Human remains from the Pigi Artemidos LBA tumulus, region of Macedonian Olympus, Pieria

Abstract

The paper addresses the contextual analysis of human remains from the Late Bronze Age tumulus cemetery of Pigi Artemidos, sited at the southeast border of the region of Macedonian Olympus. It presents the available body of evidence from this funerary assemblage and compares it to other LBA cemeteries from the same region. Bearing in mind the limitations imposed by the small sample size and the absence of a demographic profile for adults, infectious diseases (e.g. posttraumatic osteomyelitis), skeletal trauma and markers of occupational activity show that the few individuals buried in the tumulus of Pigi Artemidos were physically active; furthermore, stress and deprivation during growth and development suggest poor environmental conditions. A differential burial treatment is inferred between adults and subadults. At this early stage of the contextual analysis of prehistoric populations from the region of Macedonian Olympus in Pieria, the inter-cemetery variations reveal locally diverse lifestyles and funerary expressions at the dawn of the LBA.