Life on a Napoleonic battlefield: A bioarchaeological analysis of soldiers from the Battle of Aspern, Austria

Prevalence of Dental Caries in Past European Populations: A Systematic Review

OBJECTIVE

Within the fields of anthropology and osteoarcheology, human teeth have long been studied to understand the diet, habits, and diseases of past civilizations. However, no complete review has been published to collect and analyze the extensive available data on caries prevalence in European man (Homo sapiens) over time.

METHOD

In this current study, the two databases, Scopus and Art, Design, and Architecture Collection, were searched using predefined search terms. The literature was systematically reviewed and assessed by two of the authors.

RESULTS

The findings include a significant nonlinear correlation with increasing caries prevalence in European populations from 9000 BC to 1850 AD, for both the number of carious teeth and the number of affected individuals.

CONCLUSION

Despite the well-established collective belief that caries rates fluctuate between different locations and time and the general view that caries rates have increased from prehistoric times and onwards, this is to our knowledge the first time this relationship has been proven based on published data.

Perimortem sharp force trauma in an individual from the early medieval cemetery of Säben-Sabiona in South Tyrol, Italy

OBJECTIVE

To provide a detailed analysis and interpretation of cranial and postcranial lesions noted on an early medieval skeleton from the Italian Alps.

MATERIALS

Individual (SK63) was buried within the early Christian church (5^th-8^th centuries AD) of Säben-Sabiona in South Tyrol (Italy).

METHODS

The skeleton underwent macroscopic, microscopic and metric analyses.

RESULTS

SK63 was a 19-25 year old male, the analysis identified at least 29 lesions, consisting of three possible antemortem injuries and 26 perimortem sharp force injuries on the cranium (n = 4) and postcranium (n = 22).

CONCLUSIONS

The trauma pattern observed indicates that different bladed weapons were used and interpersonal violence rather than a large-scale conflict led to the death of SK63.

SIGNIFICANCE

The present findings provide novel information on violent interpersonal interactions in early medieval Säben-Sabiona, Italy.

LIMITATIONS

The sequence of the inflicted injuries was not reconstructed.

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH

Future interdisciplinary investigations (i.e., 3D imaging and reconstructions) will provide a better understanding of the possible types of weapons used to inflict injuries, the required forces to create the lesions, as well as the directions of impact.

The emergence of human warfare: Current perspectives

The origins of warfare have long been of interest for researchers across disciplines. Did our earliest ancestors engage in forms of organized violence that are appropriately viewed as approximations, forms of, or analogs for more recent forms of warfare? Assessed in this article are contrasting views that see warfare as being either a product of more recent human societies or a phenomenon with a much deeper chronology. The article provides an overview of current debates, theories, and methodological approaches, citing literature and data from archaeological, ethnographic, genetic, primatological, and paleoanthropological studies. Synthetic anthropological treatments are needed, especially in efforts to inform debates among nonacademic audiences, because the discipline's approaches are ideally suited to study the origins of warfare. Emphasized is the need to consider possible forms of violence and intergroup aggression within Pleistocene contexts, despite the methodological challenges associated with fragmentary, equivocal, or scarce data. Finally, the review concludes with an argument about the implications of the currently available data. We propose that socially cooperative violence, or "emergent warfare," became possible with the onset of symbolic thought and complex cognition. Viewing emergent warfare as a byproduct of the human capacity for symbolic thought explains how the same capacities for communication and sociality allowed for elaborate peacemaking, conflict resolution, and avoidance. Cultural institutions around war and peace are both made possible by these changes. Accordingly, we suggest that studies on warfare's origins should be tied to research on the advent of cooperation, sociality, and communication.

Death on a Napoleonic battlefield - Peri-mortem trauma in soldiers from the Battle of Aspern 1809

On the 21^st-22^nd of May1809 Napoleon Bonaparte saw his first major defeat on land at the Battle of Aspern, just north-east of Vienna. Of the 167,000 soldiers who fought for the French and Austrian armies, a total of 55,000 died on the battlefield. Salvage excavations prior to the construction of large urban development project (2008-2016) have revealed several burial sites related to the Battle of Aspern. The skeletal remains of 30 soldiers were excavated and underwent a detailed bioarchaeological study to elucidate both the impact of 19th-century military conditions on soldiers in life, as well as how they died on the battlefield. This paper presents the analysis of peri-mortem trauma observed in 21 of the 30 skeletons (70.0%) excavated from the battlefield of Aspern. Following standard criteria in forensic and palaeopathological trauma studies, this study revealed a predominance of ballistic trauma (20 cases in 17 individuals), while only nine individuals (eleven cases) displayed evidence of blunt force trauma. By contrast, no evidence of sharp force trauma was identified in the skeletal remains. These results are discussed within the historic context of the Napoleonic Wars to reconstruct causes of injury and circumstances of death.