EAA2021: Abstract
Abstract is part of session #468:
Title & Content
Title:
Using aDNA as part of a multi-proxy approach to understand biological and social kinship of unusual burials from Portmahomack (Scotland)
Content:
The Tarbat Discovery Programme is best known for the excavation of an 8th-century Pictish monastic settlement which lay around and beneath the Church of St Colman, Portmahomack, Easter Ross, Scotland. The results of the 20-year research programme also identified exceptional archaeology belong to a later medieval settlement of the 13th to 16th centuries. Evidence for housing and craft-working was excavated, as well as over 80 medieval burials from the nave (Carver et al. 2016)
This paper presents the results of a recent scientific enquiry into a group of highly unusual burials, including a grave that contained six skulls. It was located in the central part of the nave of the church to accommodate an oak coffin containing the body of an adult male, bearing signs of perimortem sharp force injuries. This individual was buried with a group of four skulls around his head. Sometime later, the grave was reopened for the burial of a second man, an event accompanied by the rearrangement of the skull of the grave’s earlier occupant. These highly unusual burials have been the subject of a multi-proxy approach, combining detailed osteological study, radiocarbon dating including Bayesian analysis, multi-isotope analysis, facial reconstruction and ancient DNA analysis. For the aDNA, nine samples were targeted from which eight yielded genome-wide data.
Results highlight that seven of the individuals are males, with only one female was identified. They also show a high diversity of mitochondrial DNA and a relatively low diversity of the Y chromosome. Kinship analysis performed on these samples indicates a family composed of five individuals, including a woman.
Altogether, the data allows different scenarios for this family to be constructed and provides insight into Scottish clan organisation.
This paper presents the results of a recent scientific enquiry into a group of highly unusual burials, including a grave that contained six skulls. It was located in the central part of the nave of the church to accommodate an oak coffin containing the body of an adult male, bearing signs of perimortem sharp force injuries. This individual was buried with a group of four skulls around his head. Sometime later, the grave was reopened for the burial of a second man, an event accompanied by the rearrangement of the skull of the grave’s earlier occupant. These highly unusual burials have been the subject of a multi-proxy approach, combining detailed osteological study, radiocarbon dating including Bayesian analysis, multi-isotope analysis, facial reconstruction and ancient DNA analysis. For the aDNA, nine samples were targeted from which eight yielded genome-wide data.
Results highlight that seven of the individuals are males, with only one female was identified. They also show a high diversity of mitochondrial DNA and a relatively low diversity of the Y chromosome. Kinship analysis performed on these samples indicates a family composed of five individuals, including a woman.
Altogether, the data allows different scenarios for this family to be constructed and provides insight into Scottish clan organisation.
Keywords:
aDNA, Kinship, Late Medieval, Clan organisation
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authors
Main authors:
Claire-Elise FISCHER1
Co-author:
Iñigo Olalde2,3
David Reich4,5,6,7
Ian Armit1
Martin Carver1
Cecily Spall8
David Reich4,5,6,7
Ian Armit1
Martin Carver1
Cecily Spall8
Affiliations:
1 Department of Archaeology, University of York, York YO1 7EP, UK
2 Institute of Evolutionary Biology, CSIC - Universitat Pompeu Fabra, 08003 Barcelona, Spain
3 Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA
4 Department of Human Evolutionary 46 Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138
5 Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA 02142, USA
6 Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA
7 Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
8 FAS HERITAGE
2 Institute of Evolutionary Biology, CSIC - Universitat Pompeu Fabra, 08003 Barcelona, Spain
3 Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA
4 Department of Human Evolutionary 46 Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138
5 Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA 02142, USA
6 Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA
7 Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
8 FAS HERITAGE