The utility of hand and foot bones for the determination of sex and the estimation of stature in a prehistoric population from west-central Illinois

This study focuses on hands and feet as indicators of sex and stature for Native Americans, hitherto relatively neglected in this regard. The study was performed on a large, well-preserved prehistoric skeletal sample from west-central Illinois. Discriminant functions are presented which determine sex with accuracies exceeding 87%. Those functions are then tested on three other Native American samples and found to have similar high degrees of accuracy. The utility of hand and foot bones for estimation of femur length (and subsequent inclusion in stature estimation equations) is also explored. While indirect estimation of stature is determined to be possible in this manner, it is suggested that these and other stature estimation techniques that have large standard errors may be of limited archaeological or forensic value. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Life‐history theory,past human populations and climatic perturbations

A sensitivity and elasticity analysis is performed on historical life‐tables, that of Swedish females from 1751–1755 and 1966–1970, i.e. during and after the Little Ice Age. Coupled with life‐history theory, this approach supplies us with some ideas on how stature can be understood as a proxy for conditions during the intrauterine growth, important if we aspire to calibrate proposed climatic perturbations and their effect on past societies. Matrix population models represent a versatile tool that has been used extensively in conservation biology, ecology, primatology and evolutionary demography. As of yet, applications in bioarchaeology/human osteology have been restricted to population forecasting. The following paper introduces matrix population models and discusses their use in bioarchaeology. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

论纳兰词的思想境界

纳兰性德的词在清词中首屈一指,但在文学史中地位不高,大多源于人们认为纳兰词无病呻吟,思想境界不高。文章将纳兰词与李煜、晏几道、李清照的词作对比,展示其叛逆、纯真、旷达的积极面,认为文学史应该给他在我国词发展史上更高、更重要的地位。     

Reassessing the Age,Sex and Metric Variation of Commingled Human Remains from a 1911 Excavation of a Neolithic Passage Tomb Complex in North‐West Ireland

The Neolithic passage tomb complex at Carrowkeel, County Sligo, Ireland, is one of the best preserved and most significant megalithic funerary and ritual landscapes in Europe. The most substantial archaeological excavations at the complex were undertaken in 1911, from which a relatively large sample of commingled unburnt and cremated human remains from seven chambered passage tombs was recovered. Although the archaeological value of this material is reduced as its spatial and stratigraphic context is uncertain, the skeletal remains have the potential to provide insights into how these monuments were used. This study is a quantitative reassessment of that osteological material from the passage tombs excavated in 1911, with a focus on a contextual analysis of the remains. Overall, the age‐at‐death and sex ratios do not indicate any demographic differentiation between monuments in selecting locations for the deposition of bodies, and there is no clear evidence to suggest any selectiveness of certain skeletal elements took place. There may however have been a differentiating age and gender aspect in terms of the unburnt versus cremated bone surface depositions within the passage tombs, as a higher proportion of 5+ years non‐adults and adult females were present in the cremated material. By using the log‐ratio metric scaling technique on the cremated adult material, a statistically significant difference in skeletal dimensions is observed between individual passage tombs; however, it is unclear how significant this disparity is from a biocultural point of view. Despite apparent methodological difficulties in assessing an archaeological bone assemblage collected by early 20th‐century antiquarians, the material can still yield new knowledge about the rituals conducted at Carrowkeel. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.