Orsorg

What this skeleton told us: Evidence

An 11 to 13 year teenager/adolescent with a well preserved skeleton. There is some sign of a response to potential infection (new woven bone formation) and possible cysts (a fluid filled lumps) on the left and right heel bones (calcanea). There is also dental enamel thinning (enamel defects, or hypoplasia).

Interpretation of the evidence

Mortality prior to adulthood was likely high in Anglo-Saxon Britain. This young teenager/adolescent probably died from a communicable disease (infection). The enamel hypoplasia illustrates that in childhood this person experienced a deficient diet or disease. Woven bone is basically immature bone that is the first type of bone formed when a bone forming disease (or injury) affects bones. It gets replaced by lamellar bone after some time as the healing process develops. For example, the initial bone that unites a break in a bone (fracture) is woven bone.