Strøby Egede, Vedbæk-Bøgebakken and Relationships among Scandinavian Mesolithic Skeletal Material

Abstract

This paper derives from new work onMesolithic human skeletal material from Strøby Egede, a near coastal site in eastern Sjælland, with two foci. The first confirms sex identifications from original work carried out in 1986. The second, and central focus, re-examines comments by one of us (CM) based on work in 1992, and a new statistical analysis including data from the two Strøby Egede adults. In 1998 it was suggested that the Strøby Egede sample more closely resembled Skateholm, on the coast of Skåne in southern Sweden, than Vedbæk-Bøgebakken on Sjælland, fitting lithic patterns noted earlier by Vang Petersen. We revisit the 1998 suggestion below, comparing data from Strøby Egede to those available from southern Scandinavia and Germany, and suggest that the 1998 comment was, in all probability, incorrect. The analysis below suggests overall morphological similarity between individuals in eastern Sjælland and Skåne, while noting the existence of apparent outliers.