Degenerative Joint Disease and enthesopathies in a Bronze Age population from Sindou cave (Senaillac-Lauzes, Lot, France)

The anthropological characteristics of the people who lived during the cultural period of the Late Bronze Age in South West France still remain practically unknown because very few sites have provided skeletal remains which permit of an exhaustive study. The cave of Sindou is, in that sense, one of the scarce exceptions. Although the sample of Sindou cannot be considered as representative of the whole regional population (N=50), we studied the presence and severity of DJD and enthesopathies of microtraumatic origin with the aim of finding some data which contribute to the knowledge of several biological aspects of this human group. From the results of the comparisons of the Sindou remains with two different medieval samples, a great similarity is deduced for these skeletal markers, but the higher frequency and severity of Achilles tendon enthesopathy in Sindou is a probable index of a higher level of physical stress at this specific localisation.