Provider: Moravian Museum, Brno, Czech Republic

TY  - JOUR
JO  - Anthropologie (Brno)
TI  - SEX DETERMINATION USING ARCHAEOLOGICAL,
ANTHROPOLOGICAL, AND GENETIC METHODS –
A COMPARATIVE STUDY ON A MEROVINGIAN
POPULATION FROM GOTHA – BOILSTÄDT
AU  - Nováček J
AU  - Mazanec J
AU  - Bretschneider A
AU  - Flux AL
AU  - Tannhäuser C
AU  - Hummel S
Y1  - 2022
VL  - 60
IS  - 2
PB  - Moravian Museum, Brno, Czech Republic
SN  - 0323-1119
SP  - 403
EP  - 432
KW  - Early Medieval burials – Central Germany – Morphological sex estimation – aDNA investigation –
Genetic fingerprinting – Multiplex X/Y-PCR – Archaeological gender evaluation
N2  - 
N2  - In bioarchaeological practice, many different approaches and methods of sex estimation in archaeological
skeletal specimens are in use. We compare three common approaches from archaeology, physical anthropology, and
molecular anthropology to investigate the sex of an individual.
The Merovingian graveyard of Gotha – Boilstädt in Central Germany dates from the 6th to the 8th century C.E.
There is archaeological evidence of early Christianity, however, many objects also indicate the existence of other notions
towards an afterlife. Altogether, 45 burial features contained human remains, in some cases there were multiple burials
or remains of older disturbed burials within one grave pit. In total, 52 individuals from inhumation graves were
investigated. Among them, 10 were subadults below 14 years, six were juveniles (14–20 years), and 36 were adults
above 20 years. Based on the grave goods, the sex (gender) of 20 individuals could be assessed, identifying 13 females,
including one subadult individual, and seven males. Employing the methods of physical anthropology, it was possible
to estimate the sex of one subadult individual (rather male), four juveniles (three probable males and one probable
female) and 32 adults (12 males, and 20 females). For aDNA investigation, the preservation of six individuals did not
allow any sampling and, therefore, these six individuals had to be excluded from further analysis. Among the remaining
46 individuals, the preservation of nuclear aDNA was mostly good, only in six individuals was extraction of aDNA not
possible. For one of the subadult individuals, it was not possible to determine the sex, the others were four males and
five females. The sex of only one juvenile individual could not be determined by aDNA, bringing the determination up to five male and one female juvenile in total. Among the adults, 12 males, 20 females, and 5 individuals with
indeterminable sex were identified. Several differences between the archaeological, anthropological, and genetic sex
estimations were identified during the investigation. These matches and differences form the topic of this paper.
ER  -