Postmortem Change In Human and Animal Remains : A Systematic Approach

POSTMORTEM CHANGE IN HUMAN AND ANIMAL REMAINS: A Systematic Approach provides a unique, synthetic treatment of postmortem change presented in a systematic fashion with attention to the relative chronologies of both physical and cultural factors that influence human and animal remains. This book integrates reports and observations in the anthropology/archaeology literature with material as appropriate from medicine, pathology, paleopathology, ethnography (cultural anthropology) and the forensic sciences, as well as reporting on original observations by the author. In addition to discussing transformation of skeletal remains (as is the focus of most taphonomic studies in anthropology and archaeology), comprehensive treatment is given to changes in soft tissue remains, as well as to conditions under which such remains may be preserved postmortem. The immediate changes that occur within minutes/hours have been traditionally described by forensic pathologists, while this book 'fills in the blanks' between where pathology has traditionally left off, and before anthropology has traditionally begun. It also includes an integrated review of what anthropology traditionally considers. More and more anthropologists and forensic scientists are called upon to systematically interpret postmortem changes 'from beginning to end,' cutting across various fields of study. This is the first book which explores, explains and interprets all these aspects of postmortem change.