title: Exploring poverty: skeletal biology and documentary evidence in 19th-20th century Portugal.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The inference of the state of wealth or poverty from human skeletal remains is a difficult task, as the limited number of skeletal changes are mediated by numerous other physiological, biomechanical and pathological events. In recent years, identified skeletal collections have become valuable resources in enabling aetiologies of these changes to be understood while controlling for some known causative factors, e.g. age, sex and occupation. This has favoured more rigorous data analysis and interpretation.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  This study compares the presence of osteological makers of occupation - specifically degenerative joint changes (DJC) - between socio-economically framed occupational groups whilst controlling for age-at-death.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 603 individuals were distributed into seven occupational groups used as a proxy for their socio-economic status.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The results demonstrated that age was a contributing factor for DJC. Differences between occupational groups were only found for the hips, right shoulder and ankle.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Differences found were not necessarily representative of low vs high socio-economic status. Furthermore, there are limitations associated with the use of occupation-at-death, based on documentary evidence, which does not necessarily reflect wealth-status.
authors.affiliation: a NOVA CRIA - Centro em Rede de Investigação em Antropologia, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa , Portugal and.
authors.forename: Francisca
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Alves Cardoso
authors.affiliation: b CIAS - Research Centre for Anthropology and Health, Department of Life Sciences, University of Coimbra , Portugal.
authors.forename: Sandra
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Assis
authors.affiliation: b CIAS - Research Centre for Anthropology and Health, Department of Life Sciences, University of Coimbra , Portugal.
authors.forename: Charlotte
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Henderson
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000886:Anthropometry / Q000379:methods; D005260:Female; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D007592:Joint Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000209:etiology / Q000473:pathology; D007596:Joints / Q000473:pathology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009784:Occupational Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000209:etiology / Q000473:pathology; D011174:Portugal / Q000453:epidemiology; D011203:Poverty / Q000266:history*; D012923:Social Class; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Degenerative joint changes; identified collections; occupation; skeletons; socio-economic status