bioarchaeology
Sign in to saveAlso known as osteoarchaeology, osteologie, palaeo-osteology
Bioarchaeology (osteoarchaeology, osteology or palaeo-osteology) in Europe describes the study of biological remains from archaeological sites. In the United States it is the scientific study of human remains from archaeological sites.
~39 min read
Encyclopedic overview
28 sectionsContents
- Paleodemography
- Age
- Sex
- Modern sex determination methods
- Non-specific stress indicators
- Dental non-specific stress indicators
- Enamel hypoplasia
- Skeletal non-specific stress indicators
- Porotic hyperostosis/cribra orbitalia
- Harris lines
- Hair
- Mechanical stress and activity indicators
- Injury and workload
- Diet and dental health
- Stable isotope analysis
- Applications
- Carbon
- Nitrogen
- Oxygen
- Sulfur
- DNA
- Biological distance analysis
- Biocultural bioarchaeology
- Ethics
- See also
- References
- Further reading
- External links
Bioarchaeology (osteoarchaeology, osteology or palaeo-osteology) in Europe describes the study of biological remains from archaeological sites. In the United States it is the scientific study of human remains from archaeological sites.
The term was minted by British archaeologist Grahame Clark who, in 1972, defined it as the study of animal and human bones from archaeological sites. Jane Buikstra came up with the current US definition in 1977. Human remains can inform about health, lifestyle, diet, mortality and physique of the past. Although Clark used it to describe just human remains and animal remains, increasingly archaeologists include botanical remains.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “bioarchaeology” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.