Blue Bridge Lane
&
Fishergate House
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The analysis of skeletal manifestations of disease in the Fishergate House population provides valuable insights into the health and diet of people in this quarter of York, as well as information on their living conditions and occupations. In the pre-antibiotic era, the greater majority of deaths were the result of infectious disease, with half the population dying in infancy and early childhood. Children succumbed easily to gastrointestinal and respiratory infections. Epidemics of infectious diseases such as plague or smallpox were rapidly transmitted, causing many fatalities, especially in densely populated urban areas. Because people died at a much younger age, joint disease, cardiovascular disease and cancer were much less common than they are today (Roberts and Manchester 1995, 124). Instead, skeletal manifestations of chronic infectious disease, trauma and some forms of metabolic diseases are commonly observed.
apc > monographs > blue bridge lane & fishergate house > artefacts & environmental > human bone:
