Introduction

The mere mention of the word ‘cancer’ or ‘tumour’ causes even the sturdiest among us to shudder. Perhaps this is because the fear of developing these haunts us all. For most people that fear arises because cancer or neoplastic disease bears two very powerful connotations: extreme and unrelenting pain and, in its malignant forms, the inevitable death of its victim sooner or later. Abrams et al. (1950) adds a further chilling note: ‘One of the most striking and disheartening qualities of cancer is the relentlessness of its spread throughout the organism’. Even with recent advances in surgical methods, drugs and chemotherapy the life of those suffering this condition can be often extremely uncomfortable and painful. The main differences between today's sufferers and those in the ancient past are our increased ability to alleviate pain as well as effect a cure in some instances by recent developments in drug therapy. Another significant difference is the kind of nursing care available to many of us.

Bony tumours derived from neoplastic disease are generally a rare phenomenon (Huvos 1979; Ortner and Putschar 1981). Naturally then, the incidence of these conditions in archaeologically-derived human remains is very low compared to other pathological conditions. Therefore, when one of these is discovered it takes on a greater importance than if it had been found among contemporary populations. One of the main reasons for the rarity of bony lesions is that with the exception of benign conditions, the death of the individual is usually brought about by the destruction of vital soft tissues long before the skeleton becomes affected.