Burials of mobility impaired individuals from the Bell Beaker culture cemetery in Kolín, central Bohemia

Abstract

Anthropological analysis of skeletal remains from the Eneolithic Bell Beaker culture site of Kolín uncovered during a rescue excavations in 2008–2010 revealed a concentration of paleopathological finds in the section labelled II-3. We present three case studies, descriptions of pathologies manifested in bones and its diagnoses are completed with likely functional impacts and activity limitations. Although the impairments described in the study differ in its severity and etiology (trauma, specific inflammation and congenital anomaly), all of them show evidences of long-term (or lifelong) living with the impairment.