Journal of Archaeological Science , 34 , — Powell, M. Raoult, D. Rawcliffe, C. Leprosy in Medieval England. Woodbridge: Boydell Press.
Roberts, C. Stroud: Sutton Publishing. International Journal of Osteoarchaeology , 18 , — The Archaeology of Disease. Stroud, UK: Sutton Publishing. Ruffer, M. Remarks on the histology and pathological anatomy of Egyptian mummies. Cairo Scientific Journal , 4 , 1—5. On pathological lesions in Coptic bodies. Journal of Pathology and Bacteriology , 18 , — Schultz, M.
Yearbook of Physical Anthropology , 44 , — Scott, G. Dental morphology. In Katzenberg, M. Chichester: Wiley-Liss, pp. Steckel, R. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Taylor, G.
Ancient Biomolecules , 1 , — Thompson, T. Forensic Human Identification: An Introduction. London: CRC Press. Trevathan, W. Evolutionary Medicine and Health. New Perspectives. Tyrrell, A. Skeletal non-metric traits and the assessment of intra- and inter-population diversity: past problems and future potential. In Cox, M. London: Greenwich Medical Media, pp. Waldron, T. After World War II palaeopathology began to be viewed in a different way: as an important tool for the understanding of past populations, and it was at this stage that the discipline began to be related to epidemiology and demography.
The study of DNA also began to add new information to what was already known about ancient disease. Whilst traumatic injuries such as broken and malformed bones can be easy to spot, evidence of other conditions, for example infectious diseases such as tuberculosis and syphilis , can also be found in bones. Arthropathies, that is joint diseases such as osteoarthritis and gout , are also not uncommon.
Archaeologists use paleopathology as one of their main tools for understanding the lives of ancient peoples. For example, cranial deformation is evident in the skulls of the Maya, showing that they considered a person beautiful if they had a straight line connecting their nose with their forehead. Another pathology common to Mesoamerica is seen in women. Bone spurs and other deformities in the knees, toes, and backs of women show that their days spent grinding maize to make flour takes its toll on their bodies.
Also, evidence for trepanation , or drilling holes in the skull to relieve excess pressure, is also common. Skulls with multiple holes show that some patients survived this procedure many times, because the bone has begun to knit back together. In archaeology, the study of the diseases of animals has not been as wide and extensive as those of humans. However, it should be noted that this position of importance has largely come about, not because of its comprehensive coverage, but because there has been no real alternative.
Most palaeopathological literature is to be found in periodicals or compiled publications of conference papers. The study of dinosaur paleopathology has undergone a resurgence in the past two decades. An extensive bibliography of dinosaur paleopathology was released in [4].
One paper, "The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race" [5] and one book, "Paleopathology at the Origins of Agriculture" [6] , have been instrumental in bringing about a change in the way prehistoric human history is understood, away from uninformed modernist perceptions skewed by human urban populations' rough times in the dark ages, and more towards an informed and enlightened comprehension of the relative luxury, abundance, and ease of life in pre-agricultural times.
One strong proponent of the new conclusions becoming more widely taught and accepted has been John Zerzan, considered by many to be only degrees from an "ecoterrorist", due to his essays bringing to light widespread misinformation in the mainstream understanding of prehistory, and casting a shadow on the relatively recent human "success" of agriculture, evidently causing many readers of his essays to feel something they've chosen to describe as "terror".
A few recent books, such as the more popular "Guns, Germs, and Steel" [7] , citing paleopathological data, have elicited similar reactions from people. I think our process is somewhat similar to that of pathologists studying living or recently deceased patients and populations. We look at how many individuals were found, whether they were male or female, the age ranges, and so on — and we take note of distinguishing features like healed fractures or signs of malnutrition. Sometimes the signs of disease are subtle, like the skeletal changes associated with syphilis; sometimes less so, like a collapsed vertebral column caused by tuberculosis.
So, once all of that information has been tabulated, we can collate it and use it. One clear difficulty for us that is not faced by clinical pathologists is the human remains themselves. Whichever way you look at it, the remains are always merely a subset of a once-living population.
Not everybody dies where they lived; not everybody gets buried where they lived or died; not everybody is located and excavated 5, years later by archeologists; and, even if you do happen to be one of the lucky few, so to speak, not everybody is preserved well enough that we can look for signs of disease.
The Paleopathology Association, founded in , is a global organization with members from all over the world. We have meetings every year in northern Europe, every second year elsewhere in Europe, and every second year in South America — and we will soon have a meeting in South Korea. The field is attracting a lot of younger researchers, especially with new developments in molecular biology, genetics, proteomics, and similar areas.
Everyone is welcome to join, including students, for whom we have a specific group within the association. For more information or to join the Paleopathology Association, please click here. The limited nature of our evidence skews our findings and makes it difficult to answer key questions.
For example, what were the demographics of those infected by a particular disease? What was its epidemiology? How many were infected? What was the disease actually like? We may suffer a dearth of evidence, but technological advances are helping us get a better handle on it. Previously, many diseases could only be found macroscopically and morphologically, limiting us to long-suffering patients whose bones had developed characteristic changes. Bone is, after all, a tissue with slow turnover and subject to non-specific changes that could be indicative of a number of diseases and disabilities.
Now, thanks to the development of specific primers to pathogenic DNA which medical researchers and clinicians use to develop vaccines, select antibiotics, and so on , we can interrogate ancient DNA for bits and pieces of the genomes of pathogens so that we can find out what infectious agents existed in a given population. One example is hemochromatosis — a genetic disease that leads to excessive uptake of dietary iron, which accumulates in the liver and ultimately leads to cirrhosis and liver failure.
The theory is that the genetic defect causing hemochromatosis arose in the Bronze Age or early Iron Age in northern Europe. In an era before prophylactic treatment, it would have been a valuable trait to possess. These two examples show what fascinating data we can obtain by studying ancient DNA — what gene variants are common, which variants are correlated with disease, how many carriers there may have been and who they were , and so on.
DNA analysis really has opened up new and exciting areas of exploration for paleopathology! Clinical advances often drive the forward progress of paleopathology because the disciplines are so closely linked. And I think this shared evolution is very important, because it lets us correlate past presentations of disease with current ones.
Here, again, leprosy is a good example. He began assisting archeologists with the excavation of medieval cemeteries where he lived by examining the bones. Eventually, he started visiting the Philippines, Thailand, Nepal, and areas of Africa where leprosy was prevalent, because he wanted to parallelize his osteological findings with the present-day development of the disease.
0コメント