Child and Adolescent Paleo-anthropological Materials of Late Sarmatian Time from the Burial Mounds of the Lower Volga Region (Paleo-pathological Aspect)

Abstract

Individual descriptions of age and paleo-pathological features observed on bones of children and adolescents of the late Sarmatian time originating from burial mounds from the territory of the Lower Volga region are presented in the paper. The method of paleo-pathological analysis of human bone remains was applied in the study. We determined the age of individual remains according to the methods and schemes presented in the works of Russian and international scientific community. The material of the study is represented by the skeletal remains of 8 people aged 0 to 16 years stored in the anthropological laboratory of the Volgograd State University. As a result of the conducted study of children and adolescent skeletons of the late Sarmatian period, previously established by the scientists information on the rare occurrence of children in the burials of this culture was confirmed. This situation is typical to most archaeological monuments in the Lower Volga and Lower Don regions of the 2nd - 4th century AD which proves the paleo-demographic uniqueness of the late Sarmatian culture. On the basis of the research on the dental pathologies expansion we make an assumption about the susceptibility of the children’s population to episodic stresses of various etiologies. The children population of the late Sarmatian period lacked oral hygiene as evidenced by the early appearance of tartar. The nature of the ration of the immature population of the 2nd - 4th century AD allows to reproduce the complex analysis of stress markers. The lack of caries and a high percentage of tartar indicate that the diet was dominated by meat and dairy products with a low carbohydrate inclusion. Porosis, revealed on bone remains, testifies to the problems with the vitamin “C” assimilation. The presence of cases of hyperostosis in the examined group means that the majority of individuals in childhood suffered from severe chronic diseases. Signs of nonspecific infections found on the bones of the skull and the postcranial skeleton, along with markers of micronutrient deficiencies in the human body testify to the hard living conditions of nomadic children.

Keywords

• late sarmatian time
• bioarchaeology
• children
• adolescents
• scurvy
• anemia
• parotic hyperostosis
• tooth diseases