and theoretical conditions that gave rise to the first state-implemented cause-of-death registration system in the United States, Massachusetts's vital registration system. Developments in almost every arena of social life during the nineteenth century were shaped in some fashion through disease. The disease ecology changed dramatically during this period shifting from acute infectious to chronic degenerative diseases, which marked the beginning of the epidemiological transition. Registration systems were key components in this transitional period, providing the raw data on which nineteenth-century public health policy emerged. The greatest challenge that public-health reformers faced in implementing and regulating cause-of-death registration was standardizing the language and practice of disease and cause-of-death reporting. I look closely at issues of implementation and regulation and examine the relative impact that standardized nomenclature and reporting practices had on cause-of-death registration in Massachusetts from 1850 through 1912. Efforts to standardize disease and cause-of-death terminology in the United States and internationally did not, however, successfully emerge until the late nineteenth century. While many disease terms were in common, their diagnostic applications were not. I argue that certain constitutive and regulative features of death registration did not match up with the institutional mandate of Massachusetts's vital registration system until forty years after its implementation. The institution-building process required the alignment of these features as normative practices, culminating in the organized efforts of European and American medical professionals to instruct physicians in proper nomenclature through explicit references and sanctions in the 1900 International Classification of Diseases. The pragmatic conditions out of which both Massachusetts' cause-of-death registration system and the International Classification of Diseases emerged did not consist of special circumstances or unique cultural practices. The social meanings of mortality in nineteenth-century Massachusetts reflected the public commitments of a diverse set of communities and practices that shared similar resources in working out the struggles and triumphs of communicating the language of death and disease.

Although the pubic symphysis remains the most commonly utilized osteological feature to ascertain age-at-death estimations by forensic anthropologists (Garvin and Passalacqua, 2012), these aging methods do not accurately age elderly individuals. Through the re-examination of a Balkan sample, Berg (2008) noted a morphological variant, which may be correlated to osteoporosis expression by the increasing presence of macroporosity, present on female individuals that had previously been unexplained. This morphological variant can assist in the application of the Suchey-Brooks method to age elderly female individuals with the inclusion of a seventh phase (Berg, 2008). Hartnett (2010) also re-examined the pubic symphysis to better estimate age for modern populations and noted morphological variants similar to those described by Berg (2008). Hartnett (2010) attributed this variant to a decrease in bone quality associated with age-related morphological change. The present study examined the 330 female skeletons housed at Lisbon Collection, with the specific aim to provide a comparison of pubic symphysis age estimation methods, including Suchey-Brooks (1990), Berg (2008), Hartnett (2010), and Boldsen et al. (2002), on a known modern skeletal collection geographically dissimilar from the collections originally examined by Berg (2008) and Hartnett (2010). This dissimilar population was important because Berg's original study noted regional differences in the appearance and applicability of the seventh phase. The morphological variants present in female elderly individuals in the Lisbon Skeletal Collection support the introduction of a seventh phase to the standard Suchey-Brooks pubic symphysis method. Using the seventh phase, the Berg (2008) and Hartnett (2010) method improved their accuracy rates for aging older individuals. However, when the entire female population sample is considered the established age-at-death estimation methods do not perform well. The relationship between bone quality, aging method estimation assessment, and known age are discussed with considerations made for the influencing factors on bone preservation. A major difficulty in this analysis was parsing out information regarding bone density loss that occurred as natural degeneration and had a relationship to age-related change. The most significant confounding factor for the analysis of bone density loss and its importance to age-related change is the influence of bone preservation. While it is clear that the seventh phase provides more valuable information for the age estimation of the elderly, the poor correlation of bone quality suggests that this feature is not particularly important for the assessment of elderly phases in this population. This research supports the induction of a seventh phase to help provide more accurate age estimations for elderly populations, as it has been found in various populations, including the Portuguese population.

The present research examined the effects of compound bows and crossbows on the remains of Sus scrofa and Odocoileus virginianus. Isolated pig heads and white-tailed deer necks were impacted by three forms of arrow heads: the broad-head tip, conical field-tip, and bullet field-tip from both the compound bow and the crossbow. The structural design of the arrowheads was examined to understand their level of impact, as well as, the velocities of the compound bow and crossbow were calculated and compared. The total number of impact marks for the experiment was 55. It was hypothesized that the compound bow would have a greater extent of trauma to bone than the crossbow due to the higher velocity created from a longer power stroke. It was also hypothesized that the broad-head arrow tip will create larger fracture patterns on bone due to the three-blade-prong design compared to the oval shape of both the conical field-tip and bullet field-tip. Through the use of one-way ANOVA and Pearson’s Chi-Square, the results show no direct correlation between the difference in the type of weapon used or the arrow tip used. The results show the vast majority of impacts are penetration with shapes that roughly resemble the cross-section of the type of tip used. The results, however, did not support both hypotheses due to the limited number of impact marks and sample size of the experiment. Further experiments are required to assess the extent to which it is possible to distinguish between arrow related osseous trauma.

The present study analyzes cranial nonmetric traits used in forensic ancestry estimation on contemporary skeletal remains of modern European Americans in order to determine if there are statistically significant differences between males and females in trait expression. Research on cranial nonmetric traits for ancestry estimation has largely ignored the effects of sexual dimorphism on trait expression; however, there is growing evidence that some traits may be impacted by sex, among other variables. The 17 macromorphoscopic traits described in Hefner and Linde (2018) and the six mandibular morphoscopic traits described in Berg (2008) were scored on 97 females and 113 males from the Texas State University Donated Skeletal Collection in San Marcos, Texas. Chi-square tests were used to analyze if there are statistically significant cranial nonmetric trait expressions between males and females. From these tests, the results indicate that 14 out of the 23 cranial and mandibular nonmetric traits are statistically significantly different between the sexes, with a p-value less than 0.05. Gonial angle flare is the most significant feature, while the zygomaticomaxillary suture is the least significant feature. Additionally, correspondence analyses (CA) show the relationship between each cranial nonmetric trait score, that demonstrated significance, and both sexes. Ultimately, this research demonstrates that several nonmetric traits used in ancestry estimation are affected by sex; thus, it may be beneficial to develop sex-specific ancestry models for nonmetric traits.

This article considers forensic anthropologists’ roles in negotiating the concept of criminality in biohistorical cases, those investigations of the famous and infamous dead that are driven by public interest rather than traditional medicolegal relevance. We review three biohistorical cases from the United States: the purported skull of a martyred Catholic priest from sixteenth century Georgia, the Mountain Meadows Massacre that occurred in Utah in the mid-nineteenth century, and the search for Billy the Kid’s grave in New Mexico. We find that anthropologists have active and passive roles in the manufacture, assignment, and sometimes denial of criminality in these cases. Additionally we explore how the analysis and discussion of violence in these biohistorical cases reflects two concepts that are distinctive to United States’ history, notably manifest destiny and the idea of closure in historical narratives. The perception that the present order is a natural culmination of history, and that the past is truly past underestimates the relevance and impact of labelling past personages as criminals to contemporary culture. As a result, forensic anthropologists’ negotiation of criminality in U.S. biohistorical cases is fraught with nebulous ethical challenges and tangible consequences.

Sex estimation is one of the most important, and arguably the first, parts of the biological profile that is estimated for purposes of human identification. This study will examine the utility of the distal humerus in sex estimation. The goal of this research is to corroborate the usefulness of the distal humerus in sex estimation and the usefulness of geometric morphometrics in sex estimation, as well as validate metric and visual methods for sex estimation using the distal humerus. Multiple methods of sex estimation are necessary because complete skeletons are rarely found, and often only fragments are discovered. Three methods of sex estimation utilizing the distal humerus are used in this study: epicondylar breadth (n=448), nonmetric traits per Rogers (1999) and Vance et al. (2011 (n=444)), and geometric morphometrics via a Microscribe digitizer and MorphoJ software (n=227). The sample was taken from the William M. Bass Donated Skeletal Collection and was primarily composed of White Americans. The male to female ratio was approximately equal. The results of the metric aspect of the study showed a classification accuracy of 88.84% with low intra-observer and inter-observer error rates. The results of the nonmetric aspect of the study showed a classification accuracy of 77% when all traits were combined with low intra-observer and high inter-observer error rates. The results of the geometric morphometric aspect of the study showed a classification accuracy of 55% for all landmarks, 57% for anterior landmarks, and 63% for posterior landmarks. The results show that not only is the epicondylar breadth a reliable and effective method of sex estimation, it is easily repeatable by other observers. The nonmetric method is useful when epicondylar breadth cannot be measured or when an observer is familiar with the method. The geometric morphometric method is not as strong as the other two methods, but with further research and modifications may become a feasible option for sex estimation using the distal humerus. The author concludes that the distal humerus is sexually dimorphic and can be used to estimate sex accurately.

The present research examined the effects that the variables of burial depth and presence of a plastic covering material had on the decomposition rate of fetal remains. The experimental sample consisted of fetal pigs (Sus scrofa) as a substitute for fetal human remains. The general size and bone composition of fetal pigs are comparable to those of fetal humans. The decomposition of the fetal pigs remains was observed in four independent variable groups: 20 cm unwrapped, 20 cm wrapped, 60 cm unwrapped, and 60 cm wrapped, per time period. The author hypothesized that the rate of decay would be slower for wrapped remains or for remains at a greater burial depth. The results of the two different burial depths and of the wrapped versus unwrapped groups was analyzed to determine the effects of those variables on the rate of decomposition. Analysis of these remains consisted of quantitative data, including pre-burial and post-burial mass comparison as well as the Total Body Score. It was found that wrapping was a significant influencer of mass loss with a p value of 0.0298 but not for the Total Body Score with a p value of 0.17565, while burial depth did not have a significant effect on either mass loss nor Total Body Score with a p value of 0.1956 and 0.08969, respectively.

No description available.

Skeletal remains exposed to an outdoor context are prone to post-mortem damage and fragmentation, making skeletal analysis difficult for the anthropologist. Research on ancestry and sex from isolated fragments of the cranium is necessary to improve identification of fragmented remains. The zygoma has proven to be more durable post skeletonization than other cranial bones, making research relevant into variation within the zygoma. Whilst the shape of the zygoma has been studied in a South African population using morphological, metric and geometric morphometric techniques, these studies did not include Indian South Africans. The Indian South African population comprises 2.6% of the total population but make up a larger proportion of the population in certain areas. For example, Indian South Africans comprise 7.4% of the population in Kwa-Zulu Natal and 2.9% in Gauteng. More specifically, Indian South Africans make up to 60% of the population in the suburb of Chatsworth with a further 91% of the population in sub-area of Arena Park, and 80% of the population in the Laudium suburb of Gauteng. Therefore, Indian South Africans must be included in anthropological studies attempting ancestry classifications. The purpose of the study was to assess the shape variation and projection of the zygoma attributable to sexual dimorphism and ancestral variation among South Africans, including Indian South Africans, using a geometric morphometric approach. A sample of 400 three-dimensionally (3D) reconstructed models from head CT scans of black, coloured, white, and Indian South Africans were used with an equal sex and ancestry distribution. Eleven landmarks previously described in the literature were used for the analysis. Each landmark was used to depict the most prominent points on the outline of the zygoma. Additionally, semi-landmarks were placed along the curves of the zygoma. The landmarks and semi-landmarks were tested for observer repeatability and reliability using dispersion analysis and revealed that all landmarks were repeatable. Procrustes ANOVA revealed significant differences among the population groups and between the sexes for all population groups, except between coloured South African males and females. A pairwise post-hoc test revealed that white and Indian South Africans had the most similarities except for males, where coloured and Indian South Africans had the most similarities for landmarks. Three interlandmark distances were created to assess the zygoma’s projection. The ANOVA for the projection of the zygoma revealed significant differences for both sex and ancestry except for white South African males and females and males overall for the zygomaticomaxillary length. The zygomaticomaxillary length (ZML) is defined as the maximum distance between the landmarks zygoorbitale and zygomaxilare. No significant differences were noted for female South Africans for the Superior Zygomatic Length which, is a measure of the maximum length of the superior margin of the zygoma (between porion and zygoorbitale; PorZygool). Further analysis of the zygoma’s projection involved creating angles between the interlandmark distances. The ANOVA for the angles of projection revealed significant differences between sexes and populations, except for white and Indian South African males and females at Angle1 (Angle at the intersection of ZML and PorZygoml) and Angle3 (the angle at the intersection of PorZygool and PorZygoml) and black, coloured and Indian South African males and females at Angle2 (the angle at the intersection of ZML and PorZygool). The large amount of overlap amongst ancestry groups demonstrated substantial group similarities; however, differences were noted at the zygomaxillary, zygomaticotemporal and frontomalar sutures. Overlap was also present between males and females, but on average, males were larger than females. Differences, such as a more inferior placement of the zygoorbitale landmark were noted at the inferior margin of the orbit specifically in females. Differences were also noted at the inferior margin of the orbit across all groups. Discriminant functions were created to assess the classifying ability of the shape of the zygoma. Results revealed low accuracies for ancestry classification for the shape and projection of the zygoma. However, higher accuracies were noted for sex classification for the shape and projection of the zygoma. While results demonstrate shape variation of the zygoma, the classifying ability of the zygoma is precarious at best, and the use of the zygoma in a forensic context may not be an option. However, the differences observed can be taken into consideration during medical procedures such as zygomatic and infraorbital implants. Although landmark placements were reliable and repeatable, further analysis of the zygoma using a semi-automatic surface registration method along with different imaging techniques (MicroCT and CBCT scans) may assist in the data collection procedure and may potentially increase the accuracy of the results. Furthermore, the results of the current study highlight the need for the assessment of the effects of diet, climate, age, edentulism and symmetry on the shape of the zygoma. / Dissertation (MSc (Anatomy))--University of Pretoria, 2020. / National Research Foundation (NRF) / Anatomy / MSc (Anatomy) / Unrestricted