Maritime Cultures Research Institute, Department of Arts, Sciences, and Archaeology, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium.
Department of Otorhinolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery, Leiden University Medical Center, The Netherlands.
Rapid Commun Mass Spectrom. 2021 Apr 15;35(7):e9038. doi: 10.1002/rcm.9038.
Strontium isotope analysis can be applied to the calcined human otic capsule in the petrous part (pars petrosa ossis temporalis; PP) to gain information on childhood mobility in archaeological and forensic contexts. However, only a thin layer of the otic capsule, the inner cortex, demonstrates virtually no remodelling. This paper proposes an improved sampling method for the accurate sampling of the inner cortex of the otic capsule to ensure that Sr/ Sr ratios related to early childhood are obtained.
Calcined rib and diaphyseal fragments and PP from ten cremation deposits are sampled for strontium isotope analysis, whereby our improved sampling strategy is applied to sample the inner cortex of the otic capsule. This allows inter- and intraskeletal Sr/ Sr comparison within an Iron Age collection from Oss, The Netherlands.
Forty percent (4/10) of the calcined PP that were evaluated for this study show marked differences in Sr/ Sr (0.00035-0.00065) between the inner cortex and the bone sample surrounding this layer, the external cortex that has higher remodelling rates. Differences in Sr/ Sr between various skeletal elements also aided in the identification of the minimum number of individuals.
Our study demonstrates the problematic nature of the external cortex and stresses the need for a precise sampling method of the correct areas of the otic capsule. This can only be obtained by cutting the calcined PP midmodiolarly to enable adequate combustion degree assessment, and the correct identification and sampling of the inner cortex of the otic capsule.
锶同位素分析可应用于煅烧的人耳骨（颞骨岩部；PP），以获取考古学和法医学背景下儿童活动的信息。然而，只有耳骨的一层薄壳，即内皮层，几乎没有再塑造。本文提出了一种改进的采样方法，用于准确采集耳骨的内皮层，以确保获得与幼儿期相关的 Sr/Sr 比值。
对来自十个火化遗址的煅烧肋骨和骨干碎片以及 PP 进行锶同位素分析，应用我们的改进采样策略来采样耳骨的内皮层。这允许在荷兰 Oss 的铁器时代收藏中进行骨骼内和骨骼间的 Sr/Sr 比较。
在这项研究中评估的 40%（4/10）的煅烧 PP 显示出内皮层与包围该层的骨骼样本（具有较高重塑率的外皮层）之间 Sr/Sr（0.00035-0.00065）的显著差异。不同骨骼元素之间的 Sr/Sr 差异也有助于确定最小个体数量。
我们的研究表明外皮层的性质存在问题，并强调需要一种精确的采样方法来采集耳骨的正确区域。这只能通过沿中纬线切割煅烧的 PP 来实现，以能够评估适当的燃烧程度，并正确识别和采样耳骨的内皮层。
