© A. Otto/LMU; Berthold Einwag
The LMU team has excavated the remains of a house on the periphery of the city, a capacious residence consisting of 17 rooms. It belonged to the Administrator and Chief Priest of Ur’s second most important temple, obviously a prominent member of the city’s elite.
The LMU team has excavated the remains of a house on the periphery of the city, a capacious residence consisting of 17 rooms. It belonged to the Administrator and Chief Priest of Ur’s second most important temple, obviously a prominent member of the city’s elite.
The LMU group began work on the site 2 years ago, and has now uncovered the whole house, together with a vaulted tomb in which the remains of 24 individuals were discovered. To accomplish this task, the team, which included Bachelor's and Master's students as well as doctoral candidates worked 6 days a week on the site. "They did a fantastic job," says Adelheid Otto. "We began work every morning at 5 and worked until 10 or 11 o'clock at night."
Comment: One must take care to not assume that one person's genetics is representative of the whole population, as well as the fact that just because someone has genetics for something it doesn't necessarily mean that they are expressed. With that said, some of those characteristics were likely to be in play and other evidence supports these findings, such as with the woman's diet, and there appears to be a relationship and similarities shared with Japan's native Ainu population. See: