Lower and middle paleolithic of northern Asia: Achievements,problems, and perspectives

Considerable progress has been made in recent years in the study of the Lower and Middle Paleolithic of northern Asia. There is growing evidence for initial human occupation before 700,000 years ago—as early as elsewhere in Asia—and for a very early adaptation to the arctic desert environment. New models of Lower Paleolithic settlement involve expansion and reduction of occupation in response to climatic variation, rather than simple colonization followed by steady occupation. The Middle Paleolithic of northern Asia is better documented, including actual finds of archaicHomo sapiens. The transition to the Upper Paleolithic seems to involve the survival of earlier cultural traits, but the mechanisms and processes are not well understood. Further significant knowledge concerning these periods awaits the development of common methodologies for classification and analysis.     

“Tooting One's Horn” and Lauding One's Fellow in the Construction of a History of Anthropological Theory

The notion of lobbying for a place in the history of anthropological theory is used to frame the importance of the autobiography, collected works, Festschrift essays, and biography reviewed here. Ranging from bottom-up historicism, behavioral paleoanthropology, and French structural Marxism to historical particularism, the books by or about Stocking, Freeman, Godelier, and Mead emphasize the contributions of each while staking out a new or extended intellectual territory or status in the fluid (re)writing of the theoretical history of the discipline.     

The Foramina Transversaria of The Sunghir 2 and 3 Cervical Vertebrae

The Mid Upper Paleolithic immature Sunghir 2 and 3 skeletal remains exhibit non-closure and doubling of several of their cervical vertebral foramina transversaria. Both exhibit non-closure of the atlas (C1) foramina. Sunghir 3 also exhibits foraminal non-closure in her C4 to C5. Sunghir 2 has doubling of the foramen on C4 and C6, whereas Sunghir 3 has it on C4 to C6. The anatomical distribution of these variants places Sunghir 2 and 3 at the limits of recent human cervical vertebral morphological variation. The correspondence between these variants and vascular pathways is unclear, and therefore their implications remain uncertain.     

Human remains from the Moravian Gravettian: morphology and taphonomy of additional elements from Dolní Vĕstonice II and Pavlov I

Zooarchaeological analysis of the earlier Mid Upper Paleolithic (MUP) (Pavlovian) assemblages from Dolní Vĕstonice II and Pavlov I, southern Moravia, have yielded 11 additional remains from Dolní Vĕstonice II (five of which may be associated) and 20 remains from Pavlov I (16 of which come from a pair of hands, Pavlov 31). These remains are those of early modern humans, albeit with a few generally archaic features. At least two of them represent very tall individuals, among the tallest known for the Upper Paleolithic. These remains also raise the question, previously posed, as to the nature of differential treatment of the dead among MUP humans, given the presence of ritual burials, isolated bones and (with Pavlov 31) selected associated anatomy. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

新疆于田县流水墓地26号墓出土人骨的古病理学和人类学初步研究

前言古病理学作为一个新的研究领域,主要是对考古发掘出土的人骨进行自然科学范畴的医学检查,因此这一科学领域涉及到医学、人类学和考古学。古病理学研究的对象通常为出土的古代人骨,也有很少量的干尸,甚至还有在沼泽中保存的尸体。因为考