Originally posted on Monday, July 7, 2014
Today marked the first day of the Bioarchaeology workshop. After a short walk to the lab we entered through a hellish doorway into the courtyard of what was lately an abandoned building.
lovely, right? Photo courtesy Heather Boswell ( http://bonesandimmortality.blogspot.ro/ )
At the door, John Bethard, the program lead, greeted us and had us drop our bags outside and grab a writing utensil so we could take…THE BONE QUIZ.The variety included adult bones, juvenile bones, even prenatal bones. One was a non-human (bird). Forty Five seconds per station, it was a pretty rough wake up. I didn’t do as terribly as I was afraid, but there’s still plenty of room for improvement.Afterwards, we went to the cafe next door for some espresso and a roll, then back in. An introductory lecture, covering the recent paradigm shift regarding the amount of anthropological data derived from children from the days of Hooton to the days of Lillehammer. From there we progressed onto the pelvic girdle, and the differences between adult osteology and non-adults is astounding. Noon brought lunch (a kebab), and the afternoon we had some hands on study time, then a trip to the local Museum
I’m hot stuff (photo courtesy Heather)
In one of the churches that we are working on, there were 70 individuals, 69 juveniles and one elderly woman, on whose finger was this ring. The symbol is unknown to the researchers.
The museum wanted to replicate the church interior, and although some ossuaries may have piles like this, these churches were not so haphazard.
The town was so astounded with the excavation that they have an impressive display of the findings.In 2007, one of the nearby churches flooded. A new drainage system was to be installed, and an archaeological team was brought in. They pulled up the pews, pulled up the flooring, and began digging, quickly finding a cohort of burials, 69 children and one elderly female. Following that, we were dismissed for the day, went grocery shopping, and now I reside in the common room, clacking away where I can find an internet connection.
Soon, laundry will need to be done.
This is our laundry room.