Considering care: A traumatic obturator fracture dislocation of the hip in a middle-aged man from Gaelic Medieval Ballyhanna, Co. Donegal, Ireland

Objective This article explores the potential care provided to a middle-aged man who had a suite of injuries evident in his skeleton, most notably an obturator fracture dislocation in his left hip. Materials The skeleton derived from the Late Medieval Gaelic population buried at Ballyhanna, Co. Donegal, Ireland. Methods A transdisciplinary bioarchaeology of care approach was adopted to undertake a phenomenological study of an individual with an acquired disability. Results The man would have required intensive nursing care in the months following the initial injury, and longer-term accommodations may have been made by the wider community to support him. Conclusions Use of a transdisciplinary bioarchaeology of care approach enables important insights to be gained concerning the social impact of disability on the affected individual, his kin, and wider community. Significance This study achieves a new level of integration of bioarchaeological findings with archaeological, historical, and ethno-historical sources, thereby enabling a phenomenological approach to interpretation of life after acquired disability. This is the first study to allow such an intimate insight into lived experience and it provides a model for bioarchaeology of care analysis of individuals from historical eras. Limitations These include difficulties in identifying the nature of a long-standing complex injury. Suggestions for future research Further explorations of the bioarchaeology of care in historical time periods should incorporate a similarly wide range of transdisciplinary sources to enrich interpretations of the lived experiences of individuals, their care-givers and broader communities.