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Brief communication: Additional cases of maxillary canine‐first premolar transposition in several prehistoric skeletal assemblages from the Santa Barbara Channel Islands of California
Author(s) -
Sholts Sabrina B.,
Clement Anna F.,
Wärmländer Sebastian K.T.S.
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
american journal of physical anthropology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.146
H-Index - 119
eISSN - 1096-8644
pISSN - 0002-9483
DOI - 10.1002/ajpa.21343
Subject(s) - premolar , crania , transposition (logic) , prehistory , geography , archaeology , mainland , demography , dentistry , medicine , linguistics , philosophy , sociology , molar
This article identifies and discusses seven new cases of complete maxillary canine‐premolar transposition in ancient populations from the Santa Barbara Channel region of California. A high frequency of this tooth transposition has been previously documented within a single prehistoric cemetery on one of the Channel Islands. A total of 966 crania representing 30 local sites and about 7,000 years of human occupation were examined, revealing an abnormally high prevalence of this transposition trait among islanders during the Early period of southern California prehistory (∼5500–600 B.C.). One of the affected crania is from a cemetery more than 7,000‐years‐old and constitutes the earliest case of tooth transposition in humans so far reported. The results are consistent with findings by other studies that have indicated inbreeding among the early Channel Islands groups. Together with the normal transposition rates among mainland populations, the decreasing prevalence of maxillary canine‐first premolar transposition among island populations across the Holocene suggests that inbreeding on the northern Channel Islands had all but ceased by the end of the first millennium B.C., most likely as a result of increased cross‐channel migration and interaction. Am J Phys Anthropol 143:155–160, 2010. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.