Abstract
AbstractArchaeological research at the ancient city of Meninx in Jerba, Tunisia, carried out by the Institut National du Patrimoine Tunisie and Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU) produced more than 10,000 faunal specimens and shed light on subsistence activities spanning from the fourth century BCE until the seventh century CE. Despite its highly diverse fauna totalling at least 69 species of mammals, birds, reptiles, fish and molluscs, domestic livestock formed the mainstay of the economy at Meninx. Throughout site occupation and compared with contemporaneous sites in coastal Tunisia and Libya, sheep were of prime importance at Meninx. Diachronic demographic profiling illustrates an emphasis on the production of wool for making textiles. Together with the ubiquitous presence of crushed banded dye‐murex (Hexaplex trunculus) shells implying exploitation of purple dyes, we assume that both activities were integrated into a single chaîne opératoire for making purple‐dyed fabrics that were traded across the Mediterranean from Punic until Late Roman times. Zooarchaeological findings also suggest that during the Byzantine Period, this major economic activity came to a standstill, with people returning to more self‐sufficient subsistence strategies. An intersite comparison furthermore revealed that high proportions of ovicaprines are a typical feature of Punic–Roman sites in Jerba. But even at the height of Roman power in the region, autochthonous husbandry traditions continued to exist on the island, as illustrated by the fauna from Henchir Bourgou.
Highlights
Except for Egypt, where since the 1960s faunal studies became an integrated part of archaeology, and the coastal Mediterranean strip, comparably few archaeofaunal analyses have been conducted in other parts of northern Africa
The eastern coast of southern Tunisia witnessed intense archaeological research, for example, at Ghizène (Ben Tahar, 2016/17), Zitha (Moses et al, 2019), Henchir Bourgou (Ben Tahar, 2018; Ben Tahar et al, 2020) and more recently, at Meninx, a major ancient harbour located on the island of Jerba (Ritter & Ben Tahar, 2020; Ritter, Ben Tahar, Fassbinder, & Lambers, 2018) (Figure 1)
Carried out by the joint efforts of the Institut National du Patrimoine Tunisie and Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU) (Ritter et al, 2018). Based on these as well as previous archaeological research carried out in the 1990s by the University of Pennsylvania (Fentress, 2018; Fentress, Drine, & Holod, 2009), it could be shown that Meninx was inhabited continuously from Punic until Byzantine times, that is, from the fourth century BCE to the seventh century CE
Summary
Except for Egypt, where since the 1960s faunal studies became an integrated part of archaeology, and the coastal Mediterranean strip, comparably few archaeofaunal analyses have been conducted in other parts of northern Africa. Carried out by the joint efforts of the Institut National du Patrimoine Tunisie and Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU) (Ritter et al, 2018) Based on these as well as previous archaeological research carried out in the 1990s by the University of Pennsylvania (Fentress, 2018; Fentress, Drine, & Holod, 2009), it could be shown that Meninx was inhabited continuously from Punic until Byzantine times, that is, from the fourth century BCE to the seventh century CE. The lengthy conflicts between Rome and Punic northern Africa, terminating with the integration of the latter region into the Imperium Romanum (second/first century BCE), or the collapse of the Roman Empire succeeded by the Vandalic/Byzantine Period (fifth to seventh century CE), represented major political developments associated with significant sociocultural and economic consequences (e.g., Azaza & Colominas, 2019; MacKinnon, 2018; Moses et al, 2019). Evidence for settlement continuity at Meninx suggests that the inhabitants met the challenges of changing economic–political conditions, but to which extent the latter are reflected in the (bio-)archaeological record will be detailed below
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