George Milner

Objectives A Geographical Information System (GIS) approach enhances the acquisition, management, and analysis of trace element data from cortical bone. A high‐resolution spatial dimension expands the research potential of Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (LA‐ICP‐MS) data from cortical bone cross‐sections. The chemical characterization of hundreds of osteons, notably sequences of superimposed osteons, permits more exacting studies of individual life histories than is possible with analyses of bulk bone samples. Methods A GIS procedure was used to estimate Sr, Ba, Pb, and Cu concentrations, originally generated through LA‐ICP‐MS, for bone microstructural features, notably fragmentary and intact osteons, in a human femoral cross‐section. The skeleton is from Ribe, Denmark, and dates to the early modern period. Results Postmortem chemical alteration was limited to the bone's outer and inner margins. Two dietary indicators, Sr and Ba, and two socioeconomic indicators, Pb and Cu, measured for individual osteons were correlated with one another. Osteon sequences indicate concentrations of all four elements increased late in life for this individual. Conclusions The application of GIS procedures expedites fine‐grained analyses of variation in the distribution of trace elements in bone microstructure identifiable in cortical bone cross‐sections. It provides an efficient means of extracting the most information possible from LA‐ICP‐MS data about the lives of people in the past. Combining the two procedures makes it easier to track exposure to elements such as Pb across the part of an individual's life represented by osteon sequences.

Agriculture—specifically an intensification of the production of readily stored food and its distribution—has supported an increase in the global human population throughout the Holocene. Today, with greatly accelerated of growth during recent centuries, we have reached about 8 billion people. Human skeletal and archaeobotanical remains clarify what occurred over several millennia of profound societal and population change in small-scale societies once distributed across the North American midcontinent. Stepwise, not gradual, changes in the move toward an agriculturally based life, as indicated by plant remains, left a demographic signal reflecting age-independent ( α 2 ) mortality as estimated from skeletons. Designated the age-independent component of the Siler model, it is tracked through the juvenility index (JI), which is increasingly being used in studies of archaeological skeletons. Usually interpreted as a fertility indicator, the JI is more responsive to age-independent mortality in societies that dominated most of human existence. In the midcontinent, the JI increased as people transitioned to a more intensive form of food production that prominently featured maize. Several centuries later, the JI declined, along with a reversion to a somewhat more diverse diet and a reduction in overall population size. Changes in age-independent mortality coincided with previously recognized increases in intergroup conflict, group movement, and pathogen exposure. Similar rises and falls in JI values have been reported for other parts of the world during the emergence of agricultural systems.