Diet, Labor, and Life Histories: Reconstructing Individual Experiences at Non Pa Wai in Central Thailand

LIU Chin-hsin1*, Vincent C. Pigott2, Emily Nightingale1, John Krigbaum3, and Karen M. Mudar4

Between 1986 and 1994, the Thailand Archaeometallurgy Project (TAP) excavated three sites (Non Pa Wai, Nil Kham Haeng, Non Mak La) in the Khao Wong Prachan Valley, central Thailand, dating from the late Neolithic to the early historic period. The project examined the development of prehistoric metallurgy in this ore-rich area and its role in shaping the region’s society and culture. Previous studies on TAP stratigraphy, metallurgical sourcing, craft production, and zooarchaeology indicated that this area sustained long-term occupation punctuated by episodic hiatuses from the Neolithic onward. From ca. 1200 BCE, occupants at Non Pa Wai (NPW) participated in large-scale, on-site copper smelting, with products exchanged to locales elsewhere in Thailand. The distribution of copper products suggested participation in regional exchange networks, which may have involved direct mobility of individuals. To infer lived experiences of the people participating in differing patterns and extents in subsistence and craft production during the time span of NPW, we reconstruct osteobiographies of the recovered NPW occupants, using skeletal morphology, stable isotope data, and mortuary context. We illustrate the nuanced variation in NPW people’s dietary choices, physical activity patterns, and growth trajectories. These were reflections of how they managed and mitigated the opportunities and challenges associated with the broader sociocultural changes. By highlighting individual life histories, this bottom-up approach allows us to infer the active agency of community members as they took part in the establishment and maintenance of the intra- and inter-community interactions in the region.