Anthropology

Reproducibility and observer agreement are critical to the produc-tion of standardized and comparable data sets. The reproducibility of record-ing methodology is a current issue in entheseal change studies. The effects of a picture reference guide on current entheseal change methodology are ex-plored in the hope of increasing observer agreement and thus overall applica-bility of the picture reference guide method in a variety of archaeological con-texts. The picture guide seems marginally effective; however, it requires a few modifications and subsequent testing before full-scale implementation.

Entheseal changes (EC), formally musculoskeletal stress markers, are the recordation of osteophytic change at an enthesis (any muscular origin or insertion). Study of EC is valuable in decoding past life activities, social dynamics, and health through the quantification of reactive osseous changes at entheses. The current study assesses EC to ascertain activity patterns at the Late Mississippian Dallas Phase (~1300-1550 AD) site of Toqua, aboriginally located in the lower Little Tennessee River Valley of East Tennessee. Toqua was a multiple mound, palisaded settlement of maize-intensive agriculturalists. The subsistence strategy may have required intense and possibly specialized labor of the upper arms and shoulders. This study compares entheseal scores of 96 individuals at the origins of biceps brachii, triceps brachii, deltoideus, and pectoralis major on the humerus, radius, and ulna of males (n=48) and females (n=46). These adults are separated into three age-at-death groups: Young Adult (15-30 years of age [yoa]), Middle Adult (31-44 yoa), and Old Adult (45-55+ yoa). The data suggests changes and transitions in social roles or labor patterns as people senesce and tentatively supports a heterarchical social organization. Burial patterns both here and at other Dallas Phase sites and ethnohistoric evidence support this notion. Power relationship within the Dallas phase and at this site may have been more horizontally than vertically complex. This sample does not reflect sustained, life-long labor, but rather reflects the heterarchical or fluid social roles and power relationships reflected in the SE Appalachian mortuary patterns and programs.

In this study we evaluated migration models to the Americas by using the information contained in native mitochondrial genomes (mitogenomes) from North America. Molecular and phylogeographic analyses of B2a mitogenomes, which are absent in Eskimo-Aleut and northern Na-Dene speakers, revealed that this haplogroup arose in North America ∼11-13 ka from one of the founder Paleo-Indian B2 mitogenomes. In contrast, haplogroup A2a, which is typical of Eskimo-Aleuts and Na-Dene, but also present in the easternmost Siberian groups, originated only 4-7 ka in Alaska, led to the first Paleo-Eskimo settlement of northern Canada and Greenland, and contributed to the formation of the Na-Dene gene pool. However, mitogenomes also show that Amerindians from northern North America, without any distinction between Na-Dene and non-Na-Dene, were heavily affected by an additional and distinctive Beringian genetic input. In conclusion, most mtDNA variation (along the double-continent) stems from the first wave from Beringia, which followed the Pacific coastal route. This was accompanied or followed by a second inland migratory event, marked by haplogroups X2a and C4c, which affected all Amerindian groups of Northern North America. Much later, the ancestral A2a carriers spread from Alaska, undertaking both a westward migration to Asia and an eastward expansion into the circumpolar regions of Canada. Thus, the first American founders left the greatest genetic mark but the original maternal makeup of North American Natives was subsequently reshaped by additional streams of gene flow and local population dynamics, making a three-wave view too simplistic.

Citation: Achilli A, Perego UA, Lancioni H, Olivieri A, Gandini F, Kashani BH, Battaglia V, Grugni V, Angerhofer N, Rogers MP, Herrera RJ, Woodward SR, Labuda D, Smith DG, Cybulski JS, Semino O, Malhi RS, and Torroni A. Reconciling migration models to the Americas with the variation of North American native mitogenomes. 2013. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 110 (35): 14308-14313 doi:10.1073/pnas.1306290110.