Abstract
The oral health and two cranial stress markers such as cribra orbitalia and porotichyperostosis in the remains of early modern Nigerian people, housed in the University of Cambridge since 1911 were investigated. Early modern Nigerian people had no carious teeth, and their antemortem tooth loss was low. These results were almost similar to those of Kubota et al. at the end of the 20th century. Some stress markers including enamel hypoplasia, cribra orbitalia and cribrotic hyperostosis were recognized, but the degree of these stress markers was slight. It is thought that the people who received a strong stress were not able to survive, which is a paleopathological paradox. Their dental attrition was very severe and it corresponds to the Yayoi people (ca. 2700〜1700 years BP) in Japan. Their severe dental attrition suggested that the slight occlusal caries had disappeared. On the other hand, their alveolar bone loss was relatively severe, and it was presumed that the frequency of periodontal diseases was high in the early modern Nigerian people. The number of missing teeth, the degree of dental attrition and alveolar bone loss of the late middle aged individuals was significantly different from early middle aged individuals. Physical anthropologists handle similar ancient human skeletal remains. Present study helps us to compare ancient and modern people in order to understand various problems and to find new perspectives.
