Introduction

Due to its resistance to decomposition, the human skeleton proves to be an extremely valuable source for the reconstruction of past life parameters. Archaeologists, historians, and anthropologists alike rely on these biological building blocks for many paleodemographic inferences and, not surprisingly, there is a longstanding tradition of establishing mortality profiles from prehistoric cemetery populations. These death structures serve as indicators of overall life expectancy, fertility, and even population growth. Moreover, historical patterns of health, disease, and ontogenesis are used to isolate biological as well as social life history factors.

However, the principal source of error – the accuracy of the osteologically derived vital statistics – needs to be critically addressed. Unfortunately, given the desire to make paleodemographic inferences, it is all too often forgotten that the attribution of individual biological profiles merely represents a well-founded estimate. While sexing methods, when applied to sufficiently preserved adult skeletons, may reach an overall precision of up to 90% (St Hoyme and İşcan 1989), postmaturity age assessment still remains one of the most difficult tasks. Although bones and teeth undergo a lifelong age-related metamorphosis, each part of the skeleton, depending on its location, structure and function, reflects a different aspect of the aging phenomenon (Figure 4.1).

In spite of the strong overall association between maturational and skeletal changes, the aging process is merely universal to the extent that it applies to both sexes and all populations.