Breastfeeding is known to be a powerful mediator of maternal and childhood health, with impacts throughout the life course. Paleodietary studies of the past 30 years have accordingly taken an enduring interest in the health and diet of young children as a potential indicator of population fertility, subsistence, and mortality patterns. While progress has been made in recent decades toward acknowledging the agency of children, many paleodietary reconstructions have failed to incorporate developments in cognate disciplines revealing synergistic dynamics between maternal and offspring biology. Paleodietary interpretation has relied heavily on the “weanling's dilemma,” in which infants are thought to face a bleak choice between loss of immunity or malnutrition. Using a review of immunological and epidemiological evidence for the dynamic and supportive role that breastfeeding plays throughout the complementary feeding period, this article offers context and nuance for understanding past feeding transitions. We suggest that future interpretative frameworks for infant paleodietary and bioarchaeological research should include a broad knowledge base that keeps pace with relevant developments outside of those disciplines.

中文翻译：

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重新审视“断奶的困境”：不断发展的证据和婴儿古饮食解释的问题

众所周知，母乳喂养是孕产妇和儿童健康的强大中介，对整个生命过程都有影响。因此，过去 30 年的古饮食研究对幼儿的健康和饮食产生了持久的兴趣，将其作为人口生育率、生存和死亡率模式的潜在指标。虽然近几十年来在承认儿童的能动性方面取得了进展，但许多古饮食重建未能纳入揭示母体和后代生物学之间协同动态的同源学科的发展。古饮食解释严重依赖于“断奶困境”，即认为婴儿在丧失免疫力或营养不良之间面临着严峻的选择。本文通过对免疫学和流行病学证据的回顾，证明母乳喂养在整个辅食喂养期间所起的动态和支持作用，为理解过去的喂养转变提供了背景和细微差别。我们建议，未来婴儿古饮食和生物考古研究的解释框架应该包括一个广泛的知识库，与这些学科之外的相关发展保持同步。