Evidence of interpersonal violence at two sites of the Bijelo Brdo culture in eastern Croatia

Abstract

Human skeletal remains from Bijelo Brdo-Venice Street and Vukovar-Lijeva Bara have previously been anthropologically analysed and published, but in this paper cranial traumas are studied for the first time. The sample consists of 84 adult skulls curated in the Natural History Museum and the Archaeological Museum in Zagreb. Results showed a high frequency of cranial trauma (19.0 %) recorded in 16 out of 84 well-preserved skulls. Although males exhibit twice as many traumas as females (24.4 % vs. 12.8 %) the difference is not statistically significant. Trauma is present most frequently on the left side of the skull, and there is perimortem trauma in both sites, as well as in both sexes; this indicates the existence of interpersonal violence in these populations.