Paleohealth based on dental pathology and cribra orbitalia from the ancient Egyptian settlement of Qau

Abstract

Reports on the health of the people of ancient Egypt, one of the four great civilizations of the world, are of considerable interest to many. This paper addresses the paleohealth of people from Qau in ancient Egypt based on samples housed at the University of Cambridge. This skeletal series extends from the Protodynastic Period to the 30th Dynasty, with the largest number being from the 6th to 8th Dynasties. The remains are divided into four groups (male, female, early middle age, and late middle age) and physical anthropology methods were used to investigate dental caries, periodontal disease, antemortem tooth loss, dental wear, alveolar bone recession, enamel hypoplasia, and cribra orbitalia. The study was limited in that resource materials from multiple dynasties were combined, and no postcranial skeletal examinations were possible. However, the following matters were found regarding the paleohealth of the ancient Egyptian Qau people: (i) the rate of dental caries was low; (ii) periodontal disease was present and progressed with age; (iii) even so, tooth loss was low; (iv) dental wear was pronounced; and (v) there were no age-related stress markers, and few individuals with serious disease. Overall, based on the Qau people in this data, it can be assumed that the health status was poor, the death rate of newborns, infants, and young children was high, and individuals exhibiting severe stress markers died before reaching adulthood. Ancient Egyptians have long been the subject of much anthropological and archaeological study, and this paper introduces several interesting topics for further investigation concerning the paleoenvironment and paleohealth of these ancient people.