Contrary to Burger et al. (2016), there is ample evidence of colonial cinnabar mining in southern Ecuador.

The relative Bronze Age chronology for Scandinavia was established as early as 1885. It is traditionally divided into 6 periods (I–VI). Earlier attempts to make an absolute Bronze Age chronology for southern Scandinavia were derived from burials and settlements and were mainly based on radiocarbon-dated charcoal or carbonized cereals, often with undefined archaeological periods. Here, we present high-precision 14C dating on burials with well-defined associated archaeological periods in order to improve the absolute chronology of the Danish Bronze Age. Our results are in broad agreement with the traditional absolute chronology of the Danish Bronze Age. However, our results do indicate that the onset of period III likely occurred earlier than previously thought.

Objectives: Surveillance programs are recommended to both families at high risk (Amsterdam-positive families with known- and unknown mutation) and moderate risk (families not fulfilling all Amsterdam criteria) of colorectal cancer (CRC). Cost-effectiveness has so far only been estimated for the group at high risk. The aim of the present study is to determine cost-effectiveness of surveillance programs where families at both high and moderate risk of HNPCC participate.

Methods: A decision analytic model (Markov model) is developed to assess surveillance programs where families at high and moderate risk of HNPCC are offered surveillance from age 25 and age 45, respectively. The model includes costs for all families referred to genetic counseling, including genetic risk assessment, mutation analysis, and surveillance in relevant families with or without known mutation, plus the costs related to any surgical treatment. The risk of metachronous CRC is also modeled.

Results: Incremental costs per life year gained are estimated to be €980 when families at both high and moderate risk of HNPCC undergo surveillance (€508 for high risk and €1600 for moderate risk) and €1947 when the moderate risk group is evaluated genetically but not offered surveillance. Sensitivity analysis showed these findings to be robust, although cost-effectiveness can be improved in cases of more conservative referrals to genetic counseling.

Conclusions: The result for high risk families confirms the findings in similar studies. Somewhat surprisingly, cost-effectiveness improves when surveillance of the moderate risk groups are included in the decision model.

The Formative in the northern Andes

The northern Andean regions, encompassing northernmost Peru, all of Ecuador and the southern provinces of Colombia, remain archaeologically very poorly known. Although the past 30 years have witnessed an increasing number of archaeological projects in coastal zones, especially the Santa Elena Peninsula, work in the highlands outside of the greater Quito commute zone has lagged sadly behind. Southern Ecuador, in particular, has had little investigation since earlier this century when first Max Uhle, then Donald Collier, John Murra and, finally, Wendell Bennett, demonstrated the existence of ‘Formative’ cultures in Ecuador through their investigations at sites along the Tomebamba and Paute rivers of Azuay province and at Cerro Narrío, just to the north in the Cañar Valley (Uhle 1922; Collier & Murra 1943; Bennett 1946; FIGURE 1).

South American archaeology is a field which ANTIQUITY all too rarely embraces, and we are glad to have this report (originally planned for volume 59, 1985) on a new project studying trans-Andean contacts between the Pacific coast and the Amazon jungles.

Oral presentation of papers has assumed ever increasing importance as a mode of information dissemination among the professional community. Many oral presentations are diminished in effectiveness by disregard of formal and mechanical aspects of presentation. Discussion of these aspects among professionals is as essential as is formal instruction in them for students.

The civilizations of prehispanic America never advanced technologically beyond the early bronze age: although both the Inca and the Aztec had tools and some weapons of cast bronze, the warriors that fought Cortes used swords edged with obsidian blades. The Classic Maya, who flourished in the first millennium AD, had only a casual acquaintance with metal until the ninth century (Bray, 1977) and raised the great temples of Tikal with an engineering capability no greater than that of the builders of Stonehenge.

A recent identification of ramon in Miranda's sixteenth-century relacion of Alta Verapaz more likely describes achiote. There is very little archaeological evidence to suggest that ramon was more than a famine food in ancient Maya times.

Plumbate, a distinctive ceramic of the Early Postclassic, has been thought to have been manufactured in the Pacific region of Guatemala and traded throughout Mesoamerica and Central America. Two aberrant types of Plumbate found in Late Classic contexts in Veracruz and Early Postclassic contexts in central El Salvador suggest that the origins and spread of Plumbate or Plumbate techniques may be more complex.

An unusual hourglass-shaped vessel from a tomb in the middle Cauca Valley, Colombia, is described. This is the area of the so-called Quimbaya culture, in which metal work reached a very high artistic and technical development; however, as yet, no tools definitely used in manufacture of metal objects have been found. It is suggested that the vessel described here is a furnace built to hold a crucible, although, since the vessel was apparently placed new into the tomb, definite identification of its function is not possible.