For my burial report I’m using ‘burial two’.

In the grave theirs two bodies placed next to each other.

Body ‘307’ is lay flat on their back with their arms and legs lay straight and flat. Besides them is ‘382’
and lay horizontally across them in the same position. Besides ‘382’s left leg on the right Is a small
pile of bones labelled ‘282’ and don’t appear to belong to either body. Body ‘307’ is buried with
various jewellery including bone bracelets with copper alloy rivets along with some glass beads.
Other information we can learn from first impressions is that body’307’ is also slightly shorter then
‘382’. The image given is a sketch of the original site so other aspects such as soil types and where
the body is in the decaying process can’t be determined visually.

The first thing I would determine is their basic biological facts such as gender, age and nationality. For
determining their gender. The main method I would use is to look at their pelvic structure. Males
have larger, stronger bones and joint surfaces, as well as increased bone growth at muscle
attachment points. However, due to different characteristics specialised for childbearing, the pelvis is
the best sex-related skeletal indication. This means the female pelvis is wider and more open and
circular. In this burial body ‘307’ appears to be female and ‘382’ is male. Other indications of this are
how ‘307’ is also shorter alongside ‘382’. (Anon., n.d.).

next to determine age. Its clear both bodies are adults but to get a more precise age you can look at
how the skeleton is affected by wear and tear during a lifetime. Arthritis of the spine and joints might
indicate advancing age. Many additional signs of ageing are also recognised by scientists, such as the
look of the rib ends and the cartilage that connects them to the sternum. The rib end walls of a
young adult are robust and smooth, with a scalloped or rounded edge. The walls of an older adult
are thin, with sharp edges, and the rim often has bony, uneven protrusion. Further information can
be obtained by looking at ‘bone remodelling’. Bone continually produces new osteons, which are
minute tubes carrying blood vessels. Microscopic examinations reveal these alterations, which can
pinpoint an adult's age to within 5 to 10 years. Younger people have fewer, bigger osteons. As new
ones emerge and disturb existing ones, elderly adults have fewer osteons and more osteon pieces.
Looking at the cranium in particular as During childhood, the bones that surround the brain come
together along lines known as cranial sutures. Adult bone "remodelling" may gradually remove these
lines at varying speeds. The closure of cranial sutures provides general information about an
individual's age.

To find out the individual races. The easiest way to determine this is by taking into account where the
body was found geographically as that’s the most likely indicator of their race, however immigration
between means that this isn’t a definite indicator so we have to look closer at the bones
themselves .It is impossible to determine a person's lineage from a single bone. Instead, we utilise
callipers to collect bone measurements. The skull is regarded the most significant bone for race
determination since without it, the origin of race cannot be precisely defined. Forensic
anthropologists employ skull lengths, widths, and forms, as well as population-specific dental traits,
to help them make a conclusion.

When it comes to determining social class, an immediate indicator is what the bodies were buried
with. Jewellery is a big determiner as different materials and quality of them. Jewellery can also
determine what era the graves are from by looking at what materials and styles were common
throughout the years. In this grave in particular we can date it to around the 4th century AD, where
the use of these bangles had become more widespread in the general population, with materials like
as bone or copper alloy being utilised instead of precious metals. This also tell us that they were low
to middle class as the materials were quite common. (Escandon, n.d.). Other ways you could
determine class is by looking at their bones to see if they had a rich diet, as lack of one would
assume poverty.

Once you have all the basic information of the bodies you can start to find out their cause of death. If
the cause of death was violent and not something like old age or sickness you can look for fractures,
however you have to be careful as the majority of fractures are not deadly. Healing can be evident
around the borders of a wound when trauma occurs before death. However, 'perimortem' trauma
from the moment of death shows no indications of recovery. Examples of these include Fractures
occur as a result of pressures on the bone, causing it to crack and break; sharp force trauma occurs
when a sharp instrument, such as a blade or broken glass, comes into contact with the bone; and
blunt force trauma occurs as a result of impact from a blunt object. (Dunning, n.d.). disease can also
be shown in the bones. The location, features, and distribution of marks on a skeleton's bones can
serve as distinct "pathognomonic" indications of infection for various infectious diseases, such as
syphilis, tuberculosis, and leprosy. Most skeletal markers of sickness, however, are non-specific,
which means that bioarchaeologists may identify an individual was sick but not with what disease
today. Some diseases, such as plague and other viral infections like HIV and COVID-19, have no effect
on the skeleton. Furthermore, diseases that kill fast do not have enough time to leave a mark on
victims' bones. And if its old age similar features can be found by looking at how to determine age
which I previously mentioned.

After you’ve taken all the information you can from the bodies you take a step back to look at the
burial itself, this raises the question of why they’re buried. Using all the information previously
obtained information you can piece together the answer to this question. For example, if the bodies
were old or had signs of disease and buried with little artefacts you can assume its an average burial
caused by natural deaths. However, if the body died young and is decorated with numerous and
expensive items with an intentional cause of death you can come to the conclusion it’s a possible
sacrifice. In this case there’s two bodies together in one grave which is more unusual, even more
unusual is the 3rd party, pile of bones. So, the final step would be towards understanding why they
are placed there by using all the methods previously mentioned.

In conclusion when planning a research proposal factors to analyse include the body’s, age, class,
race, sex and cause of death. All these elements can teach us the reason for the burial.

Bibliography
Anon., n.d. smithsonian. [Online]
Available at: https://naturalhistory.si.edu/education/teaching-resources/written-bone/skeleton-
keys/male-or-female

Dunning, H., n.d. Analysing the bones: what can a skeleton tell you?. [Online]
Available at: https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/analysing-the-bones-what-can-a-skeleton-tell-
you.html
[Accessed 2023].

Escandon, C., n.d. allenarchaeology.. [Online]

Available at: https://www.allenarchaeology.co.uk/tag/grave-goods/
[Accessed 2023].