Biomolecular archaeology

introduction reviewing some of the main areas of interest in which biomolecular archaeology has either made a significant contribution or promises to do so in the near future

three series of bloodstained flakes and bones were buried in soil out of doors, retrieved month by month, and tested using a sensitive and specific ELISA with monoclonal antibodies to see if any human albumin or IgG, or bovine albumin, could be detected. A few tests were positive, including a scraper examined after twelve months' burial, but many were negative. A fourth series of bloodstained flakes kept in laboratory conditions tested highly positive for albumin and IgG after two years. The results are compared with other experimental work and with published identifications of blood from ancient sites, and factors which might have a significant effect on antigen survival are discussed

the authors discuss the potential of the study of ancient biomolecules in preserved wheat remains to provide information on the initial development of agriculture and its subsequent trajectories and spread in relation to changing human society. They detected ancient DNA in extracts prepared from charred, waterlogged and mineralized wheat seeds, and used the polymerase chain reaction to study specific genetic regions of the ancient DNA preserved in Triticum spelta from Danebury, UK and T. Dicoccum from Greece. They discuss future developments in the biomolecular archaeology of wheat, including the possibility of a genetic test that may enable tetraploid and hexaploid wheat remains to be distinguished by ancient DNA analysis

paper exploring the problems of isolating criteria for use in identifying ancient remains of plant foods, and the possibility of using chemical residues for this role. It discusses factors affecting the choice of such chemical criteria, and the taxonomic framework within which all chemical, morphological and histological criteria have to be assessed and applied. It outlines three examples of the way in which criteria of all three types have been used in identifying archaeologically critical remains of food plants from Late Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Early Neolithic sites in the Near East