An infant burial from Arma Veirana in northwestern Italy provides insights into funerary practices and female personhood in early Mesolithic Europe

Caley M Orr,Hannah Keller ,David S Strait,Stefano Benazzi,Simona Arrighi,Danylo Drohobytsky,Emanuela Cristiani,Dominique Meyer,Alessia Nava,Matteo Romandini,Geneviève Pothier-Bouchard,Falko Kuester,Jamie Hodgkins,Lucia Mancini,Sahra Talamo,Rocío Belén Griggs,Federico Lugli,Claudine Gravel-Miguel,Sara Silvestrini,Julien Riel‐Salvatore ,Luca Bondioli,Michael Buckley,Marco Peresani,Fabio Negrino,Christopher E Miller,Fabio Baruffaldi,Mateja Hajdinjak

doi:10.1038/s41598-021-02804-z

Abstract

The evolution and development of human mortuary behaviors is of enormous cultural significance. Here we report a richly-decorated young infant burial (AVH-1) from Arma Veirana (Liguria, northwestern Italy) that is directly dated to 10,211–9910 cal BP (95.4% probability), placing it within the early Holocene and therefore attributable to the early Mesolithic, a cultural period from which well-documented burials are exceedingly rare. Virtual dental histology, proteomics, and aDNA indicate that the infant was a 40–50 days old female. Associated artifacts indicate significant material and emotional investment in the child’s interment. The detailed biological profile of AVH-1 establishes the child as the earliest European near-neonate documented to be female. The Arma Veirana burial thus provides insight into sex/gender-based social status, funerary treatment, and the attribution of personhood to the youngest individuals among prehistoric hunter-gatherer groups and adds substantially to the scant data on mortuary practices from an important period in prehistory shortly following the end of the last Ice Age.

Highlights

Sciences and Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironment, University of Tübingen, Rümelinstr. 23, 72070 Tübingen, Germany. 6SFF Centre for Early Sapiens Behaviour (SapienCE), University of Bergen, Øysteinsgate 3, Post Box 7805, 5020 Bergen, Norway. 7Service of Bioarchaeology, Museum of Civilizations, Rome, Italy. 8Department of Cultural Heritage, University of Padua, 35139 Padua, Italy. 9Department of Cultural Heritage, University of Bologna, Via degli Ariani 1, 48121 Ravenna, Italy. 10Skeletal Biology Research Centre, School of Anthropology and Conservation, University of Kent, Canterbury CT2 7NZ, UK. 11DANTE Diet and Ancient Technology Laboratory, Department of Oral and Maxillo‐Facial Sciences, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy. 12Department of Chemical and Geological Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy. 13Department of Chimistry G
We report the burial of a young infant in Liguria—Arma Veirana Hominin 1 (AVH-1; nicknamed “Neve”), directly dated to the early Holocene
Arma Veirana is located within the Ligurian pre-Alps (Fig. 1) approximately 15 km northwest of the town of Albenga (44°8′45.402′′N, 8°4′18.85E)

Summary

Introduction

In Europe, the onset of the Holocene (at 11,700 cal BP) broadly coincided with the early Mesolithic, a cultural period likely to have catalyzed important social changes as humans adapted to significant environmental shifts following the end of the last Ice Age[8,9]. AVH-1 represents the earliest female near-neonate interment documented in Eurasia and provides novel insights into how age and sex/gender influenced the construction of personhood among prehistoric hunter-gatherer societies

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Results

Conclusion