There's another problem with bones other than the pelvis, and that's population factors. When I was studying "Human Skeletal Remains in Archaeology" we were told a cautionary tale.
Dr M had been examining subjects from an Anglo-Saxon cemetery, then moved on to a Medieval one. She needed to go back and check on one of the AS subjects, glanced at the skull and the robustness of the bones and thought, "Oh, yes, definitely male." She then looked at the notes she had made and saw "Definitely female". She wondered, "Why did I ever think that?" and fished out the pelvis. Female it was indeed. The problem was that the AS community - note, of exactly the same genetic stock as the Medieval village - were all taller and more robust, and the AS females were as beefy as the Medieval males.
Skulls, she said, are particularly dodgy, because bone is dynamic; the skulls of women in positions of authority develop "masculine" characteristics, and men in subservient positions lose them. This has in the past caused confusion with religious communities, but once she was clear about that we found we could use it for determining the status of monks, for example, within the community.
There's one exception to not being able to sex children, and that's neonates. For some reason their pelvises do show a difference. As we were interested in lifestyles, this was particularly interesting (were there more male neonates or more females? If the former, deaths were almost certainly natural, but if the latter it could be iffy).
DNA: yes, expensive and likely to be contaminated, so rarely used. Best source is from inside teeth.
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Dr M had been examining subjects from an Anglo-Saxon cemetery, then moved on to a Medieval one. She needed to go back and check on one of the AS subjects, glanced at the skull and the robustness of the bones and thought, "Oh, yes, definitely male." She then looked at the notes she had made and saw "Definitely female". She wondered, "Why did I ever think that?" and fished out the pelvis. Female it was indeed. The problem was that the AS community - note, of exactly the same genetic stock as the Medieval village - were all taller and more robust, and the AS females were as beefy as the Medieval males.
Skulls, she said, are particularly dodgy, because bone is dynamic; the skulls of women in positions of authority develop "masculine" characteristics, and men in subservient positions lose them. This has in the past caused confusion with religious communities, but once she was clear about that we found we could use it for determining the status of monks, for example, within the community.
There's one exception to not being able to sex children, and that's neonates. For some reason their pelvises do show a difference. As we were interested in lifestyles, this was particularly interesting (were there more male neonates or more females? If the former, deaths were almost certainly natural, but if the latter it could be iffy).
DNA: yes, expensive and likely to be contaminated, so rarely used. Best source is from inside teeth.