“A Bioarchaeological Approach to a Study of an Ancient Egyptian Population of Saqqara”
Iwona Kozieradzka-Ogunmakin
KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology, University of Manchester, United Kingdom
A bioarchaeological approach in investigating ancient Egyptian populations is not commonly applied, and archaeological and biological data are still being studied separately. This research intends to demonstrate the potential of multidisciplinary studies by using a combination of archaeological attributes and skeletal indicators of health in order to explore the nature of social structure and processes of social change in an ancient Egyptian population of Saqqara. The study is based on a biocultural analysis of the funerary customs and human remains from a multi-period cemetery where the funerary activity took place during the Old Kingdom (2686-2181 BC) and Late to Ptolemaic periods (664-30 BC).
The social structure of the cemetery population has been assessed based on the funerary wealth of the burials, and has been found to comprise inhumations of the social élite of the Old Kingdom, and the middle and lower social classes of the Late and Ptolemaic periods. The examination of the skeletal remains intends to establish whether the overall health status of the individual at the time of death correlated with their social status and to what extent the observed patterns of social and biological status changed over the period of use of the cemetery.
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