"No Wait, This is the Real Ava!" - Smithsonian

Holy something

You'll remember Ava, one of the most diligently studied and interesting Beaker women ever.  Now with ancient DNA it is revealed her hair was straight and dark.  Update!

Via The Smithsonian

"Ava" (Hew Morrison via the Smithsonian)

I think any aspiring archaeologist should look to Maya Hoole as an example as how things should be done.  Many times over.  You take something ancient and you learn as much about it as is humanly possible and don't stop.  Respect and humanize the people you study and let the facts do the talking as the picture develops.

Many thousands of Beakers sit on the shelf; shoveled out of the ground by dudes with a coiled whip on the belt.  Ava was no warrior; her grave contains no copper or gold.  Her grave was nearly forgotten.  Now she is the most interesting woman in Britain.  The face of the mysterious Beaker Enigma.

Ginger Ava, before DNA informed coloration (Hew Morrison)

See also,

"Facial Reconstruction of Late Beaker Ava'

"Ava's Scapula: Supper, Supplication or Sound?'

"One of the Beakers DNA Tested"

"Archaeosoup Interviews Maya Hoole"

"Ava of the Highlands"

Ava's Scapula - Supper, Supplication or Sound?

Archaeologist Allison Sheridan takes questions on "Ava the Beaker" in the Achavanich Beaker Burial Project podcast with archaeologist-interviewer Maya Hoole.

At 7:50 Sheridan discusses Ava's high status as indicated by a cow shoulder blade in the grave.  But does a cow scapula necessarily point to a food offering, or are there other possibilities?  If it was a food offering, could the preference of this cut tell us something about food preparation in the Scottish Early Bronze Age?

By Hew Morrison via Smithsonian Magazine

The right-hand scapula is an interesting selection for Beakers to have included in her grave.  After all, they were a cattle people and no strangers to the anatomy or mythology of cattle parts.

Since the animal may have been butchered for the occasion of Ava's death, we should assume that she had a favorable cut, or at least some non-random process determined what ended up in her grave.

I'll offer two and a half alternative purposes for Ava's cow bone selection.  The first has quite a bit of historical support, though I can't say to what degree if ever it was used as a grave item.  The second is much more speculative, but interesting nonetheless.  The third is just a few notes.

1.   Scapulimancy.  A scapula reader saw a good omen in the bone.

The prominence of European scapulimancy can't be under-appreciated when considering this case.  In Scotland, this is called slinneineachd in the old tongue, which is interpreting a boiled, right-hand scapula. (Spence, 1999).  Beakers were cattle folk and it would be difficult to see superstitious Beakers inserting an unread scapula into the grave.  OTOH, it looks as if Ava's scapula is a left-hand shoulder, so maybe not? Did this bone have meat on it?  

Also, does the bone appear to have a few red stains?  Is that cinnabar or ochre?  If so, how did it get on the bone?

In a scapulmancy scenario, we might imagine that different relatives came in for the wake.  Hillbillies walk by and touch her cold hands and they all drink very heavily and process a bullock, quartering it out for the guests.  Some bug-eyed person reads the boiled scapula, it's a message of fortune.  Maybe Ava shared a number of fears toward her end, like the well-being of her child(ren) or the meaningfulness of her own life.  The good answer may have been inserted in the grave for that reason.

See also Scapulimancy in occultopedia,

2.  Ava played some sort of harp or lyre.

Again, it's a bit curious that she is buried with a scapula, although it may be a left-hand. A hypothesis by Matahisa Koitabashi, 2013 concerned Near Eastern RH-notched bovine scapulas.  Basically, he believes it's the frame is some sort of scraper musical instrument, but not a lute bridge as previously suggested.  Without notches, it's hard to see it as a warping paddle, although I've suggested previously that Beaker women were often buried with sewing kits.

The scapular bone is easily scraped from the beef (here at two minutes), and you can see how large the harp-like bone actually is.  Maybe it's ironic that a scapula looks like a harp or lyre, or even that the harp is associated with a goddess like Egyptian Hathor or the bovine lyres of Sumeria. 

Freeze from "A Journey through Scotland's Part: The Age of Bronze"

3.  And finally, let's get to the beef cuts.

One thing that may not be so obvious is how beef is cut and prepared in the island of Britain historically.  In the United States, Bar-b-Que is a tradition originating in Southern England (Narnia) and in which the preference for meat was typically over the fire.  For this reason, blackening leaner cuts gives a flavorful taste and so the back cuts, rump and flanks come out pretty good.

The forward of the cow which has lots of marbling (the round) gets turned into ground beef or stew cubes.  This is important because in the borderlands and northern areas of Britain making beef stews was the cooking preference, so fatty meats may have been the prime for boiling with vegetables.

Even in the most primitive, hunter-gatherer society, cutting beef or buffalo is a science, so I highly doubt Beakers simply tossed a slab of beef over the shoulder into a grave.  That bone is evidence of something:  supper, supplication or sound. 

Facial Reconstruction of Late Beaker Ava (Hew Morrison via MtoE)

Here's an article from MessagetoEagle entitled "Facial Reconstruction of Ava: 3,700-Year-Old Bronze Age Woman"

The reconstruction of this Late Beaker woman was created by forensic artist, Hew Morrison.  He used tooth enamel to estimate some of the soft tissue.  I don't know if DNA has been taken from Ava, however it would be nice to verify hair and eye color in the near future.

Ava's reconstruction by Hew Morrison (Via MessagetoEagle)

Ava is noteworthy for having an especially deformed head.  Not only is she hyper-brachycephalic, but her occiput is flat as a pancake.  Two good examples of flatheads are the deformed standard-bearer of UCL's Beaker project and the Mesetan woman hyper-linked in the same post [here].
 

See this post "Ava of the Highlands"

See Maya Hoole's  "The Achavanich Beaker Burial Project"

Archaeosoup Interviews Maya Hoole on Ava

Reconstructing 'Ava': Achavanich Beaker Burial Project 

One of the Beakers DNA Tested

Here's another Beaker that may end up in the Behemoth.

It looks like hyper-brachycephalic Ava of the highlands might be in there.  DNA was taken from her well preserved remain, although I'm not sure what relationship the Natural History Museum of London has with Harvard or Copenhagen

I've blogged on Ava several times [here], [here], [here].

Ava of the Highlands (BBC)

From the BBC: "Effort to unlock secrets of 3,700-year-old woman 'Ava'"

Hat tip, Mandy Chamberlin!

When you read the BBC story, don't get wrapped around the axle of periodization.  This is a late Beaker burial, directly carbon dated to 3700 B.P.

It is a particularly interesting burial for a number of reasons.  I'll go by the numbers starting with the news story in the BBC.  As you can tell, this young woman was hyper-brachycephalic bordering on ultra-brachycephalic based on the measurements of archaeologist Maya Hoole, who's managing "The Achavanich Beaker Burial Project". (see website)

The Young Beaker Woman (modified, via The Achavanich Burial Project)

I've previously hypothesized that the already meso- to brachycephalic ethnic Beakers were intensely swaddled as infants using cradle boards, further deforming their heads in some cases.  Comparing the two women of Achavanich (Highlands) and Camino de Yeseras (Madrid) might be a useful place to start (scroll down on this post).

Before preceding, I'll give you my two cents on flatheads.  It is clear to people-not-on-drugs that there is an identifiable ethnic core to the pan-Euro-African Bell Beaker phenomenon and that these people are easily distinguishable from the local substrate, in terms of height, skull characteristics, teeth, toes, and now by ancient DNA, etc.

But it seems that some Beaker heads are also outside 'normal' dimensions, unless they all had some kind of congenital deformity, which is not likely.  That leaves environmental concerns as the likely cause of a flathead like Hoole illustrates for Achavanich girl below.

A Pancake Head! by Maya Hoole (modified, via The Achavanich Burial Project)

Part of why I'm confident Beaker babies were strapped to cradle boards is really fourfold.  The first is the deep paternal ancestry of Beaker men, which quite clearly takes us to North Asia where there is plenty of ethnographic examples on both sides of Beringa.  We can see similar occipital flattening in Mongolian or Navajo babies of varying intensity.

The second question is really about mobility.  Beakerfolk were not 100% copper-wielding, warrior men walking around like roosters.  They were all ages, but more often children and babies.
So when we talk about Beaker mobility we must remember who is mobile.  You will remember a post recently on disabled Beaker folk and you may remember that even the Amesbury archer was crippled and may have needed a walking cane since one of his knees was blown out.  We can at least solve the baby mobility problem.

Navajo Woman and Child (Commons)

Thirdly, Europeans have a long and rich tradition of border-line child abuse swaddling.  It's only been in the last century or two that old school swaddling has died out, although its still customary to tightly wrap an infant in blankets.  Really it comes down to cradle boards, intensity and folk beliefs which have varied in intensity.

Finally, intentional head deformation, as practiced on every continent by every people since the Paleolithic, aims to lengthen the skull.  Intentional skull deformation is often very dramatic and highly differentiated, not something requiring giant calipers. 

Lapp Family (UMD Sweden)

This leaves us with an elegant solution, that the folk beliefs of the Beaker culture encouraged binding infants to cradle boards to include the head.  Mongolians did this to increase the child's height and 'make them strong and upright'.  Europeans generally believed it helped build the character and keep them out of trouble.

If this was the case, it could complicate other aspects of research though.  One is that cradling has been linked to an increase in infant hip dysplasia and the malformation of the acetabulum.  These types of patterns may have been (instead) used to indicate frequent horseback riding in Germany.  I don't know if developmental and adult deformities are easily separated or not.

Now moving on to this oddly decorated beaker.  Some of it seems to have some Grooved Ware character with the palm leaf pattern.  It's considered remarkable by Hoole for the number of techniques used to create it. 

The Clarke N4 Short Neck Beaker (modified, via The Achavanich Burial Project)

And now for one last comment on the burial.  Within in rock-cut pit there was placed a cow scapula, which is the shoulder blade.  There is no mention or expectation that it was ever notched, however this particular bone was a common burial artifact among the 'Sea Peoples' with connections to Cyprus, among others.  I believe cow spatulas are also found in Iberia; I'll have to research this further.  Perforated cow spatulas are also found in Northern China.

It has been variously proposed that notched and un-notched scapulas were musical instruments (David S. Reese, 2002), either a harp body or possibly a sound board like a turkey slate*, except for musical purposes.  

A Sea Peoples Scapula

A little of topic, this website of the Sea Peoples epic, has a pretty good breakdown of Sea People groups. 

Overall, there's quite a bit of Bronze Age activity around Caithness, especially at Achavanich.

* a turkey slate is load friction based soundboard used for hunting turkeys in North America

Maybe Not Offerings (Kysely et al, 2020)

We can suppose that Beakers engaged in some sort of necromancy and divination through several different means, a likely one was bothroic ritual, which would be by no means an exclusive practice.  The many empty pits they left near cemeteries with conjurable-worthy items and alcohol containers testify to this possibility.

This paper, "Scapulae and phalanges as grave goods: a mystery from the Early Bronze Age" Kysely et al, 2020, speculates on another magic practice widespread in Europe into historic times, but here focused on EBA Central Europe, that is the likelihood of some sort of scapulimancy and astragalomancy in Unetic graves.

Trinovantes by Peter Froste.

Unfortunately this is ppv, so I won't dwell on this topic unless I get a copy.  But maybe what we see in other regions, and as the authors suggest here, is that the selection of cuts appear prescriptive instead of a general offering or practical equipment.  Certain parts and certain animals.

Maybe Ava had this done in her grave as well.

Based on a study of animal bone finds from the Únětice Culture cemeteries (2200–1700 BC) in Bohemia, Czech Republic, the study analyses selected aspects of the funeral rite in the Early Bronze Age in Central Europe. The focus is on unworked and unburned cattle, pig, sheep/goat and red deer scapulae, phalanges (+ some astragali) and ribs—significant burial phenomena in the Únětice Culture—determined as undoubtedly intentional components of funerals, that is, as grave goods. Radiocarbon and other evidence show that the phenomena existed for the whole of the Únětice Culture and perhaps longer. The presence of scapulae in 41% of the graves in the cemetery at Mikulovice and tens of other cemeteries in Bohemia and Moravia, and the complete domination of phalanges among the animal bones in graves in the funerary area at Vliněves provide evidence of the importance of these customs in the funerary rite. Rib cuts certainly represent meat offerings but the meaning of isolated (unarticulated) scapulae and phalanges/astragali is difficult to determine. The hypothesis that scapulae found always singly could also be real meat offerings is difficult to accept, so further roles, whether practical or symbolic, should be considered. An earlier suggestion that scapulae were used as a trowel for digging grave pits is highly improbable, as follows from our analysis, and we were unable to confirm the use of the flat scapula as a plate for other offerings or a base for paintings. The choice of the (near-triangular) scapula to symbolise the triangle must be left in the realm of speculation. Unworked and variably positioned phalanges and astragali are unlikely to have been used for clothing or hair decoration but, based on analogies, might have been used in magic or games (amulets, tokens, dice, game pieces). The possible use of scapulae and phalanges + astragali in divination is considered in the light of ethnographic and historical records of scapulimancy and astragalomancy on four continents. As scapulae and phalanges do not usually appear together in a single grave, they could represent attributes of different social groups or statuses.

Last Minute Review of 2016

In a few weeks 2016 will be a distant memory because some spectacular papers are about to parachute in.

Here's a few things that were memorable.

From the "Beakers & Bodies Project" (British Archaeology, 2017)

1.  One of the best forensic reconstructions of an ancient person was brought to life:  "Ava of the Highlands" 

2.  There was the release of a paper "The Beaker People Project" that gave some support to the idea that flatheads could have been a product of infant rearing practices.

My view for a long while has been that flattened occiputs are enticingly a tell-tale sign of infant cradleboard use, most common in North Asia.  That, in combination with a strong genetic disposition for brachycephaly, made for some strange new head shapes in the Beaker period.   (Being Tall)

Discussed this a little further here VanderWaals, 1984

3.  Very recently there was a 'Neolithic Eyebrow' raising paper from Christina Roth, 2016.  I suspect this is part of a drip from a bigger paper, but in any case the Mesetan Beakerfolk clearly have unexpected maternal profiles that are not native to the plateau lands of Iberia.

Roth's paper agrees to some degree with Brotherton et al, 2013 in that Iberia has the kind of components that later appear elsewhere in Europe, while the reverse could also be true in the Mesetas and the Tagus estuary.  Some sort of reflux in one direction or the other seems likely.

On the other hand, kept in mind Hervella et al, 2015 who suggested that the dominant Beaker maternal profiles (H + V) were largely a contribution from a later Neolithic influx (relatively speaking) from Anatolia which also began to expand with the Beakers.

4.  Ancient Canary Islander DNA introduces some intriguing possibilities.   The bottom line is that R1b owes much less to the mission period than expected.  It could predate Berbers.  It's probably not Roman either.

The most backwards, isolated, hayseed hicks of the Canary Islands tested from a millennium ago are also the most Atlantic-like.

5.  Beer can literally be brought back from the dead.  [here].  This is more than analyzing ingredients and reproducing a beverage; it's actually reanimating surviving yeast (gives beer most of its unique character).

If beakers meant for drinking were periodically waterproofed with beeswax, then it's possible that yeast migrated into the liner and survived the harsher processes of decomposition.  Reproducing those yeast cells and then reusing (by the right hands, Alex McGovern?) could tell us volumes about the stages, temperatures and conditions in which that particular beer was made and stored (even if it was a relatively wild and uncontrolled yeast).

That would tell us if there was a radical difference in alcohol content in the funeral beakers of children, women and men.  Also, I suspect Neolithic beer was fermented in 1/4 oak log barrels (which is basically a hallowed-out oak log proofed with wax).

This next year looks to be a good one.  Happy New Year!