During the late 3rd millennium BCE, the Eastern Mediterranean and Near East witnessed societal changes in many regions, which are usually explained with a combination of social and climatic ...factors.1–4 However, recent archaeogenetic research forces us to rethink models regarding the role of infectious diseases in past societal trajectories.5 The plague bacterium Yersinia pestis, which was involved in some of the most destructive historical pandemics,5–8 circulated across Eurasia at least from the onset of the 3rd millennium BCE,9–13 but the challenging preservation of ancient DNA in warmer climates has restricted the identification of Y. pestis from this period to temperate climatic regions. As such, evidence from culturally prominent regions such as the Eastern Mediterranean is currently lacking. Here, we present genetic evidence for the presence of Y. pestis and Salmonella enterica, the causative agent of typhoid/enteric fever, from this period of transformation in Crete, detected at the cave site Hagios Charalambos. We reconstructed one Y. pestis genome that forms part of a now-extinct lineage of Y. pestis strains from the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age that were likely not yet adapted for transmission via fleas. Furthermore, we reconstructed two ancient S. enterica genomes from the Para C lineage, which cluster with contemporary strains that were likely not yet fully host adapted to humans. The occurrence of these two virulent pathogens at the end of the Early Minoan period in Crete emphasizes the necessity to re-introduce infectious diseases as an additional factor possibly contributing to the transformation of early complex societies in the Aegean and beyond.
•We provide genetic evidence of Y. pestis and S. enterica from Bronze Age Crete•The Y. pestis genome is part of an extinct lineage of non-flea-adapted strains•Ancient S. enterica genomes cluster with contemporary non-host-adapted strains•The isolates coincide with societal changes ca. 2,000 BCE in Eastern Mediterranean
Neumann et al. reconstruct ancient Y. pestis and S. enterica genomes from Crete around 2,000 BCE, a period of significant societal change in the region. Both strains are part of now-extinct lineages, but their existence suggests the importance of considering infectious diseases as a contributing factor to societal transformations.
This paper presents the earliest evidence for the exploitation of lignite (brown coal) in Europe and sheds new light on the use of combustion fuel sources in the 2nd millennium BCE Eastern ...Mediterranean. We applied Thermal Desorption/Pyrolysis-Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry and Polarizing Microscopy to the dental calculus of 67 individuals and we identified clear evidence for combustion markers embedded within this calculus. In contrast to the scant evidence for combustion markers within the calculus samples from Egypt, all other individuals show the inhalation of smoke from fires burning wood identified as Pinaceae, in addition to hardwood, such as oak and olive, and/or dung. Importantly, individuals from the Palatial Period at the Mycenaean citadel of Tiryns and the Cretan harbour site of Chania also show the inhalation of fire-smoke from lignite, consistent with the chemical signature of sources in the northwestern Peloponnese and Western Crete respectively. This first evidence for lignite exploitation was likely connected to and at the same time enabled Late Bronze Age Aegean metal and pottery production, significantly by both male and female individuals.
The Neolithic and Bronze Ages were highly transformative periods for the genetic history of Europe but for the Aegean-a region fundamental to Europe's prehistory-the biological dimensions of cultural ...transitions have been elucidated only to a limited extent so far. We have analysed newly generated genome-wide data from 102 ancient individuals from Crete, the Greek mainland and the Aegean Islands, spanning from the Neolithic to the Iron Age. We found that the early farmers from Crete shared the same ancestry as other contemporaneous Neolithic Aegeans. In contrast, the end of the Neolithic period and the following Early Bronze Age were marked by 'eastern' gene flow, which was predominantly of Anatolian origin in Crete. Confirming previous findings for additional Central/Eastern European ancestry in the Greek mainland by the Middle Bronze Age, we additionally show that such genetic signatures appeared in Crete gradually from the seventeenth to twelfth centuries BC, a period when the influence of the mainland over the island intensified. Biological and cultural connectedness within the Aegean is also supported by the finding of consanguineous endogamy practiced at high frequencies, unprecedented in the global ancient DNA record. Our results highlight the potential of archaeogenomic approaches in the Aegean for unravelling the interplay of genetic admixture, marital and other cultural practices.
Presents the study of the finds from the Mycenaean cemetery of Clauss near Patras, carried out between 1988-1992 under the direction of Prof. Thanassis Papadopoulos. During the excavation project, ...fifteen chamber tombs were located and researched in detail, to be added to those already known from the pre-war excavations by Nikolaos Kyparissis.
The burials in this tomb provided evidence of physical adaptation to the environment in which the people lived, of tuberculosis or brucellosis probably contracted through consumption of produce from ...infected animals, of professional intervention for the healing of a broken limb, of living conditions on Crete perhaps better than on the mainland reflected by the tall stature of burial III, of burial IV’s diminished stature and dental hypoplasia that reflect an increasingly stratified society adversely affecting the social gender of women.
The Mycenaean Cemetery at Achaia Clauss near Patras: People, material remains and culture in context' comprises the study of the finds from the excavation of the Mycenaean cemetery of Clauss near ...Patras, carried out by the University of Ioannina and the Archaeological Society at Athens from 1988 to 1992, under the direction of Professor Thanassis Papadopoulos. In the course of the excavation project, fifteen chambered tombs were located and researched in detail, to be added to those already known from the pre-war excavations by Nikolaos Kyparissis. The presentation of the topic expands into seven thematic chapters: from a general review of the cemetery space and the sites, to analytical description of the excavation, remarks on the architecture, study of the finds, analysis of the burial customs and finally, narration of the overall history of the cemetery according to chronological period and generation of its occupants. The eighth and last chapter is an addendum including a brief presentation of the anthropological analysis of the skeletal material by Photini J. P. McGeorge and Wieslaw Wieckowski. The Mycenaean cemetery at Achaia Clauss near Patras presents fragments of the life and death of some members of a local community that existed for almost four centuries at the western end of the Mycenaean world.
The present study, using modern analytical methods, is the first comprehensive discussion of the physical anthropology of Crete in the third and second millennia BC. The text is divided into ten ...chapters of which the first three are introductory. The first chapter summarizes previous anthropological research on Crete and sets out the aims of the thesis. The second chapter describes Crete's geographical situation and the known evidence for the prehistoric environment of the populations under study. The third chapter discusses their cultural background and also provides a chronological frame of reference. The following chapters present the material studied, much of it newly excavated, and describe the nature of the material and its archaeological context. Unfortunately very little early skeletal material survives, so that this investigation mainly relies on later, better preserved material from numerous Minoan chamber tombs. The demographic data extracted is discussed. The methods of multivariate analysis of the metrical data and their results are described giving their interpretation. There follows a discussion of the non-metrical traits observed in the population and their possible biological significance. The evidence of oral and skeletal pathology, using photographic and radiographic illustrations, is presented and discussed. In the final chapter, the conclusions, the biological variation of the Cretan population and links with mainland Greece and the rest of the Eastern Mediterranean are considered. Some insight into the relationships between the populations is offered.
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