Is it correct that skeleton analysis can tell about if someone was a migrant?
I’ve just read the following passage and can’t understand how high concentration of a certain element in the bones can indicate the respective human was a migrant. Doen’t it merely mean that those people ORIGINATED FROM region growing certain kind of foods containing that element?
————-here the text——————————
“The discovery of distinctively shaped ceramic pots at various prehistoric sites scattered over a wide area has led archaeologists to ask how the pots were spread. … Now, analysis of the bones of prehistoric human skeletons can settle the debate: high levels of a certain metallic element contained in various foods are strongly associated with people who migrated to a new place after childhood. Many of the bones found near the pots at a few sites showed high levels of the metallic element. Therefore, it must be that the pots were spread by migration, not trade.”
Yes. You are right to think that trace element analysis of skeletal material can indicate certain things about diet. So can stable isotope ratios, another type of chemical analysis. Both techniques can also indicate whether an individual migrated to the area in which his or her remains were recovered.
Trace elemental ratios, such as strontium/calcium, exhibit regional variation. A range of values should be determined drawing on the faunal record of the area. Individuals from outside that area should exhibit values either below or above that range. The value will reflect that specific individual’s personal history, not that of his/her parentage or heritage in general (if this is what you mean by ‘originated from’?).
Strontium stable isotopes can also be used for this purpose. There are four isotopes of strontium and they are found in rock, groundwater, soil, plants, and animals. The strontium found in groundwater and soil is incorporated into plants and animals. Concentration and ratios of strontium isotopes vary with local geology. Strontium substitutes for calcium in the hydroxyapatite of teeth and bone. In humans, adult tooth enamel formed in childhood, so the strontium ratios in their tooth enamel will reflect the strontium isotope composition of the environment in which they grew up. As with the trace elements, if it’s different from that of the environment in which they’re found, it indicates they must have migrated there at some point.
That passage is a bit too overgeneralized, I think. It sounds like it’s saying that all migrants, from all places to all places, mysteriously have high trace elements of something, just for being migrants. It’s not that simple. It has to do with local variations in stable isotopes and trace elements in plants, animals, etc., and finding humans in a place where they don’t reflect the expected values of things for that place.
It’s some nifty stuff!
–Edit–
Just wanted to add that there are A LOT of considerations that have to be taken into accout with this kind of work. For example, dentin, enamal and bone apatite from the same individual will display different values (for reasons understood, but nonetheless it complicates things). Also, if you’re using migratory animals to determine the local range of values, these animals may skew your range so it doesn’t accurately reflect the locality. Often, due to costs of conducting the analysis as well as not having a lot of skeletal material to work with, sample sizes are often too small to draw conclusions that can stand on their own as “proof” of anything. And so on. Overall though, this kind of analysis can be very useful evidence supporting (or rejecting) a hypothesis about migration, diet, etc. Unexpected results have sometimes lead to much needed re-thinking of well-accepted hypotheses.
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