This image shows a roundworm egg (Ascaris sp.) with a typical undulating membrane. Image: University of Basel, IPAS
Posted on 01/02/2015 2:26:39 PM PST by SunkenCiv
The settlement was inhabited around 100 B.C. and is one of the most significant Late La Tene sites in Central Europe. The team found the durable eggs of roundworms (Ascaris sp.), whipworms, (Trichuris sp.) and liver flukes (Fasciola sp.). The eggs of these intestinal parasites were discovered in the backfill of 2000 year-old storage and cellar pits from the Iron Age.
The presence of the parasite eggs was not, as is usually the case, established by wet sieving of the soil samples. Instead, a novel geoarchaeology-based method was applied using micromorphological thin sections, which enable the parasite eggs to be captured directly in their original settings. The thin sections were prepared from soil samples embedded in synthetic resin, thus permitting the researchers to determine the number and exact location of the eggs at their site of origin in the sediments of the pits. This offered new insights into diseases triggered by parasites in the Iron Age settlement.
Poor sanitary conditions
The eggs of the Iron Age parasites originate from preserved human and animal excrement (coprolites) and show that some individuals were host to several parasites at the same time. Furthermore, the parasite eggs were distributed throughout the former topsoil, which points to the waste management practised for this special type of 'refuse'. It may, for example, have been used as fertilizer for the settlement's vegetable gardens. As liver flukes require freshwater snails to serve as intermediate hosts, it is conceivable that this type of parasite was introduced via livestock brought in from the surrounding areas to supply meat for the settlement's population.
(Excerpt) Read more at pasthorizonspr.com ...
This image shows a roundworm egg (Ascaris sp.) with a typical undulating membrane. Image: University of Basel, IPAS
Aw! Now you’re making’ me hungry!
Lol, at first glance I thought it said “Late La Trene” site!
I wonder if they had any effective treatments for those sorts of parasites back then. Probably not. If you had worms you were probably stuck with them.
I find it encouraging that serious scientists are busy developing new techniques for squeezing information out of archeological deposits even though there is no money in it. All the rest are off chasing the Global Warming will-o-the-wisp.
Call me a Luddite or flat-earther but isn’t it a stretch to assume such impossible accuracy two millenia (supposedly) after the fact?
over easy with bacon and buttered toast pls.
Perhaps you are, but only your fellow Luddites would care, assuming that you are one to begin with.
In this case, we have actual biological evidence, roundworm eggs that have been preserved and that can be identified by their morphology under the microscope.
Chronological sequencing has progressed so much since my days in academia some 40 plus years ago that one would think that we did it with chicken bones and incantations, which we did not: we preferred bourbon.
No, no, I'm not knocking leaps of faith. Some great science has been produced by great faith.
It kept them all very thin. Probably why we have an ‘obesity epidemic’ today.
Round worms, again! Richard the Third was castigated for having them after his remains were found. Everybody had them - most, especially, I would think is soldiers in the field.
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