Paleobiology of Etruscan populations

A research project on the population biology of ancient Etruscans has recently started. The aim of this multidisciplinary research is the anthropological definition of Etruscan populations, about which little is known. The study of the skeletal remains is expected to lead to the identification of characteristics typical of this group, which will be used to establish affinities and differences with other contemporary Italic populations, as well as with previous and subsequent groups. An outline of the project is presented here, together with an indication of the problems concerning the availability of material. A summary of previous research on Etruscans is also given. In the final section, preliminary results are presented on one aspect of the research presently under way, namely the odontometric study of different groups of Etruscan populations. These results suggest a homogeneity within the groups described under the common label “Etruscans”.     

Reconstructing past cultural landscape and human impact using pollen and plant macroremains

Abstract

Three examples of plant landscape shaping, carried out by Iron Age populations living in different geographical areas, are presented. The examples differ in population type (Garamantes, Etruscans, and Romans), archaeological context (settlement, necropolis, furnace, port), and area of plant exploitation (respectively, Fezzan – Libyan Sahara and Tuscany, Latium – central Italy). The leitmotiv of the three parallel investigations highlighted that humans induced clear changes in plant cover modifying the quantitative ratio among native elements and spreading the plants of economic interest even outside of their natural habitats. Micro- and macroremain analyses once more enhanced that landscape reconstruction depends on both wild and cultivated plants, and that the cultural plant landscape is composed of a complex mixture of indigenous and exotic elements. Archaeobotany results in great help in reviewing ancient prejudices, rewriting history in a modern ecological view, also discovering a different role in the landscape evolution of past civilizations. In this light, the Garamantes deeply transformed the oases in agrarian producer sites, and the Etruscans, in the area of the Gulf of Follonica, modified the previous forest vegetation, probably enhancing the xeric features. The Romans, believed as the main creators of the environmental changes in the Mediterranean basin, surprisingly did not produce consistent plant changes in the area of the Tiber delta, in the surroundings of the imperial port of Rome, during the first century AD.     

Dental anthropology of Central-Southern,Iron Age Italy: The evidence of metric versus nonmetric traits

Discrete and metric dental traits are used to assess biological similarities and differences among 13 bioarchaeological populations located on each side of the Apennine mountains in central-southern Italy and dated to the first millennium BC . An initial hypothesis, that the mountain chain might provide a significant geographical barrier for population movement (resulting in greater biological affinities among those groups on the same side), is not supported. Instead, the samples appear to cluster more on the basis of time than geography. Archaeological evidence, however, supports an association between populations on opposite sides of the mountains and thus is in accord with the dental data. As anticipated, discrete dental traits appear to be more useful than metric dental traits in assessing such population affinities. This research represents a beginning to a better comprehension of the complexity of the biological and cultural dynamics of Italian populations during recent millennia. Am J Phys Anthropol 107:371–386, 1998. © 1998 Wiley-Liss, Inc.