Christopher J Knüsel
Biographic Data
| ID | 902145 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Christopher J Knüsel |
| GIVEN NAMES | Christopher J |
| FAMILY NAME | Knüsel |
| SIGNATURE | KNÜSEL C J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Bradford |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2506-3652 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 83 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 659 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 83 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1992 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 13 |
Microtrauma at the humeral medial epicondyle
OBJECTIVE: Lacunar lesions at the anterior medial collateral ligament (MCL) bundle attachment on the humeral medial epicondyle may represent partial avulsion fractures. This study developed and validated a quantitative approach to assess their morphology. MATERIALS: Two Neolithic samples were studied: Parisian Basin (France, N = 45) and Meuse Valley (Belgium, N = 25). METHODS: Lesions were extracted using a 3D protocol with ambient occlusion and …
An actualistic study into the effects of lime and gypsum on human remains for a better understanding of neolithic plaster burials in Southwest Asia
Pre-Pottery Neolithic plaster burials in Southwest Asia have received little attention to date despite their relative frequency. This study is the first experimental attempt to gauge the effect of lime and gypsum plaster on human decomposition. Three human donors were buried at the Australian Facility for Taphonomic Experimental Research (AFTER). The donors, bound with rope and partly covered with ochre, were placed on the left side in a flexed p…
Perspectives archéo-anthropologiques sur le siège de Tournai en 1709
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Quantifying surface changes at the medial epicondyle
International audience
Refuting the existence of Indonesian Homo erectus neurocranial affinities in Maré (Loyalty Islands, New Caledonia)
Au cours d'une expédition sur Maré (Îles Loyauté, Nouvelle-Calédonie), le père Marie-Joseph Dubois conduit des recherches anthropologiques l'amenant à théo- riser sur la présence de traits neurocrâniens d'Homo erectus indonésiens et d'influences biologiques polynésiennes. Pour tester ses hypothèses, un total de cinq crânes archéologiques de Maré ont été analysés par morphométrie linéaire pour : 1) estimer la présence d'affinité avec les H. erectu…
The Use-Life of Ancestors
When archaeologists discuss ‘ancestor cults’ or ‘ancestor veneration’, what this might entail in practice usually remains vague, leading to charges that the concept of ‘ancestors’ is often applied generically. In this article, the authors combine bioarchaeological, taphonomic, radiocarbon, and isotopic studies to explore the ritual practice of the selective retention, curation, and deposition of a group of human crania and mandibles. Between 5500…
A cranial injury from the earliest Gravettian at the Cro-Magnon rock shelter (Vézère Valley, Dordogne, southwest France)
Scratching the surface? A histotaphonomic study of human remains at Neolithic Çatalhöyük
The Routledge Handbook of Archaeothanatology
Lexicon of Terms Used in Archaeothanatology
653Preamble: This lexicon is not intended to be exhaustive but as indicative of the relevant published sources available, as well as to aid with definitions of terms when reading contributions herein and elsewhere. Where appropriate and possible, sources in English and French have been included for further reading and research purposes. All translations have been performed by the authors of this lexicon and verified, if possible, with those previ…
The Earliest European Burials
A pre-occupation with the dead, whether individually or collectively, is one of the most symbolic of human behaviours. Implicit in evidence for these behaviours are cognitive capacities that permit the expression of sentiments transmitting particular values through the actions made on behalf of the dead. These also reflect important social structuring principles of the group. Europe – from the Atlantic coast and the Iberian peninsula to the Ural …
Twenty-first century bioarchaeology
This article presents outcomes from a Workshop entitled "Bioarchaeology: Taking Stock and Moving Forward," which was held at Arizona State University (ASU) on March 6-8, 2020. Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the School of Human Evolution and Social Change (ASU), and the Center for Bioarchaeological Research (CBR, ASU), the Workshop's overall goal was to explore reasons why research proposals submitted by bioarchaeologists, both g…
No gentry but grave-makers
Archaeologists have adopted the Gini coefficient to evaluate unequal accumulations of material, supporting narratives modelled on modern inequality discourse. Proxies are defined for wealth and the household, to render 21st century-style economic tensions perceptible in the past. This ‘property paradigm’ treats material culture as a generic rather than substantive factor in unequal pasts. We question this framing while suggesting that the Gini co…
The unwritten history of medical treatment
Routledge Handbook of Archaeothanatology
The Two Cultures – An Unfinished Synthesis
Social memory through the mortuary and architectural use of pigments at Neolithic Çatalhöyük (7100 cal BC to 5950 cal BC)
Pigments are frequently associated with symbolic use and ritual performance, contributing to the creation of social memories in past and present societies. The Neolithic settlement of Çatalhöyük, central Anatolia, Turkey, features a roughly millennium-long occupation - from 7100 cal BC to 5950 cal BC - with an unusually large dataset of elaborate symbolic assemblages and subfloor burials, often associated with pigments. These elements make Çatalh…
Les vestiges humains gravettiens dans le Sud-Ouest de la France
Cette communication présente les principaux résultats du projet Gravett’Os, qui porte sur du matériel anthropologique du Sud-Ouest de la France (découvertes récentes et reprises des collections anciennes) associé au Gravettien (34-24 000 cal BP). Ce projet a permis l’identification de 32 individus provenant de 5 sites (Cussac, Fournol, Gargas, Abri Pataud, Cro-Magnon). Nos études confortent les analyses précédentes sur les comportements au Gravet…
La nécropole Rubané de Mulhouse-Est (Haut-Rhin, Alsace)
L’ensemble funéraire rubané moyen (5100 av. n.è.) de Mulhouse-Est, découvert fortuitement lors de l’exploitation d’une gravière dans les années 1960, présente le double intérêt de correspondre à la plus ancienne nécropole de la région, mais également à l’une des plus exceptionnelles, tant au niveau de l’état de conservation des os que de la richesse du mobilier funéraire. Le site a livré une vingtaine de sépultures, principalement individuelles, …
The Cro-Magnon babies
An analysis of modified human teeth at Neolithic Çatalhöyük, Turkey
Ancient Mycobacterium leprae genomes from the mediaeval sites of Chichester and Raunds in England
Not All That Is White Is Lime’—White Substances from Archaeological Burial Contexts
Archaeological burial contexts may include a variety of white substances, but few analyses have been published. This study reports on the physico‐chemical characterization of such residues from seven archaeological sites. It is often assumed that white materials from burial contexts are lime. Our findings demonstrate that they can be gypsum, calcite (chalk), aragonite, brushite, degraded metal, natural (gum) resins or synthetic polymer–based prod…
Exploring life patterns using entheseal changes in equids
Understanding changes in the relationships between humans and horses through time and across geographic space is of great interest for researchers due to the fundamental economic, social, and symbolic importance of the horse for human societies. Altered muscular or ligamentous attachments serve as a means to explore this subject. Entheseal changes (ECs) are widely employed in biological anthropology for reconstructions of past activity patterns i…
Blood Red Roses
Enthesopathies as occupational stress markers
Enthesopathies—that is, “musculo‐skeletal stress markers”—are frequently used to reconstruct past lifestyles and activity patterns. Relatively little attention has been paid in physical anthropology to methodological gaps implicit in this approach: almost all methods previously employed neglect current medical insights into enthesopathies and the distinction between healthy and pathological aspects has been arbitrary. This study presents a new vi…
Understanding Entheseal Changes
Over the past two decades, many articles have been published on entheseal changes (usually called 'Musculoskeletal Stress Markers') as activity markers in past societies. Over-simplified methods and over-interpretation of past activities have generated strong critiques of research results in this area of enquiry. While some significant improvements regarding the recording systems for entheseal changes have been applied more recently, many bioarch…
Iron Age breastfeeding practices in Britain
We present here the results of carbon and nitrogen isotopic analysis of bone collagen undertaken on all skeletal remains of infants and young children below the age of 6 years ( n = 34) from the internationally important British cemetery site at Wetwang Slack in East Yorkshire (middle Iron Age, ca . 4th to 2nd centuries BC). The aim of the study is to investigate infant diet, with particular reference to breastfeeding and weaning practices, and t…
Activity‐related skeletal change in medieval humeri
This paper examines humeral cross‐sectional properties in two different samples of later medieval date: a group of blade‐injured males from the sites of Towton, North Yorkshire, and Fishergate in the City of York, England, and a comparative group of nonblade‐injured males also from the site of Fishergate in York. CT image slices were taken of the humeral shaft at 20%, 35%, 50%, 65%, and 80% from the distal end to investigate population difference…
Funerary taphonomy
Understanding complex fragmented assemblages of human and animal remains
Fragmentation
Scattered and commingled human and animal remains are commonly encountered on archaeological sites, and this contextual relationship begs the question of whether human and animals were treated in a similar manner before burial. The recording system presented here provides a means by which to confront problems of equifinality – that is, when taphonomic alterations create apparently similar patterns and, therefore, confuse behavioural inferences dr…
Paleodemographic comparison of a catastrophic and an attritional death assemblage
The aim of this contribution is to examine the effect of an indiscriminate epidemic on a population to assess whether or not a catastrophic event can be identified from examination of paleodemographic data. Using paleodemographic techniques, the death assemblage from the Royal Mint site, London, a Black Death cemetery dated 1349 AD, is compared with that from St. Helen‐on‐the‐Walls, York, which dates from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries AD…
Bioarchaeology of Neolithic Çatalhöyük
Twenty-first century bioarchaeology
This article presents outcomes from a Workshop entitled "Bioarchaeology: Taking Stock and Moving Forward," which was held at Arizona State University (ASU) on March 6-8, 2020. Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the School of Human Evolution and Social Change (ASU), and the Center for Bioarchaeological Research (CBR, ASU), the Workshop's overall goal was to explore reasons why research proposals submitted by bioarchaeologists, both g…
Hand Dominance and Bilateral Asymmetry of the Epicondylar Breadth of the Humerus
For this consideration of bilateral asymmetry of the epicondylar breadth of the distal humerus and its relationship to hand dominance, metric analysis of the humerus was conducted on a living population from Ontario, Canada, and on the late AngloSaxon skeletal population (tenth to eleventh century AD) from Raunds Furnells, Northamptonshire (UK). Examination of trends in adult asymmetry reveals that while certain variables, such as age and sex, ca…
Cleaning the dead
Crouching in fear
At present, there is no accepted standardised lexicon in English to describe burials and the position of buried human remains. Terms have tended to vary with the investigator and rely on loose, but often ill-defined systems of previous use. As a consequence, there are myriad terms used to describe the same phenomena or, as the case may be, no single well-defined term to do so. This means that new terms are continually invented – and sometimes re-…
Bioarchaeology
When one reads archaeological publications on funerary remains, one might think that the deceased was sacrificed to accompany the burial of a pot [34]. One could easily blame archaeologists for this predicament, but it also has its roots in a research tradition within biological anthropology that tends to provide biological data to the archaeologist who provides the social and cultural meaning. Due to empirical divergence this approach encourages…
Aging Well
Over the (slightly more than) two decades that the European Journal of Archaeology (formerly the Journal of European Archaeology ) has been in print, we have published a number of excellent and high profile articles. Among these, Paul Treherne's seminal meditation on Bronze Age male identity and warriorhood stands out as both the highest cited and the most regularly downloaded paper in our archive. Speaking informally with friends and colleagues …
Death, Decapitation and Display? The Bronze and Iron Age Human Remains from the Sculptor's Cave, Covesea, North-east Scotland
Excavations at the Sculptor's Cave (north-east Scotland) during the 1930s and 1970s yielded evidence for activity in the Late Bronze Age, Late Iron Age, and early medieval periods, including a substantial human skeletal assemblage with apparent evidence for the removal, curation, and display of human heads. The present project, combining osteological analysis and a programme of AMS dating, aimed to place the surviving human remains from the site …
More Circe than Cassandra
Ritual and ritual specialists have often been dissociated from power in the writings of prehistorians and archaeologists. From ethnographic and ethnohistoric accounts, however, ritual specialists often exert disproportionate control over the maintenance, manipulation, and elaboration of social codes and practices. Their roles in ritual practice (orthopraxy in non-literate societies) and its effect on decision-making accord them considerable socia…
External auditory exostoses and prehistoric aquatic resource procurement
On the biomechanical and osteoarthritic differences between hunter‐gatherers and agriculturalists
A bioarchaeological and forensic re-assessment of vulture defleshing and mortuary practices at Neolithic Çatalhöyük
Probable carpometacarpal and tarsal coalition from Baousso da Torre Cave (Italy)
Le barrage de Tolerme, mis en eau en mars 1990, cree un plan d'eau touristique de 40 ha. Il est constitue d'une digue principale de 17,5 m et d'une digue de col haute de 11 m. Le cout a ete optimise par le choix de barrages en enrochements avec etancheite centrale par paroi moulee. Les crues sont evacuees grace a un deversoir de surface, le vide d'emprunt de la carriere etant utilise comme fosse de reception.(A) (Titres en anglais et en allemand:…
Gristhorpe Man
A log-coffin excavated in the early nineteenth century proved to be well enough preserved in the early twenty-first century for the full armoury of modern scientific investigation to give its occupants and contents new identity, new origins and a new date. In many ways the interpretation is much the same as before: a local big man buried looking out to sea. Modern analytical techniques can create a person more real, more human and more securely a…
On the significance of the crania from the River Thames and its tributaries
Bradley & Gordon, writing in ANTIQUITY in 1988, reported a distinct pattern in the distribution and dates of the many human crania that have been found in the River Thames. Issue is taken with that view, and the insight it promised in relating human remains to the prehistoric British interest in watery places
Scratching the surface? A histotaphonomic study of human remains at Neolithic Çatalhöyük
Stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis and dietary reconstruction through the life course at Neolithic Çatalhöyük, Turkey
Food has long served as a mechanism for identifying and reinforcing social structures, but while carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis has provided important identity-based evidence of past diets, the cyclical and stable/fluid nature of food consumption practices across the life course has been relatively neglected. In this paper, the large human assemblage at Çatalhöyük with all age groups present has enabled diet reconstruction of the rarely rep…
The throwing hypothesis and hominid origins
Variable views of Middle Palaeolithic adaptation, behaviour and variability
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Shared principles
It was to be expected that the pioneering concordat between archaeologists and Native Americans (Shared principles': a cooperation agreement between a Native North American group and archaeologists, ANTIQUITY 65: 917–20) would evoke a response from physical anthropologists
Slipped proximal femoral epiphysis in a priest from the medieval period
During the course of a routine analysis of a cemetery burial population associated with the medieval hospital of St Giles, Brough, North Yorkshire, the partially excavated burial (No. 1423) of a priest, as identified through the associated chalice and paten dating to the medieval period, was observed to exhibit osseous changes commensurate with those of an untreated slipped proximal femoral epiphysis. Secondary osseous changes were noted that may…
On the biomechanical and osteoarthritic differences between hunter‐gatherers and agriculturalists
A cripple from the medieval hospital of Sts James and Mary Magdalen, Chichester
The skeletal remains of a medieval leper from the hospital of Sts James and Mary Magdalene, Chichester, demonstrate osseous alterations in possible response to altered posture and crutch-aided locomotion. This individual provides further insight into the possible identification of osseous changes commensurate with maintained abnormal posture and strenuous use of one limb to aid locomotion. In this regard, it allows an appreciation and assessment …
Evidence for Remedial Medical Treatment of a Severe Knee Injury from the Fishergate Gilbertine Monastery in the City of York
Short Reviews
On the significance of the crania from the River Thames and its tributaries
Bradley & Gordon, writing in ANTIQUITY in 1988, reported a distinct pattern in the distribution and dates of the many human crania that have been found in the River Thames. Issue is taken with that view, and the insight it promised in relating human remains to the prehistoric British interest in watery places
Death, Decay, and Ritual Reconstruction
Archaeologists often joke that patterning which cannot be explained in socio‐economic terms is likely to be of ritual significance. This view has contributed to both reticence about and a rather impressionistic approach to potential ritual patterning in the archaeological record. The application of interpretations derived from the forensic sciences to such contexts may help to exclude natural or taphonomic processes that can mimic these patterns …
Brief communication
A rare, activity-related lesion, the clay-shoveller's fracture, was identified during osteological analysis in three human populations dating from the Roman to the later Medieval period in England, circa fourth to 14th centuries A.D. The prevalence of this fracture in these populations suggests an osteological indicator for several possible manual activities, but also one that may be the result of a long-standing human subsistence adaptation requ…
Variations in hunter-gatherer skeletal health in prehistoric Australia
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
Brief communication
A rare, activity-related lesion, the clay-shoveller's fracture, was identified during osteological analysis in three human populations dating from the Roman to the later Medieval period in England, circa fourth to 14th centuries A.D. The prevalence of this fracture in these populations suggests an osteological indicator for several possible manual activities, but also one that may be the result of a long-standing human subsistence adaptation requ…
Comment on Mallegni and Valassina's secondary bone changes to a cranium trepanation in a Neolithic man discovered at Trasano, south Italy
Comment on Mallegni and Valassina's secondary bone changes to a cranium trepanation in a Neolithic man discovered at Trasano, south Italy
Comparative degenerative joint disease of the vertebral column in the medieval monastic cemetery of the Gilbertine Priory of St. Andrew, Fishergate, York, England
The pattern of degenerative joint disease (DJD) of the intervertebral and apophyseal joints of the vertebral column of 81 skeletons from the thirteenth to fourteenth century medieval priory cemetery of St. Andrew, Fishergate, York, was recorded in relation to their location of interment: eastern cemetery, southern cemetery, and intramurally (within the priory buildings). Archaeological context and ethnohistorical accounts support the interpretati…
Paleodemographic comparison of a catastrophic and an attritional death assemblage
The aim of this contribution is to examine the effect of an indiscriminate epidemic on a population to assess whether or not a catastrophic event can be identified from examination of paleodemographic data. Using paleodemographic techniques, the death assemblage from the Royal Mint site, London, a Black Death cemetery dated 1349 AD, is compared with that from St. Helen‐on‐the‐Walls, York, which dates from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries AD…
More Circe than Cassandra
Ritual and ritual specialists have often been dissociated from power in the writings of prehistorians and archaeologists. From ethnographic and ethnohistoric accounts, however, ritual specialists often exert disproportionate control over the maintenance, manipulation, and elaboration of social codes and practices. Their roles in ritual practice (orthopraxy in non-literate societies) and its effect on decision-making accord them considerable socia…
Bio-cultural effects in medieval populations
Fragmentation
Scattered and commingled human and animal remains are commonly encountered on archaeological sites, and this contextual relationship begs the question of whether human and animals were treated in a similar manner before burial. The recording system presented here provides a means by which to confront problems of equifinality – that is, when taphonomic alterations create apparently similar patterns and, therefore, confuse behavioural inferences dr…
Fragmentation
Scattered and commingled human and animal remains are commonly encountered on archaeological sites, and this contextual relationship begs the question of whether human and animals were treated in a similar manner before burial. The recording system presented here provides a means by which to confront problems of equifinality – that is, when taphonomic alterations create apparently similar patterns and, therefore, confuse behavioural inferences dr…
A foot deformity from a Romano-British cemetery at Gloucester, England, and the current evidence fortalipesin palaeopathology
A male skeleton from the Romano-British site at Kingsholm, Gloucester, is described with abnormalities in the humerus, femur, tibia, fibula and foot. Computed tomography of the femora to enable cross-sectional analysis suggested altered normal gait to compensate for the deformity. Differential diagnoses are considered and a diagnosis of clubfoot deformity is suggested. Palaeopathological evidence for clubfoot is rare in the literature but the cas…
Understanding complex fragmented assemblages of human and animal remains
Activity‐related skeletal change in medieval humeri
This paper examines humeral cross‐sectional properties in two different samples of later medieval date: a group of blade‐injured males from the sites of Towton, North Yorkshire, and Fishergate in the City of York, England, and a comparative group of nonblade‐injured males also from the site of Fishergate in York. CT image slices were taken of the humeral shaft at 20%, 35%, 50%, 65%, and 80% from the distal end to investigate population difference…
Hand Dominance and Bilateral Asymmetry of the Epicondylar Breadth of the Humerus
For this consideration of bilateral asymmetry of the epicondylar breadth of the distal humerus and its relationship to hand dominance, metric analysis of the humerus was conducted on a living population from Ontario, Canada, and on the late AngloSaxon skeletal population (tenth to eleventh century AD) from Raunds Furnells, Northamptonshire (UK). Examination of trends in adult asymmetry reveals that while certain variables, such as age and sex, ca…
Archaeology (47 works) · Forensic Anthropology and Bioarchaeology Studies (46 works) · History (40 works) · Geography (34 works) · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (29 works) · Biology (23 works) · Paleopathology and ancient diseases (21 works) · Medicine (20 works) · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology (19 works) · History (18 works)