Evidence for temporal and social differences in cranial dimensions in Edo‐period Japanese

Abstract

This study examined the craniometric traits of the Edo-period (AD1603-1867) human skeletons from the Hitotsubashi site in Tokyo, compared them with temporally and socially various populations, and attempted to detect the morphological differentiation patterns that the Edo-period Japanese exhibited over time and under those social/environmental conditions. The materials measured here were the townsmen's crania from the Hitotsubashi site, which were dated back to the early half of the Edo period. The observations revealed that the Hitotsubashi samples were more dolichocephalic than any other Edo series and were different from subsequent Edo series in terms of larger maximum cranial length and smaller maximum cranial breadth. The Hitotsubashi samples were definitely in contrast with those of Tentokuji and Shirogane, both of which included a samurai (warrior) class of the late to final Edo period and exhibited the most brachycephalic crania. It is reasonable to assume that the temporal and social situations were possibly related to the observed cranial variation and that the temporal changes in cranial dimensions in pre-modern Japan might have reflected the nutritional and environmental conditions.

The diet of townspeople in the city of Edo: carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analyses of human skeletons from the Ikenohata-Shichikencho site

“…Although the ageatdeath distribution of the Ikenohata population is younger than that of the aggregated townspeople skeletons (Kobayashi, 1967) and rural population reconstructed from historical census documents (Kobayashi, 1956) during the Edo period, this could be an artifact of the age estimation method by Lovejoy et al (1985), as the author has noted (Nagaoka, 2007). Furthermore, human skeletons from the Ikenohata site have been used in various studies of physical anthropology as representative of townspeople during the Edo period because of their large number and good preserva tion (Ohsako, 2000;Nagaoka and Hirata, 2005;Kawakubo, 2007;Sakaue, 2007Sakaue, , 2012Kawakubo et al, 2009;Hayashi et al, 2012;Nagaoka et al, 2012b). However, the primary concerns of these studies were not Ikenohata individuals, and datasets from Ikenohata have been used only for com parative purposes.…”

Biological distance at the Ryan Mound site

“…Ancient DNA studies are also complicated, costly, destructive, and can be unfruitful. Metric studies of both the crania and post‐crania have been used to reconstruct relationships as well (Auerbach, ; González‐José et al, ; Humphries et al, ; Nagaoka, Kawakubo, & Hirata, ; Varela, O'Brien, & Cocilovo, ). However, metric data can be difficult to collect, especially on poorly preserved remains, and observer error rates tend to be high (see Oeh, ; Stojanowski & Euber, ).…”