Stress For Ancient Population Of Jiayi Cemeteries In Turpan, Xinjiang Province

The materials for research of this dissertation are excavated in the Jiayi cemetery,Turpan Basin, Xingjian. These tombs are located in the south of Yaer town, Turpancity. The time of this cemetery is about10centuries to2centuries BC, which is thelate Broze Age to the early Iron Age, and the archaeological culture is the Subei XiCulture. This dissertation is based on the stress theory to reconstruct these ancientpopulations’ living conditions.Chapter1: Research backgroundIn this chapter, the author gives an introduction to the concepts of the stresstheory, the research history, the classification of stress indicators and the main purposeand method of this research.Chapter2: Environment and archaeological background of Turpan BasinThis chapter introduced the natural geographical and environmental changes ofTurpan basin and the archaeological culture of this area. Meanwhile, it introduced thebasic situation of the Jiayi cemetery.Chapter3: Ancient demography researchUse the method of forensic anthropology and physical anthropology to appraisethe sex and age of204individuals, and make the brief life table. The average age ofdeath and the life expectancy of female are higher than that of male. By thecomparison with other ancient people, the proportion of mortality in the minor of lifeof the population in Jiayi is higher than others. One reason may be related to theburial custom. The other reason is that other cemetery have no complete collectionand correct identification of subadult skeleton..Chapter4: Stress researchThe first part of this chapter is about cribra orbitalia and porotic hyperostosis. Thefirst step is exploring the relationship between cribra orbitalia (and porotichyperostosis) and the age of death. The result shows that iron deficiency have anegative impact on an individual’s survival. In addition, the relationship between thecribra orbitalia and porotic hyperostosis are also made some brief discussion. Finally, by the comparison with other ancient people about the incidence of cribra orbitalia,the author discusses the cause of high morbidity of Jiayi ancient population.The second part of this chapter is about developmental defect of enamel. Firstly,the statistics of the individual incidence of LEH are high, indicating that thispopulation suffer relatively larger stress in childhood. In addition, compared thedifference between the incidence of genders group indicate that the prevalencebetween the sexes is no significant difference, which implied that at least during toothdevelopment period(0-7years old), boys’ and girls’stress are relatively similar. Wealso discuss the relationship between age of death and LEH, and find that the healthyindividuals have longer life than individuals with LEH. Finally, the chapter counts thepeak age of LEH, and reasons are discussed.Chapter5: Infant and Juvenile growthThis chapter introduces a method to assess the growth and development ofancient population. And limb bones of infant and juvenile as the basis, conducting anassessment of its growth pattern. At last, whether stress has an effect on individual’sgrowth and development or not is also discussed.