Interlunation children": new data on the quality of life in Yaroslavl in the 16th - 17th cc. according to the anthropological materials from children burials

The publication demonstrates possibilities of investigation of skeletalremains from children burials in bioarchaeological reconstructions. Salvage excavationswere conducted within the Yaroslavl Kremlin by the Institute of Archaeology, RAS in2007, 2009-2010, headed by A. V. Engovatova. A cemetery related to the church of Johnthe Chrysostom with totally 250 burials was investigated. The studies of skeletal remainprovide data on the Yaroslavl population, both adult and children, in the 16 th - 17 th cc.Probability of malnutrition, vitamin insufficiency, and famine was evaluated. In the childrenselection five individuals with vitamin C insufficiency were revealed, their majority diedat the age of less than 1 year old. Differentiated diagnostics shows that in the periodin question in the city special acute form of «infant scurvy» (known as Moller-Barlowdisease) was spread. This is the first palaeoanthropological evidence of the disease ina big city during Interlunation confirms the data of written sources on scurvy epidemicsin the fortress of Sviyazhsk in 1552 and St. Sergius Trinity Lavra in 1609.