engleski

Subadult health and diseases in the medieval and early modern period population from Gora, Croatia

The Gothic Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary is situated in Gora (Banovina, Croatia), a well-known medieval site occupied by military orders (Knights Templars and Hospitallers). The church itself bears its beginnings sometimes earlier, in the Romanesque period, and the site was used for burials from the beginning of the 11th century, throughout the late medieval and early modern period, up to the end of the 18th century. Rescue archaeological excavations conducted from 2008 to 2011 uncovered 424 burials in the church itself and along the outer perimeter of the church walls. As about 40% of the total osteological sample consists of subadult individuals, the focus of the research is the analysis of the physiological health of the medieval and early modern period subadult population buried at this site. The mortality rates and the health status are explored through different age groups, the latter using standard subadult stress markers such as nonspecific periostitis, cribra orbitalia and linear enamel hypoplasia in permanent dentition. The specificity of the subadult sample from Gora is a high number of metabolic diseases. About 10% of the sample shows signs of vitamin C deficiency (scurvy) and about 5 % of the sample shows signs of vitamin D deficiency (rickets). Because of their well-known aetiology and characteristic markings on the dry bone, these metabolic diseases are ideal for gaining a deeper insight into the researched population’s health and survival rates.

Gora ; Croatia ; subadult health ; rickets ; scurvy

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