STARC OSTEOARCH: An open access resource for recording and sharing human osteoarchaeological data

Abstract

AbstractThis paper introduces an open access resource for recording and sharing macroscopic data on archaeological human skeletal remains: STARC OSTEOARCH. The resource was developed using a cloud collaboration service, Airtable, and it accommodates data collection on individual skeletons as well as disassociated commingled remains. The attributes covered include key information on demography (sex and age‐at‐death), taphonomy (zonation, anatomical preservation, weathering, fragmentation, and other types of post‐mortem alteration), diet (dental diseases and dental wear), mechanical stress (entheseal changes, osteoarthritis, Schmorl's nodes, and vertebral arthritis), biodistances (cranial metrics and nonmetrics and dental metrics and nonmetrics), and various pathological lesions. References and key descriptions of the categories per attribute have been incorporated in the resource to facilitate raw data sharing, which can be achieved using Airtable's sharing functionality. This initiative aims at promoting standard practices in the field and facilitating data collection and sharing.