This course is about what we can learn from examining the human skeleton, and how we can use this knowledge to reconstruct the lives of people who lived in the past. In archaeology and anthropology, human skeletal remains can provide unique insights into the past and the present; insights that cannot be gained otherwise. These insights are explored in five main themes spread out over five weeks of learning. First, it is shown how age-at-death, sex and stature can be estimated by the close examination of (archaeological) skeletal remains. In subsequent modules it is shown how human bones can provide information about the diseases and injuries that people suffered from and what they ate. Also, it is shown how the human skeleton provides information about the kinds of activities that people engaged in and about how they migrated and moved around their landscapes. In this course, you will examine all aspects of the human skeleton that can provide us with information about these different facets of life. Together we will explore the scientific field that is known as human osteoarchaeology. - Human, because it is about us and our ancestors, - Osteo, because it is about our bones, - Archaeology, because we use this information to better understand the behaviors and events experienced by past people. During the course, you will decipher the clues left behind in the skeletons of past peoples with the methods and techniques that are presented. You may also discover some clues hidden in your own skeleton and what they reveal about the life that you are living. Want to know more? You can take a look at the course trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJi22TxzpRw
Activity: Joint Degeneration
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來自 Universiteit Leiden 的課程
Osteoarchaeology: The Truth in Our Bones
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從本節課中
Bones to Activity
Welcome to module four!
This week is all about activity. What activities did people perform in the past? How did they move about, and how much? We will be answering these questions by studying many different aspects of the skeleton, like long bones, joints, the spine, and even teeth. We will be showing you what all these marks mean, and what they can tell us today about activities performed in the past.
與講師見面
Andrea Waters-RistAssistant Professor
Faculty of Archaeology
Welcome to the second case study of the activity reconstruction module.
This case study focuses on a suite of pathological lesions.
In particular, osteoarthritis and intervertebral disc disease.
That can provide clues about the types and
levels of physical activities in which past peoples engaged.
So, it comes as no surprise that we can damage and degrade the parts of our body,
especially the joints, that we put a lot of stress and strain upon.
Many of you may already have a bum joint, maybe in the ankle or in the knee that
you can attribute to a type of activity or an injury from the past.
If you'd like you can tell us about this from the online forum.
Maybe you are a baseball pitcher and your shoulder never completely recovered.
Maybe you're a runner and
you can tell it’s hard on your knees despite the other health benefits.
Maybe you do a lot of fine handiwork like weaving or quilting or
needlepoint and your hands get sore quite quickly.
What you're experiencing is likely some degree of joint degeneration.
Probably for most of you, it's manageable, and if you cease putting stress and
strain on that joint, the degeneration and discomfort will largely cease.
But for others, perhaps the damage is already too far gone, and
medical intervention is required, maybe even surgery.
Knee and hip replacement surgeries are very common today,
largely because of the unavoidable wear and tear that we put on these joints
over time and the same idea applies to people in the past.
Joint degeneration leaves clear marks on the skeleton.
So osteoarchaeologists can use these lesions to get a sense of what types
of physical activities must've been commonly performed by an individual and
a population.
So let's discuss the two main diseases and pathological lesions that
fall within the category of joint degeneration that we're talking about.
First, the most widely studied disease in this regard, osteoarthritis.
Osteoarthritis is a joint disease occurring only in synovial joints wherein
there's erosion of the joint cartilage.
This can be quite easily recognized in bones according to four possible changes.
First, new bone can form,
both on the joint's surface as well as on the edges of the joint, called osteophytes.
Also the surface of the bone can become porous and pitted.
The normal outline or contour of the joint can change or become deformed.
And fourth, finally, areas on the joint where there's bone to bone
contact can attain a polished appearance called eburnation.
Now, as with a lot of the lesions and diseases that we've discussed in this
course, osteoarthritis has a multifactorial etiology.
Activity is but one of the factors that can cause osteoarthritis and
other factors especially age,b
But also sex, genetic factors, body mass,
the anatomy of the joint itself and trauma, all play a role.
What we typically see in osteoarchaeological research will be
evidence of pronounced mechanical loading
as a result of strenuous activities that were performed over the course of
many years.
By way of a famous example of the effect of rigorous repetitive activity.
We have what was coined Atlatl elbow caused by regular spear throwing.
Coined by Dr. Angel in 1966,
one of the early scholars to demonstrate the usefulness of this field of inquiry.
And in fact, this is quite like a modern condition known as tennis elbow.
Extreme overuse of the extensor muscles on the back of the arm and
around the elbow will cause bony arthritic changes.
Also important in osteoarchaeological research about joint
degeneration is a specific disease that occurs only in the spine called
intervertebral disc disease or degenerative disc disease.
The spine is unique; unique because between the bodies of
the vertebr there is a structure known as the intervertebral disc.
The intervertebral disc consists of an outer fibrous ring,
the annulus fibrosis which surrounds an inner jell-like centre,
the nucleus pulposus, and it's crucial in shock absorption.
The degeneration of this joint looks a bit different than that of synovial joints.
With disc degeneration the nucleus pulposus dehydrates,
decreasing its ability to absorb shock.
Recall from week one,
the lost of height that comes with age, well this is a major contributor to that.
The annulus fibrosus becomes weaker and has an increased risk of tearing.
If there are fissures or tears, the inner nucleus pulposus can seep out.
This can then put pressure on the vertebral nerves, and
this is known as a herniated disc.
Some of you probably know it can be quite painful. So
what does this look like on the bones?
Well, we commonly have these bony
outgrowths along the margins of the vertebral body, osteophytes.
And in the vertebrae, these can get very large.
Eventually, separate vertebrae may even fuse together,
something known as ankylosis.
We can also see abnormal pitting and porosity on the tops and
bottoms of the vertebral bodies.
As well as a change in the shape of the vertebra, so-called joint deformation.
But there's another lesion that only occurs in the vertebrae
as an indentation in the bodies called Schmorl's Nodes.
These are more frequent in individuals with intervertebral disc disease, and
thus sometimes related to activity.
Schmorl's Nodes are protrusions of the intervertebral disc into the body surface
of the vertebra.
So, as with osteoarthritis in synovial joints, intervertebral disc disease
in the spine is caused by a range of factors and the most important one is age.
Simply speaking, the older you are,
the more likely you are to have intervertebral disc disease and
the more likely it's affecting a larger percentage of your spine.
But factors such as sex, diet, disease and genetics are definitely important.
As is the anatomical position of the vertebrae,
given how loading forces differ in different parts of the spinal column.
One can easily envision that with high levels of mechanical loading as a result
of strenuous and repetitive types of activity, distinctive patterns of
intervertebral disc disease and osteoarthritis may emerge.
For example, Dr. Nancy Lovell examined
human skeletal remains from the Bronze Age Period at the site of Harrappa.
A centre of the Indus Valley civilization which prospered 4 to 5,000 years ago,
in what is modern day Pakistan.
She proposed that the high frequency of intervertebral disc disease and
osteoarthritis observed in the upper, or cervical spine,
might be related to the practice of carrying heavy loads on the head.
For example, containers of water, clothing, firewood, or food.
So with that information, we're now going to turn to our case study.
I'm very pleased to welcome Dr.
Linda Van Der Merwe from the Academic Medical Centre in Amsterdam.
Linda, thank you for joining us today.
Dr. Van Der Merwe conducted osteoarchaeological research on 19th
century diamond miners from Kimberley, South Africa.
So to begin, can you please tell us about what drew your attention to the very
interesting skeletal collection and what were the main aims of the research?
>> In 2003, the [INAUDIBLE principality] in Kimberley accidentally unearthed several unmarked
graves next to what is currently known as the fence of the Gladstone Cemetery.
The McGregor Museum was alerted about these trenching activities.
They halted the trenching and
they received a permit to do the rescue excavation for the unmarked graves.
The remains recovered needed to be investigated so
I was honoured enough to do the investigation.
The graves date to a really interesting time period in the history of
Kimberley, as well.
They were dated to 1897, from 1897 to 1900 and
that's a time period in which Kimberley was actually blooming.
And the diamond mining was really growing.
The majority of labour on the mines was performed by migrant labourers
working on the mine.
And they were mainly these individuals were admitted to
Community Hospital in case they got sick and the hospital was actually using that
part of the cemetery to bury unknown individuals.
So the main aim of the study was to identify the individuals buried there,
as some of the people in their surroundings thought that they were
soldiers buried in that part of the cemetery.
And to attempt to do a demographic profile to
assess pathology and then to see if we can figure out where they actually came from.
>> I see, so now let's focus on some of
the palaeopathological analyses in particular when looking at the spine.
So could you tell us a bit about what types of spinal pathology recorded,
so spinal osteoarthritis and degenerative disease and
what were the results of those analysis?
>> After we did the demographic profile of the population,
we assess the prevalence of degenerative disc disease and Schmorl’s nodes in the collection.
And in order to interpret the data we reported that
divided by sex and age group.
Now if you look at the Kimberley collection,
they were mainly composed of young and middle adult males.
And about 13.9% presented with degenerative disc disease and
around 29% with Schmorl's nodes.
So in order to say something about the data we compared them to two
other samples.
The one was the Vende and the Vende, in this instance, represents
the rural lifestyle where the individuals came from.
The Vende were of the same demographic profile, and
the second sample was from Koffiefontein,
and that is also a mining migrant collection
with the same demographic composition of the Kimberley skeletal remains.
And if you compare those two you see that they were actually
more affected by degenerative disease and
that the prevalences were comparable to that observed in.
>> Very interesting, so then with that information in mind and
also with the historical data about the life ways of these individuals,
during that time period,
what were you able to conclude about their activity patterns?
>> We could conclude that they were indeed
more affected by conditions such as physical activity.
That would actually cause increased prevalence
of the degenerative joint disease and Schmorl’s nodes.
You could argue that this could also developed due to the very
active lifestyle that they have in a rural setting.
But, they were actually significantly more affected than the Vende that actually
represented this rural lifestyle.
So we could definitely decide with some certainty that the mine
had influence on the prevalence of the degenerative changes that we observed.
>> Fantastic research, thank you very much for joining us today.
In this video, you've learned about joint degeneration,
specifically osteoarthritis and intervertebral disc disease.
And how osteoarchaeologists can use these as indicators of
the activities of past peoples.
We've seen how spinal degeneration research has improved our understanding of
the activity patterns of diamond miners from the the 19th century.
Coming up next is the final case study of this module.
We'll switch from focusing upon markers of activity in the skeleton to
markers of activity in the teeth.
See you soon.
