Services
Planning
Specialist advice for pre-contract planning of archaeological projects can ensure greater cost-effectiveness and efficiency during fieldwork and post-excavation phases.
York Osteoarchaeology offer
- Confidential pre-planning advice and guidance to enhance the speed and quality of skeletal excavation and post-excavation processing
- Site-specific advice with the aim of exploiting the maximum potential of a cemetery
- A flexible, cost-effective, reliable and prompt osteological service which aims to achieve a fast and high quality turn-around
- Academic and public forms of publication
Excavation
Extensive experience in field archaeology ensures an understanding of a variety of taphonomic situations, including:
- different soil conditions
- contaminated sites
- crypt excavations (we hold Draeger Safe Entry into Confined Spaces certificates)
- a wide range of construction sites
York Osteoarchaeology offer specialist advice from the planning stages to the completion of a project on a variety of procedures connected with human remains:
- Guidance on exhumation isues
- In situ assessment
- Excavation
- Lifting
- Sampling
- Treatment of soft tissue
- Transportation
- Processing
- Storage
- Disposal
York Osteoarchaeology has experience of many types of mortuary customs, including
- Sand bodies
- Mass graves
- Ossuaries
- Cremation burials
- Lead coffins
- Sarcopahgi
- Dismembered skeletons
- Secondary burials
- Non-burial disposal
- Dense churchyard burial
- Pyre excavation
- Forensic disposal
Analysis and Reporting
York Osteoarchaeology Ltd adheres to standards set by English Heritage (2002), the Irish Heritage Council (2000) and Historic Scotland (1996) during the excavation, analysis and reporting of human remains. The analysis and reporting of human skeletal remains from archaeological contexts involves:
assessment of preservation
estimation of age
determination of sex
calculation of stature
analysis of skeletal manifestations of pathology
analysis of dental pathology
integration of results with the archaeological context
analysis of the funerary rituals
demographic analysis, population structure and dynamics
comparative analysis of different skeletons from the same population
inter-population comparisons with published information on skeletal assemblages from the same period, the same area, the same funerary treatment or the same background
concluding interpretation of the results of the skeletal analysis at individual, sample and population level
Following Analysis
- Aid with curation and storage of assesmblages
- Re-boxing of human remains
- Preparation and advice of museum displays
- Publicising the results
