Il cimitero medievale di via Orfeo (Bologna): quattro possibili casi di treponematosi venerea.

Between 2012-2014 the Superintendence of Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape of Emilia-Romagna, has conducted archaeological fieldworks on a large Late Medieval cemetery (14th-16th century), which archaeological and documentary sources attribute to a Jewish context. The Laboratory of Bioarchaeology and Forensic Osteology of University of Bologna conducted an anthropological study on a sample of 130 individuals. This contribution aims to present four possible cases of venereal treponematoses (TT. 91, 136, 170, 187). Human skeletal remains of graves 91, 136, 170, and 187 were examined to reconstruct the biological profiles and to conduct paleopathological and tomographic analyses, given the presence of lesions on several anatomical districts. Cranial lesions were present on individuals from TT.91 (M, 25-35 years), 170 (M, 25-35 years) and 136 (M, 15-18 years), in which simultaneous destructive and proliferative processes (caries sicca) with focal destruction and remodeling of the external surface and diploe are denoted. Long bones of these three individuals also present osseous alteration such as gummatous osteoperiostitis, with an increased bone density and non-uniform thickening. Individual of T. 187 (11-12 years) presents a hole (3 cm Ø) located on frontal bone, whose margins are remodeled with proliferative processes both on ectocranial and endocranial sides. These lesions are likely linked to treponematosis (bacterial infection by Treponema), interpreted as venereal syphilis. After differential diagnoses, we suppose the individuals of TT. 91 and 170 were likely affected by an advanced stage of the infection, while individual T. 136 seems to have been affected by a tardive congenital form of the disease. Lesions of individual of T.187 suggest an infective origin, but poor bone preservation prevents a clearer interpretation. These cases of treponematosis, possibly linked to venereal syphilis, are relevant for paleoepidemic aspects, as well as contributing to only few Italian osteological cases dating to the same period