Secrets of the Iron Age have been revealed following analysis of the bones of the TB sufferer who died between 400 BC and 230 BC.

Known to be the earliest case of TB in Britain, new analysis by the museum in Wimborne illuminates more details about his backstory, the nature of Iron Age society, and the spread of this disease.

The research was made possible by a Small Grant Big Improvement grant of £1,000 from South West Museum Development. The project entitled ‘The Iron Age TB skeleton – going beyond the glass case’ has enabled the museum to draw new conclusions and improve the interpretation of this significant and nationally-important artefact.

Chemical analysis of the man’s bones and teeth, carried out on behalf of the museum has revealed that the man arrived in Dorset around the age of eight.

The skeleton, whose spine displays signs of tuberculosis (TB), was one of the most significant discoveries made during archaeological excavations at Tarrant Hinton, between 1967 and 1985.  These excavations uncovered a variety of evidence for settlement from the Bronze Age, through the Iron Age, to the Roman period. Professor Alistair Pike, professor of Archaeological Sciences at the University of Southampton, helped build up a fuller picture of the man using mass spectroscopy to investigate stable isotope ratios, looking at carbon, nitrogen, strontium, and oxygen levels.

This type of analysis works on the principle that whilst everyone’s bones and teeth are made up of the same chemical elements, differences in the precise form of these chemicals can provide information about a person’s diet and also the source of their drinking water when their teeth were forming in childhood. Samples were taken from the tooth enamel of three molars whilst collagen was extracted from rib and long bone fragments.

Carbon and nitrogen isotopes indicated that the man ate a mixed diet consisting of plants – cereal crops and other vegetables – grown on chalkland, whilst the bulk of his protein came from cattle and sheep. His diet was less varied than that of other Iron Age people as there was no evidence of marine or freshwater fish or pig.

Strontium isotopes showed that the man was living on the southern British chalklands between the ages of eight to 14 when his third molar (wisdom tooth) was developing. However, the oxygen values for the two earlier molars, suggest a non-local origin before the child was weaned on to solid foods.

The combined strontium and oxygen isotope analyses suggest a high probability that the man spent his early childhood in an area of Carboniferous Limestone to the west of Britain. This type of geology is found in South or West Ireland, on the Atlantic coasts of South West France and in the Cantabrian Mountains of Northern Spain.

Dr Simon Mays, human skeletal biologist for Historic England said, “We know from the DNA evidence that this person would have got his TB from another person rather than from infected meat or milk. Human-to-human transmission is favoured by crowded city living, but the fact that we find TB at this early date reminds us that the disease could still survive in the rather sparse human populations of the prehistoric past.

“Finds of diseased skeletons in Continental Europe tell us that tuberculosis was present there for thousands of years before our Tarrant Hinton man was born. The isotope evidence is tantalising. Perhaps he caught his disease in mainland Europe. But it could equally well be that TB was already well-established here by the Iron Age – it does not often show on the bones and we do not have very many skeletons from this period.”

Professor Alistair Pike commented, “The coronavirus pandemic has shown how the long-distance movement of people can rapidly spread disease and this will have been no different in the past. By using isotopes to trace prehistoric people’s origins we hope to determine when, where and how far the diseases of the time were spreading.”

James Webb, acting museum director, said, “The changes in his spine would have taken several years to develop. His mobility and daily functioning would have been impaired. The indication is that his community must have cared for him, despite his illness, for him to have survived so long.

“The results shed more light on Iron Age society. They also show that local people had access to the Atlantic sea routes which linked the coastal communities of Europe.”