Pathological evidence in the Pre-Columbian human remains from the Lee Collection (Jamaica)

Abstract

The Archaeology Laboratory in the Department of History and Archaeology at UWI has housed the James W. Lee Collection of Arawak artefacts and human remains since 2000. A complete database is being prepared by two of the authors (PAJ and ER) as part of a project under the auspices of the Jamaica Bauxite Institute. The collection spans a total of 265 sites and was collected over a 27 year period (1959-1986). Eight caves and 16 open-air sites produced human remains, with a minimal number of 46 individuals. Despite adverse taphonomic factors, age and sex estimation, metric analyses, and pathological case descriptions, could be carried out in a number of cases. This paper will focus on the paleopathological evidence. Two skulls (EC12, Bull Savannah #2 cave, St. Elizabeth, and CC15, Taylor's Hut cave, Clarendon) were artificially modified. CC15 was found inside a bowl. At E12 (Black River West) an increase in thickness in two fragments of tibiae and in one fibula is regarded as a pathological condition, possibly related to treponematosis. Signs of degenerative joint diseases, such as eburnation in an atlas and in a humerus, and osteoarthritis in several bones, were detected at J1 (Hartfield) and JC7 (Spot Valley cave). Finally a case of agenesis exists in the right decidual incisor in a mandible of a juvenile with an age-at-death around 4 years (Y4, Rio Nuevo, St. Mary). This study is a contribution to the understanding of extinct pre-Columbian populations in the Caribbean region.