title: "A Bioarchaeological Approach to Everyday Life: Squatting Facets at Abu Fatima"
authors: ["schrader.md"]
abstract: This paper offers a bioarchaeological approach to everyday life at Abu Fatim through an examination of squatting facets of the ancient population of Nubia.
Everyday life in Nubia involves activities such as, cooking, cleaning,
planting seeds, harvesting crops, watching a football match, chatting
with friends, monitoring children, eating delicious foods, and drinking
tea. If we conjure up images of these quotidian actions from personal
experiences, many of these activities are performed in a squatting
position (Fig. 1). When a chair or mat is not available, modern Nubians
will frequently assume a squatting position, with hips, knees, and
ankles bent, to create temporary respite. As many of us that are not
commonly in this position can attest to, it requires a degree of
flexibility that no doubt comes with years of habituation and practice.
Using bioarchaeological methods, we are able to assess whether or not
ancient populations also frequently assumed a squatting position. The
lower leg bone (tibia) has been shown to possess accessory articulating
facets when the ankle joint is regularly hyperdorsiflexed (i.e., when
toes are drawn towards shins; Fig. 1). There have been a few
bioarchaeological publications using this approach, however, they are
mainly limited to case studies.[^1] I argue that the squatting facets
method has broader theoretical importance as it can be used as an
indicator of everyday life in the *longue durée*. We have a window into
how people spent their days, inside and outside of the home, and
potentially a temporal line of continuity between ancient and modern
populations.
**~~Figure 1. Squatting Position and Skeletal Consequences of Habitual Squatting (modified from Trinkaus 1975)[^2]~~**
# Bioarchaeology of the Everyday
Everyday life is vitally important to the development of individual and
communal identities as well as to agentive action and social change.
While certain major life events (e.g., wedding, funeral, war, etc.) may
create a more marked memory, the majority of lived experiences are those
that we might consider mundane. It is these minutiae that scholars of
practice theory suggest are the most crucial---these everyday actions
can be minor acts of resistance to an overarching social system that,
with enough support and continuity, can go on to change entire social
structures.[^3] In this way, these everyday lives of everyday people are
anything but mundane, but rather consist of a series of critical ways of
operating.[^4]
Archaeologists have long argued that understanding everyday life in the
past is essential. Moving away from temples and tombs, archaeologists
became interested in how everyday people lived in their day-to-day
milieu. Additionally, archaeology is ideally situated to study this
everyday past given the material record that everyday life creates.
Interpretations of everyday practice have been achieved through studies
of midden deposits, architecture, debitage, landscape modification, and
ceramics. Footprints at the ancient Mayan site of Chan Nòohol were even
used to recreate movements and personal interactions within this
community.[^5] The archaeology of everyday life in ancient Nubia has
been examined through several lenses, including, but not limited to
architecture and use of space, foodways, and identity expression.[^6]
Skeletal data has the ability to provide unique insight into everyday
life in the ancient world. Contrary to popular belief, bones are not as
unmalleable as we might assume. Rather, the skeletal frame adapts
throughout one's life, slowly remodeling on a cellular level. It is
estimated that it takes approximately 10 years for the skeleton to
completely remodel.[^7] This process also facilitates a record of life
events, embodied in the bones themselves. This is frequently referred to
as embodiment theory in bioarchaeology and speaks to the biosocial
nature of bioarchaeologyn[^8] The discipline goes beyond looking at
broken bones or diseases to assessing lived experience in the ancient
past, how it changed during periods of political, economic, and social
upheaval, and how these data can be used to inform our understanding of
our modern world.
In previous work I have used this embodiment framework to examine
everyday life in ancient Nubia.[^9] By examining skeletal indicators of
activity (osteoarthritis and muscle attachment sites) as well as
biomolecular approaches to diet (carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis),
I was able to document how everyday life changed for Nubians living
under colonial New Kingdom rule as well as in a post-colonial and
Napatan landscape. By integrating a theoretical framework grounded in
practice theory into bioarchaeological data, I was able to interpret
relatively subtle diachronic changes in activity and diet as acts of
agency and resistance. For example, bioarchaeological activity markers
indicate that the post-colonial Third-Intermediate and Napatan period
population may have indeed been engaging in more physically strenuous
everyday movements than New Kingdom colonial Egypto-Nubian populations
(at the site of Tombos, Third Cataract). However, this need not be
interpreted as something negative, but rather can be framed as a newly
independent community utilizing local raw materials (e.g., quarrying,
mining) and building new communities and connections (e.g., construction
efforts; new trading partners and political allies).[^10]
# Squatting Facets
As discussed above, squatting facets are an articulation between the
shin bone (distal tibia) and foot (talus) that are thought to be
acquired in life. When an individual squats down for extended periods of
time, the two bones begin to touch, where in a normal anatomical
position, they would not. This creates a new joint, or articulation, and
is an example of how the skeleton can adapt during life (Fig. 2). Note
that changes can also be seen on the femur, patella, talus, and
metatarsals, however, most commonly the distal tibia is affected and
studied.[^11]
**~~Figure 2. Images of Different Types of Squatting Facets on Distal Tibiae (modified from Singh 1959)[^12]~~**
Squatting facets have been studied for decades both from a clinical and
bioarchaeological perspective. Clinicians have examined the prevalence
of squatting facets in modern populations as well as associated the
presence of squatting facets with the potential for subsequent
injury.[^13] Several papers have reported the presence of squatting
facets both in adults as well as fetuses. The interest in fetal
squatting facets stems from the question, are squatting facets the
product of activity, acquired through one's life? In which case we would
expect to find them only on adult remains. Or are squatting facets
inherited? In which case we would find them on both adults and fetuses.
Furthermore, does the frequency of squatting facets vary across
genetically heterogeneous populations? Singh, for example, compares
adult and fetal squatting facets prevalence in an Indian population and
notes that, while adults do have higher frequencies, fetuses do indeed
possess squatting facets.[^14] Singh does state that the presence of
squatting facets in fetuses is low in this sample, it is also variable
between other samples published in previous works (22.6% Indian; 23%
European; 3.1% Japanese). Barnett, however, provides an explanation for
these findings. Barnett argues that these traits can indeed be
inherited, however, if the activities that maintain this articulation
(i.e., squatting) are not maintained throughout the lifecourse, they
will become obliterated as bone turnover occurs.[^15] While this
explanation does explain the presence of squatting facets on both fetal
and adult remains, the matter is still a topic of debate today.
Bioarchaeological studies have contributed to this research by looking
at changes in squatting facet frequency through time as well as sexual
division of labor in the past. Squatting facets have been found in early
hominin remains, including Neanderthals.[^16] Broadly speaking, we see a
decrease in squatting facets through time, and a notable decrease during
the medieval period. Boule examined 543 tibiae from French and American
archaeological sites (1st-20th centuries CE), and found that prior to
the Middle Ages, squatting was quite common; however, with the dawn of
the Middle Ages, there was a steady decrease in the frequency of
squatting facets.[^17] Similarly, Dlamini and Morris found that
squatting facets were common in Late Stone Age (1st millennium BCE)
South Africa, but almost nonexistent in comparative modern skeletal and
cadaver samples.[^18] Molleson reports high incidence of squatting
facets at Abu Hureyra, Syria (Mesolithic/Neolithic) and Çatalhöyük,
Turkey (Neolithic) and suggests that a saddle quern or mortar were used
to process the grains that were being harvested.[^19] Molleson also
suggests the potential sexual division of labor, indicating that women
and girls may have been responsible for preparing foodstuffs, whereas
men and boys, who exhibited higher rates of squatting facets, were
likely working with their hands while squatting, possibly making baskets
