ИСТИНА

During the military debacle of the Russian Campaign during the winter 1812, the Napoleonic “Grande Armée” was decimated. The French soldiers were forced to retreat from Moscow to Danzig, Königsberg or Vilnius. Extremely cold temperature, infectious diseases such as typhus and starvation killed more soldiers than fights with Russian troops. A large number of victims were buried in mass graves located in different places on the way of Retreat. The mass grave excavated in Kaliningrad (formerly Königsberg) revealed several evidences of war trauma on skeletal remains of Napoleonic soldiers. Among them, the individual 2 from Pit C, a young male of 20-25 years old, exhibits a serious wound in the lower part of his face. This injury, probably due to a saber wound,broke the mandible and damaged the maxillary bones and anterior teeth. Remodeling processes show that this serious wound was not immediately fatal and that the death might be due to an intercurrent cause, occurring a few time after the trauma. The goal of this study is to use a 3D methodology of virtual reconstruction for (i) understanding the mechanism of the trauma, (ii) reconstructing virtually the missing parts of the facial bones, (iii) restoring the complete facial skeleton and (iv) performing a facial reconstruction using the AFA3D (Anthropological Facial Approximation in 3D) methodology integrated in TIVIMI® (Treatment and Increased Vision for Medical Imaging) software program. This restoration can be completed by a 3D printing.These results highlight the potential of 3D methodology for better understanding war traumatology during Napoleonic times -and more generally in paleopathology -and for enhancing access to this part of our cultural heritage.