Francisco Etxeberria

CIFOSIS ANGULAR DE LA COLUMNA VERTEBRAL: IDENTIFICACIÓN DEL MAL DE POTT EN UNA MOMIA GUANE PREHISPÁNICA DE COLOMBIA

La descripcion macroscopica de las lesiones sigue siendo una de las partes fundamentales de los estudios de paleopatologia. Por esta circunstancia, se presenta una momia con una gibosidad de la columna vertebral que puede adscribirse a una caracteristica cifosis angular. En efecto, el consiguiente estudio radiografico llevado a cabo, pone de manifiesto la existencia de una destruccion selectiva del cuerpo vertebral de las vertebras D11 y D12. La imagen es caracteristica de una caries tuberculosa que asienta en ese lugar tal y como lo publica Jacques Mathieu Delpech en 1828, con la curvatura del raquis y los fenomenos nerviosos por compresion medular y abscesos por congestion, recordando al Dr. Percival Pott que lo habia descrito en 1799. En el caso que nos ocupa, una momia de sexo masculino y edad adulta joven encontrada en una cueva del departamento de Santander (Colombia), existe ademas una periostitis en la proximidad del trocanter menor del femur izquierdo que puede obedecer al drenaje del pus hasta este punto a traves del musculo psoas mayor, evolucion normal de esta manifestacion en muchos casos. De este modo es razonable proponer el diagnostico de tuberculosis, con lo que se amplia el catalogo de evidencias de esta enfermedad infecciosa que ha sido plenamente demostrada en la America Precolombina por Arriaza et al. (1995) y Lombardi (1995) a traves del estudio del ADN del Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Marks of autopsy and identification of victims of human rights violations exhumed from cemeteries: the case of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939)

The presence of autopsy marks in human skeletal remains indicates a medicolegal procedure related to ascertaining the cause and manner of death. We present here four cases where signs of autopsy were observed in the remains recovered from mass graves and cemeteries of prisoners from the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), victims of extrajudicial executions, and of death in prison, respectively. With respect to the former, historical evidence indicate that during the first weeks after the coup, official removal of cadavers and autopsy procedures were carried out to the first victims of extrajudicial killings, whose corpses were found abandoned in the road. Once the civil war was established and systematic extrajudicial killings were systematic, official military orders were issued to stop standard forensic proceedings. Therefore, autopsy marks observed in the remains exhumed from mass graves located in cemeteries may be indicative of an earlier chronology of the killings, and this information proved to be relevant for the identification process in one of the cases presented. In a cemetery of political prisoners, autopsy signs were also observed in two skeletal remains and in the official records of two prisoners, a corroboration of information also relevant for the identification process. These findings indicate that autopsy marks can be found in the remains of victims of human rights violations exhumed from cemeteries. Skeletal and archival information could be useful for the identification process in other cases of large-scale violence, where the first victims of extrajudicial executions were buried unidentified in cemeteries after autopsy procedures.

New radiocarbon dating and demographic insights into San Juan ante Portam Latinam, a possible Late Neolithic war grave in North-Central Iberia

OBJECTIVES San Juan ante Portam Latinam is one of a small number of European Neolithic sites meeting many of the archaeological criteria expected for a mass grave, and furthermore presents evidence for violent conflict. This study aims to differentiate between what is potentially a single episode of deposition, versus deposition over some centuries, or, alternatively, that resulting from a combination of catastrophic and attritional mortality. The criteria developed are intended to have wider applicability to other such proposed events. MATERIAL AND METHODS Ten new AMS 14 C determinations on human bone from the site, together with previously available dates, are analyzed through Bayesian modeling to refine the sites chronology. This is used together with the populations demographic profile as the basis for agent-based demographic modeling. RESULTS The new radiocarbon results, while improving the sites chronology, fail to resolve the question whether the burial represents a single event, or deposition over decades or centuries-primarily because the dates fall within the late fourth millennium BC plateau in the calibration curve. The demographic modeling indicates that the populations age and sex distribution fits neither a single catastrophic event nor a fully attritional mortality profile, but instead may partake of elements of both. DISCUSSION It is proposed that San Juan ante Portam Latinam was used as burial place for the mainly adolescent and adult male dead of a particular or multiple violent engagements (e.g., battles), while previously or subsequently seeing use for attritional burial by other members of one or more surrounding communities dead over the course of a few generations. The overall bias towards males, particularly to the extent that many may represent conflict mortality, has implications for the structure of the surviving community, the members of which may have experienced increased vulnerability in the face of neighboring aggressors.

Corrigendum to “Preserved brains from the Spanish Civil War mass grave (1936) at La Pedraja 1, Burgos, Spain” [Sci. Justice 56 (2016) 453–463]

a Unidad de Antropología Forense, Instituto de Medicina Legal de Galicia, Hospital de Verin, Spain b Sección de Antropología, Sociedad de Ciencias Aranzadi, Spain c Hospital Meixoeiro, Instituto de Investigación Biomédica de Vigo, Spain d Servicio de Patología Forense, Instituto de Medicina Legal de Galicia, Spain e Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Instituto de Ciencias Forenses Luis Concheiro, Spain f Cranfield Forensic Institute, Cranfield University, Defence Academy of the United Kingdom, UK g Universidad del Pais Vasco, Medicina Legal, Spain

Preserved brains from the Spanish Civil War mass grave (1936) at La Pedraja1, Burgos, Spain

During the excavation of the Spanish Civil War mass grave at La Pedraja (Burgos, Spain), 104 individuals were found interred within it, 45 of which displayed brains that were preserved but dehydrated and reduced in size. This exceptional finding has resulted in the formation of a multidisciplinary team, with the aim of obtaining as much information as possible and to primarily understand the taphonomic phenomena that has led to the preservation of these brains. The following types of analyses were undertaken on three of these brains: macroscopy, histology, radiology, chemical-toxicology, genetics, chemical analysis of the soil and 3D modelling for stereolithography. The historical context was considered, plus all archaeological and other forensic data provided by the investigation of the mass grave. The results of the analyses on these morphologically identifiable human brains confirmed the presence of nerve structures, fatty acids, and in one case ante-mortem evidence for an intracranial haemorrhage. The fatty acid profile corresponds to the process of saponification. Therefore, the interpretation is that the preservation of these brains at the mass grave of La Pedraja was due to the saponification process, which was influenced by the manner and cause of death, the chemical composition of the brain, the physicochemical properties of the soil and the meteorological conditions at the time.