Using the Dead to Understand Access to Water
As humans, we cannot survive without water. In the first world, we are privileged to have consistent access to fresh clean water. In many countries, access to water is based […]
Category Archives: Methods
New Interpretations from Old Books: Using Archives to Reassess Mortuary Sites
When we excavate an archaeological site, all of our paperwork, journals, interpretations, notes, maps, photos, and the artifacts and human remains are put into storage either at a country office, […]
Investigating Red-Colored Bones in Mesoamerica
It isn’t rare to see bones that have a color other than the usual lab-cleaned white or dirt-stained brown. In my post on colored bones from a few years ago, […]
What did the Egyptians eat?
There’s something mystical and wonderful about Ancient Egypt. It is one of the first historical eras that really captured my imagination as a child. In many ways, I think this […]
What did Genghis Khan eat?
Everyone knows something about Genghis Khan. His story and empire is part of the basic history of the world we learn growing up. He came into power by uniting disparate […]
Grave Robbing: Not Always What it Seems…
We’ve talked quite a bit here about the different ways that human remains can be disturbed once they are buried. We’ve had the “5 Reasons to Remove Single Bones from […]
The Prince is Actually a Female (and other gender misconceptions)
About a month ago, archaeologists found a sealed rock cut tomb in Tarquinia. At the front door before they even opened the tomb, they found jars and vases indicating that […]
Investigating Kinship in an Early Medieval Necropolis
There used to be an assumption within archaeology that people who were buried within the same grave or same necropolis were related to one another. In geography, we call this […]
New Morbid Terminology: Cadaveric Spasm
Understanding the natural and biological processes that affect the human body following death can be extremely important for the interpretation of the skeletal remains following excavation. The way the body […]
Continuity or Colonization: Debating Anglo-Saxon Migration
Recently, I have been reading quite a bit about migration during the Early Medieval period. Traditional narratives of this period tend to argue that as the Roman Empire was declining […]
Bones Don't Lie 