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Diet, Status, and Complex Social Structure in Iron Age Central Europe: Some Contributions of Bone Chemistry

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Tribe and Polity in Late Prehistoric Europe

Abstract

These words by Grahame Clark introduced the second edition of a volume exploring the increasing role of interdisciplinary research on archaeological problems, particularly the evolution of complex forms of human behavior and organization. Since 1970, the applications of scientific methods in archaeology have continued to increase in number. In the past decade, methods based on bone composition, including carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios in bone collagen and trace element concentrations in bone mineral, have been applied to aspects of diet, subsistence and social structure (work summarized in van der Merwe 1982; Klepinger 1984; Price et al. 1985; DeNiro 1987).

Science, like the course of civilization itself, advances at an accelerating pace. So also does the application of science to the task of unfolding the unwritten history of man’s changing relation to his environment, his advance towards a more complete and rational exploitation of natural resources in the interests of a fuller and more complex social life.

(Clark 1970:20)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA

    Matthew L. Murray & Margaret J. Schoeninger

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  1. Matthew L. Murray
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  2. Margaret J. Schoeninger
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, California, USA

    D. Blair Gibson

  2. Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA

    Michael N. Geselowitz

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Murray, M.L., Schoeninger, M.J. (1988). Diet, Status, and Complex Social Structure in Iron Age Central Europe: Some Contributions of Bone Chemistry. In: Gibson, D.B., Geselowitz, M.N. (eds) Tribe and Polity in Late Prehistoric Europe. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-0777-6_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-0777-6_7

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