Evidence of Stress Fracture in a Homo antecessor Metatarsal from Gran Dolina Site (Atapuerca,Spain)

We present the palaeopathological analysis of a right fourth metatarsal (ATD6‐124) recovered from the Atapuerca–Gran Dolina site (Spain). This fossil, ca. 1 Ma, belongs to Homo antecessor, the earliest known European hominin species. The metatarsal exhibits a proliferative lesion on its medial periosteal surface. Periosteal reaction can be the bone response to a wide number of injurious processes. We describe a lesion on the basis of macroscopic and microscopic analyses, including microtomography and scanning electron microscopy. Externally, the osteoblastic lesion presents a highly porotic and disorganised morphology. Internally, we observe a series of micro‐fractures on the compact bone that do not affect the medullary canal. We provide a differential diagnosis and suggest that the ATD6‐124 lesion could correspond to a pedal stress fracture, also known as fatigue or march fracture. Stress fractures have been related to a load increase and muscular fatigue. This type of fracture has been widely reported in the foot of soldiers and athletes, which are usually engaged in strenuous, excessive or prolonged locomotive activities. Despite its high frequency in these groups, stress fractures have not been reported as such in fossil collections, with the exception of a metatarsal belonging to the Sima de los Huesos site (Atapuerca). Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Is there a Sovietology of South‐East Asian studies?

This article provides an indictment of the study of South-East Asian international relations by confronting head-on the problems that have arisen within this field, in particular the way in which Western academics ended up colluding with deeply illiberal regimes in the area, which excluded dissenting opinions, often by deliberately denouncing these opinions as 'polemical'. This study uses the discipline of Sovietology to explore the reasons why South-East Asian studies developed into a closed community of scholarship, often hostile to dissenting viewpoints. The disciplines bear comparison because they both manifestly failed to predict the cataclysms that befell their respective areas of study. The analysis identifies similarities in the way in which the two disciplines seemed to ignore sceptical voices and evolved a shared belief in 'system stability'. As a result, both Soviet studies and the study of South-East Asian international relations developed serious methodological flaws. However, this study argues that South-East Asian studies suffered even more severe disciplinary shortcomings than its Sovietological counterpart because the academic space was further de-intellectualized by the pervasive influence of the authoritarian South-East Asian developmental state which blurred the distinction between scholarship and bureaucracy and which succeeded in co-opting Western academics. The result was to create a field of study that promulgated the tyranny of the single truth, which erroneously perceived South-East Asia as a region of domestic tranquillity and regional order. What, in fact, emerged was an intellectual culture of self-censorship that kept South-East Asian studies within tacit, self-regulated boundaries.     

Final Paleolithic and Mesolithic Research in Reunified Germany

During the past decade research into the German Final Paleolithic and Mesolithic has experienced an important revival. One clear sign of this renewed interest in the periods are the annual meetings of the Arbeitsgruppe Mesolithikum (Mesolithic Working Group) which have taken place every spring since 1992. At these meetings, which take place at changing venues, topical themes of Final Paleolithic and Mesolithic interest are presented by informal lectures and it is also possible to study regional collections (artifacts, raw materials) at first hand. Numerous contributions were subsequently published together in one volume (Conard and Kind (1998) Aktuelle Forschungen zum Mesolithikum/Current Mesolithic Research, Mo Vince, Tübingen). The present paper intends to complement that collection of papers with a synthesis of developments and perspectives and to present recent research highlights in the German Final Paleolithic and Mesolithic, together with a comprehensive bibliography, to a wider international audience.     

Prehistoric iron production technologies in the Upper Thai-Malay Peninsula: metallography and slag inclusion analyses of iron artefacts from Khao Sam Kaeo and Phu Khao Thong

This article presents a preliminary attempt to characterise Upper Thai-Malay Peninsula prehistoric iron technologies based on assemblages from two recently excavated coastal sites: Khao Sam Kaeo and Phu Khao Thong. These are the earliest known sites involved in the early trans-Asian exchange that connected the eastern Indian Ocean to the South China Sea from the mid-first millennium bc. It is from this period that iron assemblages start appearing at both continental and insular Southeast Asian sites. Three models have been offered confronting an indigenous vs. Chinese or South Asian impetus for the introduction of iron metallurgy in Southeast Asia. These models are discussed in the light of the metallographic and compositional analyses of iron and slag assemblages from these two sites using optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy with energy dispersive spectrometry, energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence and slag inclusion analysis techniques, together with other production materials from these and other contemporaneous Southeast Asian sites.     

Ireland's two nations

A Concise History of Ireland by Máire and Conor Cruise O'Brien. London: Thames and Hudson, 1972. Pp. 192; £2.50. An Economic History of Ireland Since 1660 by L. M. Cullen. London: Batsford, 1972. Pp. 208; £2.00. The Green Flag: A History of Irish Nationalism by Robert “Kee. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1972. Pp. 877; £5.95. Englishmen and Irish Troubles: British Public Opinion and the Making of Irish Policy, 1918–1922 by D. G. Boyce. London: Cape, 1972. Pp. 253; £4.50. Towards a New Ireland by Garret Fitzgerald. London: Knight, 1972. Pp. viii+190; £2.50.