SUMMARY
The presented
work focuses on the changes within the human skeleton caused by the
transition to
agriculture in the Neolithic. Two types of populations were compared that differ
in
their adaptive
strategies (subsistence economies). An agricultural lifeway is represented by
a
Lengyel
population from Osłonki (Kujawy-Pomorze voivodeship), and a Corded Ware
population
from Zemiki Gome
and Złota (both from Swietokrzyskie voivodeship) represents a
mixed,
agricultural-breeding-pastoral
economy. Morphology and indicators of response to environmental
conditions of
above mentioned samples were examined and then statistically
compared.
Morphological
traits of studied populations were analysed on the basis of measurements of
skulls
and long bones;
additionally, the degree of sexual dimorphism of both groups was
calculated.
It was revealed
that the examined samples differ in relation to their biological
structure
and statistically
significant differences concern the skull lenght and height and the
forehead
width, as well as
lenght of the tibia. These results suggest that examined groups have a
different
genetic
structure, i.e. they are characterized by a different origin - this observation
is supported by
archaeological
data.
A hypothesis was
formulated that these populations living in the same environmental
conditions,
diversely exploiting the environment and having distinct genetic equipment
could
have responded in
a different way to the factors disturbing their biological
development.
Therefore three
indicators of morphological response to living conditions
-cribra
orbitalia,
enamel hypoplasia and Harris lines were analysed. It seems that in studied
human
samples the
effect of different adaptive strategies on buffering adverse nutritional factors
and
diseases was
revealed. The prevalence and severity of studied indicators suggest that the
Lengyel
people more often
and intensively than the ,,corded" people responded to
environmental
constraints in
consequence of their agricultural lifeway (less diversified diet,
sedentarism,
exposing to
pathogens and spreading of infections, increased density), which is also
supported by
the lower values
of sexual dimorphism in this group. Moreover, a relationship between
the
occurrence of
cribra orbitalia and enamel hypoplasia and the mean age at death of
studied
individuals
(lower for the affected individuals) was found. It evidences essential, adverse
effect of
factors causing
both lesions on the biological development of studied human
samples.