Euboean, Eastern and Indigenous People: A Bioarchaeological Investigation of Ancient Pithekoussai (8th-7th cent. BC

The most recent contributions of funerary archaeology are based on the interdisciplinary approach, which integrates historical-archaeological evidence with environmental and biological records. Archaeozoology, archaeobotany, and the analysis of human skeletal remains provide a deeper understanding of funerary rituals and facilitate the reconstruction of the biocultural processes and adaptations of past communities. Where human remains are concerned, skeletons provide information on palaeodemography, palaeopathology, palaeonutrition, mobility, and ancestry both at the individual and population levels. The analysis of single individuals allows for the assessment of “osteobiographies”, i.e., the life history of the deceased, through the joint and integrated analysis of different moments and aspects of their lives. On the one hand, this operation allows for a better understanding of the complex relationships between the multiple factors and events (e.g., growth, health and stress, reproduction, mobility, senescence) experienced in the course of life; on the other hand, defining individuals’ osteobiographies aims to establish identity and social role, as also emerging from the funerary rituals. While it is true that social relationships can affect the biology of individuals, the opposite is equally true. Sex, age, origin, and the health conditions of individuals are not just biological definitions. They are also parameters that can determine status within a community and influence multiple relationships with other social factors. Nevertheless, reconstructing past social structures, hierarchies, traditions, social identities, or sex/gender relations based on funerary evidence is challenging since tombs only partially reflect the original socio-demographic composition of a given community. More often, skeletal samples from archaeological contexts are the outcome of cultural, biological, and environmental filters that are not always quantifiable. This paper discusses the results of the gross morphological and osteometric assessment conducted so far on human and faunal remains of burial dated from the mid-8th to the 7th century BC at Pithekoussai’s necropolis. By integrating human osteological data with taphonomic observations and the study of faunal remains in the tombs, this paper provides an unprecedented characterisation of the funeral practices of Pithekoussai’s community.