Superior in Life—Superior in Death
| Autor: | Carola Metzner-Nebelsick, Christian Meyer, Leif Hansen, Bernd Zich, Elke Nieveler, Kurt W. Alt, Hildrun Schreiber, Marc Fecher, Petra Held, Corina Knipper, Vera Hubensack, Nicole Nicklisch |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2015 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | Current Anthropology. 56:579-589 |
| ISSN: | 1537-5382 0011-3204 |
| Popis: | Food production provoked social inequality in agricultural societies. Starting in the European late Neolithic, conspicuously equipped inhumations with elaborate grave architecture indicated representatives of local and possibly regional elites. However, burials are always shaped by a complex combination of the desires of the deceased and of the bereaved, along with ritual customs and norms. Therefore, a superior burial may not always be preceded by long-term superior life conditions. One widely accepted characteristic of social distinction is access to different, supposedly higher-quality food, which is deducible from light stable isotope analysis of carbon and nitrogen in bone collagen (δ13C and δ15N). Four remarkable cases of high-elite individuals from the modern territory of Germany spanning from the Early Bronze Age to Medieval times exhibited δ15N values that exceeded those of contemporaneous “commoner” populations significantly. This demonstrates outstanding dietary compositions, including larger s... |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
| Externí odkaz: |
|