A Study Of Remains Of Human Beings Excavated In The Graveyard Of Xiabandi

The subject material is centered around the remains of mankind unearthed in the burial ground of Xiabandi,Kashgar Prefecture in Xinjiang.This graveyard is located in both Xindi countryside and Xiabandi countryside.These two villages are situated in Bandi,Tashkurgan tajik autonomous county,Kashgar Prefecture in Xinjiang.The burial ground is mostly situated in Xiabandi countryside.That is why people call it the Xiabandi Graveyard.In 2001,to serve the construction of water-control project in Xiabandi countryside,the Institute of Archaeology of Xinjiang and the Cultural Relic Management Institute of Kashgar Prefecture probed into the ruins scattering in reservoir inundated section in both the South and North of the Taxkorgan river.And both in 2003 and 2004,these two institutions arranged people to excavated these ruins.14 small-sized graveyards and 178 tombs were unearthed in these two endeavors.Among others,150 tombs have coffin chambers or remains.And 28 tombs merely have closure heaps,no coffin chamber nor ruinsAt present,the report in archaeology of this graveyard has been published.The150 tombs in the Xiabandi Graveyard spanned from the Bronze Age through the Han and Tang dynasties to Ming and Qing dynasties.This research aims to investigate the human skeletons in the A?burial area of the Bronze Age from the perspective of demography,anthropometry,molecular biology,archaeology and paleopathology.This burial area is the earliest and the best preserved one.It is hoped that this study will provide the latest data and information for concerned studies.The framework of this thesis is as follows:The First Chapter gives a brief introduction to the physical-geographic environment,the findings of relevant disciplines and the research methods and principles employed in this thesis.The Second Chapter is a statistical research on gender,death age and population.The author makes an abridged life table by authenticating the gender and death age of27 cases and pre-judging the average death age and longevity of them.It is calculated that the average life expectancy of this group is 23.93.Babies are not involved due to the limitation of the number of specimen.The Three Chapter is about the essential data on the metric traits of skull.By analyzing the statistical data of the metric traits of skull and the shape of these skulls,it is concluded that the craniofacial features of male living in the Xiabandi in the Bronze Age are as follows: middle craniotype or long craniotype in the ratio of length to width;normal craniotype and high craniotype in the ratio of long to wide;the narrow craniotype outnumbers the wide craniotype in the ratio of wide to high;in terms of facial cranial shape,there are broad-frontal type,middle-upper type,middle-nose type,broad-nose type,low-orbit type and high-orbit type.The prominence of the vertical direction in the face is moderate.The craniofacial features of female is basically similar to those of male.The differences are mainly manifested in shorter craniotype,wider frontal type,and slightly lower orbital type.The research also tests the purity of their race by means of standard deviation,the average standard deviation percentage,average coefficient of variation.It is still reasonable to study the residents living in the Xiabandi in the Bronze Age as an identical race even considering the complexity and diversity of their origins.The Four Chapter is about a comparative study of metric traits of skull.This research chooses 12 sets of data on the metric traits of skull of people in the Bronze Age and employs three research methods such as root mean square value,euclidean distance coefficient and clustering analysis.It is concluded that people of the Bronze Age in the Xiabandi is more closely relative to people buried in coffin chambers and wooden funeral chamber tombs.This conforms to the result of complete genome sequencing of ancient DNA.It is estimated that people of the Bronze Age in the Xiabandi is probably come from Andronovo cultural zone.It is found that people of the Bronze Age is strikingly different from people of the Iron Age by comparing 9groups of people living in the Iron Age with those living in the Bronze Age.This helps explain why it is hard to find out where the posterity of people of the Bronze Age in the Xiabandi go.The Five Chapter conducts the research from the viewpoint of paleopathology.The oral health of residents in the A?burial area is in bad condition.The wear rate of teeth prong is inversely proportional to age as a result of using dental tools instead of resulting from nutrition and development.Some other observable oral diseases are as follows: apical abscess,aplasia of enamel,dental calculus and periodontitis.Apical abscess will appear as people's age increases,so it tends to turn into apical ulcers.Some dental fistulous tracts are even connected with maxillary sinus.At this moment,invisible bony traumas are primarily found on the cranioface.Infectious diseases such as osteoma and periostitis are also found out.And the older these persons are,the more likely are they to suffer the hyperplasia of joints.The analysis of pathological phenomena suggests that violent clashes among this group as well as between this group with the other groups are least likely to occur.It is estimated that some persons of this group may travel by riding a horse through the investigation of leg bones.The Six Chapter summarizes the findings of this research and discusses relevant questions.