INTRODUCTION

TO FORENSIC
ANTHROPOLOGY
Forensic Anthropology

➢It is the field of study that deals with the analysis of human skeletal
remains resulting from unexplained deaths
➢ Since forensic anthropology employs the principles of
anthropology to analyze legal problems involving human skeletal
remains, it is an applied science that embraces both
anthropological and forensic studies.

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Five Main Goals

1. When soft tissues has deteriorated to the point that demographic

characteristics of a body cannot be determined by visual inspection, it
attempts to determine ancestry, sex, age and living height from the
skeleton.
2. When there is evidence of traumatic injury to the human bone, it
attempts to identify the nature of the traumas and their causative agents
with the intent of gathering information pertaining to the cause and
manner of death.

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3. Since it studies the amount of deterioration that occurs in
cadavers over time, it often renders a determination of the
postmortem interval – the amount of time that has passed since the
person have died.
4. Because it is acquainted with the methods of archaeology, it can
assist in locating and recovering buried or surface remains in such a
manner that all evidence relevant to a forensic investigation is
collected.
5. Using the unique features present in virtually all skeletons, it can
provide information useful in obtaining positive identifications of
deceased persons.
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Historical Background

Thomas Dwight (1843-1911)

➢He researched methods for determining
age, height, and sex from the sternum;
estimating stature without using bones of
the arms and legs; determining age at
death from closure of joints between the
bones of the skull; and estimating sex
from joints of long bones.

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a. Formative Years: Early 1800s to 1938

➢George Parkman Murder (1849) - victim

➢John W. Webster
➢Oliver Wendell Holmes I and Jeffries Wyman
➢Adolph Leutgert (1897)
➢Louisa Leugert - victim
➢George A. Dorsey

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b. Consolidation Period: 1939 to 1971

➢Wilton Marion Krogma (1903-1987)

➢Guide to the Identification of Human Skeletal Material (1939)
➢Summarized what was known about the human skeleton up to that
time
➢The Human Skeleton in Forensic Medicine (1962) – the first book
devoted to the application of the study of human bone to
forensics.

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Two Major Events:
1. World War II
➢bodies could not be recovered or were severely disfigured.
➢Central Identification Laboratory in Hawaii
➢Mildred Trotter improved ways of determining stature from the lengths
of long bones, and the result of her work is a standard set of formulas
used for determining stature from skeletonized remains.

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2. Korean War
➢Thomas Dale Stewart and Thomas McKern: Skeletal Age Changes
in Young American Males (1957)- still provides standards for
determining age from skeletal remains.
➢T. Dale Stewart: Essentials of Forensic Anthropology (1979)

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3. Modern Period: 1972 to the Present

➢American Academy of Forensic Science (1948)

➢Physical Anthropology Section (1972) met to set minimum number of
members required by AAFS

➢American Board of Forensic Anthropology (1977)

➢To ensure competence of persons practicing forensic anthropology
➢Forensic Anthropology Data Bank (University of Tennessee)
➢1986, to collect information on documented forensic cases

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Methods of Forensic Anthropology

The Forensic Anthropology Protocol (Clyde Collins Snow, 1982)

1. Are the remains human?
2. Do they represent every single individual or the commingled remains of
several?
3. When did the death occur?
4. How old was the decedent?
5. What was the decedent’s sex?

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6. What was the decedent’s race?
7. What was the decedent’s stature?, body weight?, physique?
8. Does the skeleton (or) body exhibit any signification anatomical
anomalies, signs of old disease and injuries or other characteristics
which, singly or in combination, are sufficiently unique to provide
positive identification of the decedent?
9. What was the cause of death? (gunshot wound, blunt force
trauma, tuberculosis, unknown)
10. What was the manner of death? (natural, accident, suicide,
homicide, unknown)

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Skeletal Remains as Evidence

Forensic Anthropologists utilize a biocultural approach to determine

medico-legal significance
➢Is the material bone?
➢Is the material human bone?
➢Is the material modern?
➢Is the material of forensic significance?

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Data Gathering Method

1. Anthroposcopy: visual inspection of the human body, sometimes

with the aid of x-rays or a hand-held lens, for the purpose of
identifying traits of qualitative nature.

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 (a) Is a larger and more heavily built than the one on the right (b). This would lead to an
opinion that skull (b) was from the female.

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2. Osteometry: measurement of
human bone on an objective scale
(usually in millimeters and
centimeters) using calipers or an
osteometric board.
➢Metric methods attempt to
quantify many of the
anthroposcopic characteristics
used in the identification of
aspects of skeleton.

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Simply measuring the humerus of a person and multiplying its length by 5 will yield a rough estimate of the
height of the individual from whom the bone was derived. Results of the analysis of metric data often are
expressed in terms of probability (80% of the analysis that the person was male) or ranges of values (stature
is between 5 feet, 3 inches and 5 feet, 7 inches)

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3. Chemical Methods: analyzing the chemical makeup of certain
structures of the skeleton and associated matter (e.g., the ground
beneath a decomposing body). These methods involve sampling
matter and applying special techniques to determine their nature.
4. Histology: The study of the microstructure of bone and under a
microscope to determine demographic characteristics (especially
age)

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Data Analysis Method

1. Decision Table: helps researchers to judge the

importance of conflicting information so that they can arrive
at a single conclusion (e.g., although the skeleton has some
characteristics of males, the most likely sex is female)

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Decision Table for Determining Noncontemporary from Contemporary Remains

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2. Range Charts: Charting the ranges of the
features and see where the most overlap
occurs. In this manner, the most likely estimate
can be obtained.

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3. Indexes: These are simple, but powerful statistics for quantifying
anthroposcopic traits. The values of indexes vary among groups.
Thus, calculating the index on an unknown skeleton can lead to a
determination of group membership.

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Measurements of the human nose: (a) width; (b) height).

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4. Discriminant Functions: Unlike
indexes, discriminant functions use
any number of measurements to
distinguish two or more
predetermined groups.

Graphical representation of discrimination

function (line I) for separating Whites from
Blacks using nasal width and height
Graph of the nasal index for Whites and Blacks
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4. Regression Equations: Predicting the size of one characteristic
from the size of another. This was developed by Sir Thomas Galton in
his studies of inheritance.
➢For instance, the length of the inside bone of the foot (metatarsal 1)
against stature for 22 Black persons of both sexes. Longer foot
bones are associated with taller people.

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 Graph of length of metatarsal 1 against stature showing regression

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Conclusion:

Forensic anthropology is a subfield within anthropology that deals

with the analysis of medicolegally significant human skeletons.
Although the history of forensic anthropology in the US starts in the
1800s, the discipline did not form as a field separate from the rest of
anthropology until the mid-1900s. There are protocols and methods
used by forensic anthropologists to estimate the demographic
characteristics of skeletal remains.

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