What’s in your bones? Bones do tell stories. Can you listen?
The skeleton supports, protects, and moves our body. Despite its strength, bone remains dynamic throughout life. It not only grows, but also constantly remodels through bodily demands, environmental parameters, and daily intakes. Thus, the skeleton accumulates a wealth of information on development and aging, health,
disease and trauma, diet and behavior, residential mobility, and genetic history. It also records the way of death, burial, and disposal. Overall, our bones reflect our life history and ultimately our death account, composing an osteo-biographical tale.

This course is designed as an introduction to human skeletal studies. Using lectures, supplementary materials, and hands-on lab sessions, we will cover basic human osteology, and the methodologies most used in skeletal analysis.

Course materials will focus upon two main themes: forensic anthropology and bioarchaeology. We will explore case studies and related topics from both fields, including ethics, curation, body and burial treatment, pathology and anatomical variation, dental anthropology, biological profiling, and taphonomy.

We will alternate between classroom lectures and lab sessions. Lectures will take place at the CYA facilities. Osteology lab sessions will take place at the Hellenic Center for Bioarchaeology (www.bioarch.gr), a 15-20 min walk from CYA. The lab sessions will provide hands-on experience and training using educational casts
and human skeletal reference collections. We visit academic institutes, museums, and laboratories in the context of forensic anthropology and bioarchaeology. Evaluation will be based on attendance and participation, lab quizzes, weekly responses, and a classroom presentation as a final project.