- chapter 47: Health and medicine in Etruria –
Bodies/bonesNew techniques of DNA analysis are proving useful in determining sex and consanguinity
in family tombs; intriguing studies to identify the DNA of pathogens in bodies are
now underway (e.g. A. Harrison and colleagues at University of Copenhagen) and could
substantially change our views of disease in Antiquity. Archaeological context might
at some time offer evidence of disease conditions, for instance, where multiple burials
of persons of different ages were made in a short period of time: these might be the
result of infectious disease entering a community. The burial of mother, father, son and
daughter in a third-century bc tomb in the Tarquinian Calvario necropolis might one
day be explained if the DNA of pathogens is identifi ed (e.g. Cappellini et al. 2004).
Another curious case is the Iron Age Latial burial at Osteria dell’Osa (Gabii) of a 30-year-
old man re-opened before his bones became disarticulated for deposition of an elderly
woman’s cremated remains (Bietti Sestieri 1992: 121–125; Becker and Salvadei 1992:
177–178). Likewise, burials of older children, past the dangerous age of weaning, might
be interpreted as resulting from infectious disease. Certainly, the recent results of studies
on tissue from the Chalcolithic “Iceman” have changed our views, since they show that he
was lactose intolerant and infected with Lyme disease (Keller et al. 2012).
Discoveries in the 1980s at the Tarquinia Pian di Civita site exposed some cases of
human sacrifi ce (a child and an eighth-century bc swordsman who was dispatched by
a blow perhaps from a winged axe), and also a special burial of a ninth-century bc boy
who apparently died of a congenital condition (aneurism) after a short life of seeing and
hearing things (from pressure on the brain) that no-one else could. (His affl iction, seen
in marks inside the skull, has suggested to some scholars that he was the prototype for
the supernatural prophet Tages, said to have dictated the Etruscan scriptures (disciplina
etrusca) before disappearing into the plowed earth whence he had come. (See Chapter 29;
Fornaciari and Mallegni 1997).
Many diseases and causes of death, from plague to heart attack to murder, leave no
telltale signs in the bones, but occasionally, conditions affecting bone such as anemia or
cancer have been identifi ed. A case of Pott’s disease (a type of tuberculosis, known in Italy
since the Neolithic period) was identifi ed in a skeleton discovered in a tomb at Pozzuolo
near Perugia (affecting the sacrum and lumbar spine (Capasso and Di Tota 1997: 553–
554). At Bozzolo near Mantua, a child of eight–nine years and three middle-aged men
were said to have symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis (Cattaneo and Mazzucchi 2005).^1
In the rock-cut necropolis of Norchia, a tomb of the third century bc held the “donna
con i sandali” and her newborn infant: she wore a pair of fashionable tyrrhenika sandals and
a second pair was placed beside her (Barbieri and Becker 1996–97). Another case of death
related to childbirth was a Faliscan woman of the seventh century bc whose urn held the
bones of her newborn mingled with her own; gifts within included special miniature
objects (De Lucia Brolli 2004).
TraumaChance fi nds of individuals who show evidence of trauma show a dangerous world,
whether through war or accidents. For instance, at Tarquinia, Calvario Tomb 6100 (third
century bc) held a man who died aged 45; the fi bula of one leg had a healed fracture
(Cavagnaro Vanoni 1996: 349). At Chiusi, possibly as early as 600 bc, a swordsman’s