Metallurgy, environmental pollution and the decline of Etruscan civilisation

BACKGROUND, AIM AND SCOPE

The Etruscans were justifiably famous in antiquity for their advanced metallurgy and for the rich mineral resources of their region (including La Tolfa, the Colline Metallifere, Mont'Amiata and Elba). We offer a new perspective on certain Iron Age and Archaic (ca. 1,000-480 BC: ) Etruscan industrial and habitation sites, and on the problem of heavy metal poisoning, still being investigated today, coincidentally in some of the same areas that originally saw Etruscan mines and workshops.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

This study investigates ancient sources, including literature and excavation reports, in the light of modern studies of heavy metal poisoning on human beings, plant and animal life. Furthermore, it is the first to use non-invasive Niton X-ray fluorescence analysis of samples of Etruscan (strictly ethnically Faliscan) hair (c. 350 BCE: ).

RESULTS

The findings show the strong likelihood of heavy metal poisoning in areas of Etruscan metallurgical activity with the effects of this being responsible for or contributing to the abandonment of a number of these sites around the 6th century BC: . No thoroughly satisfactory explanation of this phenomenon has previously been offered. However, findings suggest that Faliscan women, represented by sample CG 2004-6-2, were not exposed to high levels of arsenic in life, which is not perhaps surprising for an urban aristocratic woman of the mid-4th century BC: .

DISCUSSION

The reasons for the abandonment of several flourishing settlements are without doubt complex, and include political and social change. We suggest heavy metal contamination as an additional stimulus to the noted phenomenon of the peaceful abandonment, at the beginning, and at the end of the 6th century BC: , of sites in southern and northern Etruria such as Marsiliana d'Albegna (late 7th c.), Lago dell'Accesa, Acquarossa and Poggio Civitate-Murlo (late 6th c.).

CONCLUSIONS

While the historical truth of the demise of Etruscan civilisation is much more complex, an interim set of related events, the desertion of several important settlements during and at the end of the Archaic period, might actually have been stimulated by the consequences of industrial pollution and arsenic poisoning.

RECOMMENDATIONS AND PERSPECTIVES

We call for archaeologists and curators to test any available human and animal remains in their museums and collections for evidence of heavy metal poisoning, taking due caution and consideration of course to the relevance of the aristocracy, and urge the application of analytical techniques developed in response to this serious modern problem, to provide additional insights into the ancient situation.

Daily life of the ancient Maya recorded on murals at Calakmul, Mexico

Research into ancient societies frequently faces a major challenge in accessing the lives of those who made up the majority of their populations, since the available evidence so often concerns only the ruling elite. Our excavations at the ancient Maya site of Calakmul, Mexico, have uncovered a "painted pyramid:" a structure decorated with murals depicting scenes of its inhabitants giving, receiving, and consuming diverse foods, as well as displaying and transporting other goods. Many are accompanied by hieroglyphic captions that describe the participants, and include spellings of key subsistence items. Collectively, they offer insights into the social mechanisms by which goods were circulated within major Maya centers.

"Signs of the times": Medicine and nationhood in British India

Medical practice and research in colonial India historically had been an imperial preserve, dominated by the elite members of the Indian Medical Service. This was contested from the 1900s on by the emerging Indian nationalism. This essay studies debates about the establishment of a medical research institution and how actors imposed the political identities of nationalism on British colonial practices of medical science. At the same time, Indian nationalism was also drawing from other emerging ideas around health and social welfare. The Indian nationalists and doctors sought to build the identities of the new nation and its medicine around their own ideas of its geography, people, and welfare.

Norbert Elias's motion pictures: history, cinema and gestures in the process of civilization

Norbert Elias's project in The process of civilization (1939) involved reconstructing invisible movement--both the slow tempoof long-term historical change and the modification of psychic structures and embodied dispositions. To do this, he resorted to uncommon devices: treating historical texts as constituting a series amenable to a rudimentary discourse analysis, he constructed an imagined 'curve of civilization' serving as an approximation of the hidden process of change. Elias's curve was not supposed to represent single past states, but movement itself, its direction and pace. This novel concept of historical representation was related to the perception of cinema as a new medium making actual movement visible. But beyond making it possible to imagine how one could telescope long-term historical process, cinema also held the promise of serving as a microscope, making the minute movements of the human body, gestures and manners available for close inspection. While anthropologists were devising ways of using the new medium to document fleeting gestures and bodily postures, it was used by popular audiences as a source for remodelling behaviour and acquiring polite manners and body techniques, as noticed by such acute observers as Marcel Mauss and Joseph Roth. Hence, popular appropriation of the cinema gave rise to a heightened awareness of the historicity of gestures and the changing modalities of their transmission. Cinema was itself part of the accelerated motion of history, of a perceived change of pace in the process of civilization, which in its turn shed light on its historical antecedents and played an essential role in rethinking the notion of civilization and culture.

Ahmed Midhat and Adnan Adivar on history of science and civilizations

I analyze the contrasting visions of history of science in the works respectively of an Ottoman and a Turkish man of letters, Ahmed Midhat and Adnan Adivar, and claim that they perceived the link between science and cultural identity in different terms. Ahmed Midhat conceived of science as closely tied to its cultural matrix, whereas Adivar settled for a less holistic view. Both authors saw science as the harbinger of a new social existence, but they evaluated the prospects of this existence in rather divergent ways. Ahmed Midhat was concerned with the detrimental effects of an unquestioning appropriation of European scientific traditions, while Adivar had no such qualms, and celebrated the universalism and progressiveness of reason as revealed in history of science. I suggest that these differences in their outlooks presented their readers with civilizational choices.

Unique burial practice by ancient cavemen of the Hoa Binh civilization in Vietnam

The discovery of a female skeleton is reported, which can be ascribed to the Hoa Binh civilization, existing about 10,000 years before now. The most remarkable fact concerning this finding is the existence of seashells (Cyprea arabica), which were found in the eye sockets. The reasons for this in Southeast Asia so far unique burial practice are discussed.

Oldest Writing in the New World

A block with a hitherto unknown system of writing has been found in the Olmec heartland of Veracruz, Mexico. Stylistic and other dating of the block places it in the early first millennium before the common era, the oldest writing in the New World, with features that firmly assign this pivotal development to the Olmec civilization of Mesoamerica.

Climate-Controlled Holocene Occupation in the Sahara: Motor of Africa's Evolution

Radiocarbon data from 150 archaeological excavations in the now hyper-arid Eastern Sahara of Egypt, Sudan, Libya, and Chad reveal close links between climatic variations and prehistoric occupation during the past 12,000 years. Synoptic multiple-indicator views for major time slices demonstrate the transition from initial settlement after the sudden onset of humid conditions at 8500 B.C.E. to the exodus resulting from gradual desiccation since 5300 B.C.E. Southward shifting of the desert margin helped trigger the emergence of pharaonic civilization along the Nile, influenced the spread of pastoralism throughout the continent, and affects sub-Saharan Africa to the present day.

Chronology for the Aegean Late Bronze Age 1700-1400 B.C

Radiocarbon (carbon-14) data from the Aegean Bronze Age 1700-1400 B.C. show that the Santorini (Thera) eruption must have occurred in the late 17th century B.C. By using carbon-14 dates from the surrounding region, cultural phases, and Bayesian statistical analysis, we established a chronology for the initial Aegean Late Bronze Age cultural phases (Late Minoan IA, IB, and II). This chronology contrasts with conventional archaeological dates and cultural synthesis: stretching out the Late Minoan IA, IB, and II phases by approximately 100 years and requiring reassessment of standard interpretations of associations between the Egyptian and Near Eastern historical dates and phases and those in the Aegean and Cyprus in the mid-second millennium B.C.

The National Animal Germplasm Program: Challenges and Opportunities for Poultry Genetic Resources

In the United States, poultry genetic resources have consolidated because of economic pressures. Such consolidations can potentially jeopardize the poultry industry and the ability of research communities to respond to future challenges. To address the loss of genetic resources for all livestock and aquatic species, USDA established the National Animal Germplasm Program (NAGP) in 1999. Since the initiation of NAGP, population surveys have been conducted on nonindustrial chicken and turkey breeds. These surveys not only provide insight into breed status, but also serve as a benchmark for future comparisons. The survey results revealed that 20 chicken breeds and 9 turkey breeds were in various stages of being lost. The NAGP has initiated an ex situ repository for cryopreserved germplasm and tissue that already contains 59 chicken lines and 2,915 tissue samples. As the NAGP, along with its industry and university partners, continues developing the ex situ collection, there are research opportunities in cryopreserved tissue utilization and studies of genetic diversity. For cryopreserved tissues, several key research areas include improving the cryopreservation protocols for rooster and tom semen by using cryoprotectants other than glycerol and utilizing embryonic cells. Although surveys have been conducted on public research lines and rare breeds, there is a void in understanding the level of genetic diversity present in U.S. poultry populations. Therefore, an opportunity exists to perform a series of genetic diversity studies using molecular- based approaches. Such an evaluation can help clarify population differences between research lines and rare breeds and, thereby, facilitate conservation strategies. There appears to be growing consumer interest in poultry products derived from heritage breeds and/or poultry raised in nonindustrial production systems. Although the depth of such market trends is unknown, such an interest may provide an important niche for rare poultry breeds and, thereby, strengthen the genetic base.

Burning down the brewery: establishing and evacuating an ancient imperial colony at Cerro Baul, Peru

Before the Inca reigned, two empires held sway over the central Andes from anno Domini 600 to 1000: the Wari empire to the north ruled much of Peru, and Tiwanaku to the south reigned in Bolivia. Face-to-face contact came when both colonized the Moquegua Valley sierra in southern Peru. The state-sponsored Wari incursion, described here, entailed large-scale agrarian reclamation to sustain the occupation of two hills and the adjacent high mesa of Cerro Baúl. Monumental buildings were erected atop the mesa to serve an embassy-like delegation of nobles and attendant personnel that endured for centuries. Final evacuation of the Baúl enclave was accompanied by elaborate ceremonies with brewing, drinking, feasting, vessel smashing, and building burning.

The watershed empires

Watershed empires, founded by states in the highlands on the upper reaches of river systems, conquered the flood plains and other regions around them. Three of these, Ch'in in ancient China, Assyria in the middle east, and the Inca of Peru, are described, with emphasis on the horrific socio-political systems which they developed. All, however, were eventually overthrown by a combination of internal revolt and external pressures.

The impact of tuberculosis on civilization

Tuberculosis is an ancient disease that has spread in epidemic form among susceptible peoples but has had a little demographic or political impact on the populations it has inflicted. The disease continues to have a large economic impact on societies in which it is prevalent. Tuberculosis has left its mark on human creativity; on the lives of individuals in music, art, and literature; and dramatically on the advance of biomedical science and healthcare.