Review Articles · Review R2

Intrinsic and Extrinsic Factors Involved in the Preservation of Non-Adult Skeletal Remains in Archaeology and Forensic Science

Manifold BM

Forensic Science Seminar · 2013 · Volume 3 · Issue 2 · pp. 82–92

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Abstract

Human skeletal remains offers the most direct insight into the health, well-being, and the lifestyles of both past and modern populations, as well as the study of violence and traumas encountered both from archaeological and forensic contexts. They also allow archaeologists and anthropologists to reconstruction demographic details, none more so than those of children, where mortality rates were high in most human populations until the twentieth century. The study of children within biological anthropology had being taking place for many years now, but studies of mortality and morbidity are often hindered by the poor preservation of their skeletons or infrequent representation of skeletal elements. Taphonomic processes are often cited as the cause of this ‘under-representation’ of children from archaeological investigations. This phenomenon is thought to be as a result of the inability of non-adult bone to survive the changing conditions of the burial environment in which they are interred. Taphonomic factors can be divided into two types: intrinsic (resistance to bone) and extrinsic (environmental influences), both of which exert influence on the long term survival of non-adult bone. This paper aims to review the many intrinsic and extrinsic factors which can alter human bone and contribute to its deterioration in the burial environment in both archaeology and forensic science.

Keywords: Forensic science; Bioarchaeology; Taphonomy; Children; Skeletal remains

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