Dynamics of variability of nonmetric dental traits of the Staraya Russa population of XIV–XVII c.

Abstract

Introduction. The purpose of the article is to determine the character of variability of the phenofund of the population of Staraya Russa during the 14^th–16^th centuries. Fr om a paleoanthropological point of view, Staraya Russa remained almost unexplored until recently. The question of the genesis of the medieval city's population is very important. This paper publishes the first dental anthropological data on the urban population of Staraya Russa and an attempt has been made to generalize all currently available paleoanthropological samples.

Materials and methods. The sample consists of 135 individuals, formed fr om 3 groups representing the nearby cemeteries of Staraya Russa. The first group belongs to St. George’s Church and dates back to the second half of the 14^th century (42 individuals). The second group belongs to the Saint Mina Church, dating from the 16^th–17^th centuries (71 individuals). The third group belongs to the St. Nicholas Church (22 individuals), it is synchronous with the St. Mina Church. The Novgorod State University (by E.V. Toropova) carried out archaeological excavations of the necropolis in 2006-2009. The research program is based on the methodological developments of A.A. Zoubov.

Results. The population of Staraya Russa has the traits of the northern gracile complex (type) of the western dental trunk. When comparing the samples, the stability of the morphological traits of the population of Staraya Russa during the 14^th–16^th centuries is observed. This happened according to a local and chronological criterion (the sum of groups of the 16^th–17^th centuries). There were no statistically significant discrepancies between the frequencies (except for the case, which was explained by a small number of observations). We do not observe such homology, for example, in Pskov, wh ere several different morphological variants are represented. In an comparison, the morphological traits of the population of Staraya Russa are similar to the total sample of Krivichi (by R.U. Gravere). Possible participation of the Baltic-Finnish populations in the formation of the morphological complex of Staraya Russa.

Discussion. The main conclusion is the phenotypic continuity of the population of Staraya Russa at different historical periods. This suggests that the process of joining Staraya Russa to Moscovy did not have an impact on the phenofund, which was most likely formed on the basis of Krivichi (with the inclusion of the Baltic-Finnish component). Similar population processes occurred in some other non-urban settlements of the North-West of Russia, wh ere a similar dental anthropological complex was found to a large extent.

Acknowledgements. Before writing the article, the author made a report «Nonmetric dental of the population of Staraya Russa in the second half of the XIV–XVII centuries» at the XL scientific conference «Novgorod and the Novgorod land. History and Archeology» (29.01.2026). The author expresses his gratitude to the organizers of the conference for the opportunity to speak and discuss the results. The author thanks the Novgorod State University team of archaeologists, in particular E.V. Toropova (the head of the archaeological excavations in Staraya Russa) for the opportunity to work with the collection and the staff of the Institute and Museum of Anthropology (Moscow State University) for providing access to the collections. The author thanks N.A. Leibova for providing unpublished data and advice during the writing of the article and O.M. Leibova for assistance in data visualization.

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