Abstract
The present research investigates the relationship between dietary habits and mortality patterns in the Roman Imperial and Medieval periods. The reconstructions of population dynamics and subsistence strategies provide a fascinating source of information for understanding our history. This is particularly true given that the changes in social, economic, political, and religious aspects related to the transition from the Roman period to the Middle Ages have been widely discussed. We analyzed the isotopic and mortality patterns of 616 individuals from 18 archeological sites (the Medieval Latium sites of Colonna, Santa Severa, Allumiere, Cencelle, and 14 Medieval and Imperial funerary contexts from Rome) to compile a survivorship analysis. A semi-parametric approach was applied, suggesting variations in mortality patterns between sexes in the Roman period. Nitrogen isotopic signatures influenced mortality in both periods, showing a quadratic and a linear effect for Roman Imperial and Medieval populations, respectively. No influence of carbon isotopic signatures has been detected for Roman Imperial populations. Conversely, increased mortality risk for rising carbon isotopic values was observed in Medieval samples.
Highlights
Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analysis from bone proteins is routinely employed in bioarcheological research to investigate dietary habits of human populations from different prehistoric and historical periods [1,2,3]
To better understand the relationship between diet and life-span in the Roman Imperial and Medieval periods, we considered 616 individuals from 18 Roman and Medieval archeological sites from Latium (Figure 1), which had previously been analyzed at the Centre of Molecular Anthropology for ancient DNA Studies at the Department of Biology of the University of Rome “Tor Vergata” [39,40,41,42,43,44,45]
The analyzed sample consisted of 616 individuals from 18 archeological sites in Latium (Italy) dating back to Imperial Roman and Medieval periods (N = 212, N = 404, respectively) for which we performed a comparative analysis between both periods, exploring the complex relationship among isotopic values, sex, and age at death
Summary
Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analysis from bone proteins is routinely employed in bioarcheological research to investigate dietary habits of human populations from different prehistoric and historical periods [1,2,3]. Such studies recently focused on investigating the relationship between diet, health status, and demographic parameters [4,5,6,7,8]. The relationship between diet and death risk, analyzed in the research by Zazpe and colleagues [12] in a cohort of Spanish adult individuals, suggested differing mortality risks associated with specific dietary habits. Individuals following a Mediterranean diet showed a reduced mortality risk [12]
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