Life and Death in Asia Minor combines contributions in both archaeology
and bioarchaeology in Asia Minor in the period ca. 200 BC - AD 1300 for
the first time. The archaeology topics are wide-ranging including death
and territory, death and landscape perception, death and urban
transformations from pagan to Christian topography, changing tomb
typologies, funerary costs, family organization, funerary rights,
rituals and practices among pagans, Jews, and Christians, inhumation and
Early Byzantine cremations and use and reuse of tombs. The
bioarchaeology chapters use DNA, isotope and osteological analyses to
discuss, both among children and adults, questions such as demography
and death rates, pathology and nutrition, body actions, genetics,
osteobiography, and mobility patterns and diet. The areas covered in
Asia Minor include the sites of Hierapolis, Laodikeia, Aphrodisias,
Tlos, Ephesos, Priene, Kyme, Pergamon, Amorion, Gordion, Boğazkale, and
Arslantepe.
The theoretical and methodological approaches used make it highly
relevant for people working in other geographical areas and time
periods. Many of the articles could be used as case studies in teaching
at schools and universities. An important objective of the publication
has been to see how the different types of results emerging from
archaeological and natural science studies respectively could be
integrated with each other and pose new questions on ancient societies,
which were far more complex than historical and social studies of the
past often manage to transmit.
