Abstrakt
Changes in body build after the transition to agriculture are supposed to be a response to changes in environmental and social conditions. Such changes were not connected with the genetic changes in Neolithic populations but they were an adaptive response by the human organism to the new conditions of life in Neolithic agriculture society.
The studied long bones characteristics in the Upper Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic from Central Europe (length of long bones, body height, sexual dimorphism of long bones, proportion of long bones) contain three different morphological patterns of long bones - the Upper Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic ones- had probably existed over the course of Homo sapiens microevolution in the Upper Palaeolithic/Neolithic transitional period. We have found significant differences between the Upper Palaeolithic and Neolithic populations in: (1) body size, body shape and limb proportions, (2) basic biomechanical limb parameters and limb robusticity,and (3) sexual dimorphism both in body size and shape, and in the proportions and biomechanical structure of limbs.
The morphology of long bones of the Mesolithic populations of a transitional character, and "non-typical" agricultural the Corded Ware Cultures populations reveal certain traits similar to the Mesolithic populations. The morphology of Neolithic populations from two types of archaeological cultures (agricultural and pastorals) seems to be of a different character.
The Corded Ware Cultures populations (pastorals) are in some respects similar to the Mesolithic populations, the Band Pottery Culture populations and Lengyel Culture (agricultural populations) show extremely different pattern morphology of long bones in relation to Upper Palaeolithic populations. The differences observed between the Upper Palaeolithic and Neolithic populations resulted from multiple biological and cultural factors which combined to affect a new adaptive strategy and subsistence pattern.