Zooarchaeological Assemblages Research Articles

Fish species richness, resourse availability, and human selectivity reflected in the fish bone material from a medieval Franciscan friary in the Baltic Sea

Fish and fishing in the Baltic Sea during the Middle Ages is partly known through research on historical records and zooarchaeological materials, and combinations of them. Due to the uneven distribution of written records and research focus, much is known about the large-scale cod and herring fisheries in the southern parts of the Baltic Sea. However, in the northern parts of the Baltic Sea, both large-scale and small local fisheries are less researched. This article considers the species richness, resource availability, and human selection identifiable in these sources. Zooarchaeological material from the Franciscan friary on the island of Kökar in the Åland archipelago will be discussed in relation to zooarchaeological and written sources from the Castle of Kastelholm (Åland). Historical records identify the friary as having taxation rights to large-scale seasonal catches of cod in the outer archipelago; how the friary collected this toll is unclear. It has been assumed, based on the historical records, that cod was the most consumed fish at the site. This study revealed that the zooarchaeological assemblage does not support the interpretation of cod as the most important fish for consumption at the friary during the Medieval Period (AD 1450–1530).

Freshwater exploitation at Ajvide - Pitted ware culture fishing practises investigated through laser ablation facilitated strontium isotope analyses

The importance of marine resources for the Neolithic hunter-fisher-gathers of the Pitted Ware Culture of Gotland, Sweden, is well documented through zooarchaeological analyses and diet studies of human remains. Terrestrial areas were important for living and supplementing the diet but the extent of the terrestrial territories and regions of land use for different groups is largely unknown. The presence of euryhaline species in recovered zooarchaeological assemblages indicates that freshwater fishing or fishing in the brackish estuaries of the Baltic Sea was part of the subsistence practises. To explore if the inland freshwaters of Gotland were used and, if exploited, where they were located, 18 teeth from euryhaline fish from the Pitted Ware Culture site Ajvide on Gotland were selected. The 87Sr/86Sr isotope ratios in the fish teeth were analysed using laser ablation-multi collector-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry and correlated with an updated bioavailable baseline of Gotlandic water sources. Through this approach, the habitational origin of the fish was shown to primarily stem from at least six freshwater sources located in the west-central area of Gotland, in close relation to the site, with a few individuals originating from within the Baltic Sea. The study highlights the significance of ichthyoarchaeological analysis in understanding the territorial practice of past foraging societies and recommends further studies on euryhaline species to expand our knowledge of fish habitat, human resource utilization and land use.

Fishing further inland? The role of the transition to agriculture on fishing practices in the Soconusco region, Mexico

In the Soconusco region of Mexico, the abundance of larger-bodied, carnivorous fish decreased relative to smaller-bodied, omnivorous/herbivorous fish between the terminal Late Archaic (4700–4000 BP [2700–2000 BCE]) and late Early Formative (3300–3200 BP [1300–1200 BCE]). The exact reason is unknown, occurring during a time of change when plant-based food production became a larger proportion of the diet and settlement patterns were shifting. Here, we address whether the same diversity of fish harvested during the terminal Late Archaic persisted into the Formative Period and if it reflects a change in where fish were being harvested. Using seven previously identified and published zooarchaeological assemblages dating to between the Middle Archaic and Middle Formative periods, we analyzed changes in diversity (NISP versus NTAXA, evenness, and richness) and habitat exploitation (nestedness and proportion of aquatic environment). We find differences in taxonomic diversity, changes in where fish were harvested along the coast, and the degree of exploitation intensity. Finally, we conclude the Chantuto society may have shifted their focus from marine to more freshwater species in conjunction with early low-level food production and agricultural production. We suggest the shift in focus during the late Early Formative and Middle Formative to estuarine–riverine environments may have occurred in conjunction with agricultural intensification.

New insights into the subsistence economy of the Late Bronze Age (1100–400 cal BC) communities in the southeastern Baltic

This paper presents the findings of a research project aimed at reconstructing the subsistence economy of the Late Bronze Age communities in eastern Lithuania. We focused on examining archaeobotanical and zooarchaeological assemblages from three hillforts alongside δ13C and δ15N stable isotope analysis of plant and animal remains. Our results suggest that local populations primarily relied on growing domestic plants and animals for their subsistence. By the Late Bronze Age, they had already adopted a diverse package of cultivated plants, with barley and millet being the main crops. Also, inhabitants relied on pig and goat/sheep as a primary source for their protein intake. Finally, δ13C and δ15N measurements suggest that farmers engaged in intensive agriculture with semi-permanent field systems and moderate application of manure.

Human settlement density, not late Holocene climate change, influenced Artiodactyla species abundance in northeastern California faunal assemblages

Variation in late Holocene artiodactyl (e.g., deer, pronghorn, bighorn sheep) hunting in northern California has often been examined from a behavioral ecological perspective to understand past foraging and land-use practices and related changes in human behavior, including settlement patterns, technological change, social signaling, large-scale resource intensification, and anthropogenic resource depression. However, rarely are past climate records and proxies of human population density coupled with zooarchaeological estimates of artiodactyl abundance to evaluate the ecological and anthropogenic drivers of changes in species representation over time. To better understand changes in human behavior related to past large game hunting, we disentangle the causal relationships between late Holocene climate change, human demography, and artiodactyl abundance to assess whether climate change, human hunting, or both impacted the abundance of artiodactyls in zooarchaeological assemblages from northeastern California. We evaluate how climatic variability and inferred human settlement density impacted artiodactyl abundance using modeled paleoclimatic reconstructions, distributions of radiocarbon dates, and faunal data derived from 35 archaeological sites and 37,319 individual faunal specimens. Using piecewise structural equation models, we assess the direct and mediating effects between climate, human settlement density, and artiodactyl abundance and determine the individual effects of these variables on large game species representation in zooarchaeological assemblages. We find that expanding human settlement density and related increases in logistical foraging—not late Holocene climate change—directly impacts the relative abundance of artiodactyls in these assemblages. Moreover, our findings reveal that the effects of climate change are entirely mediated through human settlement density. While our study is unable to decipher if observed changes in human behavior were motivated by goals related to energetic maximization or costly signaling, our study does provide a useful framework for separating the effects of human- and climate-induced explanations for variation in species composition in faunal assemblages.

Identifying non-anthropogenic accumulation in zooarchaeological assemblages using naive Bayesian classifier: A trace-oriented actualistic taphonomic approach in the hyperarid coasts of the Atacama desert

The taphonomic evaluation of zooarchaeological assemblages is paramount for compelling interpretations of past subsistence strategies, palaeoecological interactions and overall biasing of the anthropogenic bone deposition and modification by non-anthropogenic agents. A recent trend in this field, has focused on bone surface modifications (BSM) to successfully generate reference frameworks for critical evaluation of the interpretive potential of selected zooarchaeological samples by examining BSM patterns produced by known agents in experimental settings. These approaches compare anthropogenic and non-human generated patterns using different machine learning (ML) algorithms, classifying and assigning sets of traces to specific processes such as gnawing, scoring or intentional fracture. We propose a simplification in two key aspects to make this new arising area of ML assisted taphonomic interpretation more accessible for zooarchaeologists. First, we encourage a trace oriented multivariate data recording protocol for taphonomic analysis including the most commonly recorded BSM plus others such as shape modification, penetrative modification and element or tissue loss modifications thus expanding comparative potential. Second, we offer a ML approach based on Naïve Bayes Classifier (NBC) that discriminates each given observation by comparing to actualistic taphonomic patterns to determine the average percentage of non-anthropogenic modification within zooarchaeological samples. To illustrate the potential value of these proposals for taphonomical interpretation, we analyzed seven different Mid to Late Holocene assemblages containing avian and mammal remains from the coastal platform in the hyperarid core of the Atacama Desert. We compared their alteration with a local sample of actualistic data recovered to characterize regional taphonomic patterns. A NBC was trained with a 75% random selection of the total archaeological and actualistic samples. Afterwards we tested the remaining sample, achieving over 90% accuracy in determining whether a random specimen from any sample corresponded to an actualistic or an archaeological context implying key differences in taphonomic trace patterns.

Reconsidering archaeological garden hunting: A view from the northern U.S. Southwest

Archaeologists frequently use garden hunting, or the hunting of animals from cultivated areas, to explain patterns in the zooarchaeological record of people who relied on agriculture. Rarely, however, have archaeologists systematically tested whether garden hunting actually occurred. For example, in the Northern U.S. Southwest, researchers often suggest that garden hunting explains the prevalence of lagomorphs, particularly cottontails (Sylvilagus spp.) but sometimes also jackrabbits (Lepus spp.), in zooarchaeological assemblages. We use stable isotope analysis of lagomorphs from three Ancestral Pueblo sites—Sand Canyon Pueblo, Hummingbird Pueblo, and Tijeras Pueblo—to test this suggestion. We find that garden hunting does not seem to explain either cottontail or jackrabbit abundance in these assemblages. We propose alternate approaches to understanding this subsistence practice in the U.S. Southwest and elsewhere.

Testing osteometric species determination on zooarchaeological dolphin remains from Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age sites in Ash-Sharqiyyah, Sultanate of Oman

Different Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age sites located in the Ras al-Hadd cape and Ras al-Jinz Bay area (Ash-Sharqiyyah South Governorate, Sultanate of Oman) have provided thousands of zooarchaeological dolphin remains suggesting a strong reliance on the exploitation of these animals. Dolphins are hard to identify to the species level due to a highly comparable interspecies osteological morphology as well as a general lack of extensive osteological reference collections. As a result, such remains are frequently identified as “dolphin”, without any further species identification being undertaken. In this study, we assess whether an osteometric method for distinguishing the nine dolphin species that are present in Omani waters can be used to identify the zooarchaeological specimens. Zooarchaeology by Mass-Spectrometry (ZooMS) was also undertaken on a subset of the specimens but proved ineffective due to the poor preservation of the material in an arid climate. This evidence strengthens the need for effective species identification methods based on traditional zooarchaeological methods. This research is based on our ongoing analysis of the thousands of dolphin remains from the Omani zooarchaeological assemblages.

Prehistoric human diet composition in Northwest Patagonia: Complementing isotopic analysis with zooarchaeological information

AbstractIn this work, we study diet composition of prehistoric human populations of Northwest Patagonia by exploring the combination of two different approaches frequently used in bioarchaeology, Bayesian isotope mixing models, and zooarchaeological analysis. For this purpose, we compiled a large dataset of previously published δ13C and δ15N human and resource values, as well as zooarchaeological data, corresponding to the Middle–Late Holocene and distributed throughout Northwest Patagonia. We first propose a replicable approach to divide the region into different areas comprising human individuals that shared the same available resources and perform isotope mixing models at individual level using default (i.e., uninformative) prior distributions in the Bayesian mixing models. Then, we explore a potential complementation of isotopic and zooarchaeological evidence by introducing the frequency of zooarchaeological assemblages with the different resources, as well as NISP, as priors in the Bayesian mixing models to guide diet estimations. Additionally, we use these frequencies to analyze the possible absence of some important resources in previous analyses. Based on the species distribution and geographical location of bioarchaeological sites, we divided the region into five areas (Northwest and Northeast Neuquén, South Neuquén/Rio Negro, and Southwest and Central‐east Mendoza) that differ in the resources available for potential human consumption. The results obtained show high diet variability among these areas, with individuals from Northwest and Northeast Neuquén consuming mainly large animals (i.e., guanaco and rhea, respectively) and South Neuquén/Rio Negro and Center‐east and Southwest Mendoza consuming a larger diversity of resources. Our results show that considering zooarchaeological priors in the analyses results in diet composition estimations more in line with the ecological diversity present in the region than previous estimations. We propose that approaches like this, which are common in ecological studies, should be considered in bioarchaeology to make more robust estimates of diet composition.

Estimating the Ontogenetic Age and Sex Composition of Faunal Assemblages with Bayesian Multilevel Mixture Models

Understanding the ontogenetic age and sex composition of zooarchaeological assemblages can reveal details about past human hunting and herding strategies as well as past animal morphology and behavior. As such, the accuracy of our estimates underlies our ability to ascertain details about site formation and gain insights into how people interacted with different animals in the past. Unfortunately, our estimates typically rely on only a small number of bones, limiting our ability to fruitfully use these estimates to make meaningful comparisons to theoretical expectations or even between multiple assemblages. This paper describes a method to use zooarchaeological remains with standard biometric measurements to estimate the ontogenetic age and sex composition of the assemblage, focused on immature, adult-sized female, and adult-sized male specimens. The model uses a Bayesian framework to ensure that the parameter estimates are biologically meaningful. Simulated assemblages show that the model can accurately estimate the biometry and composition of zooarchaeological assemblages. Two archaeological case studies also show how the model can be applied to produce tangible insights. The first, focused on sheep from Neolithic Pinarbaşı B, highlights the model’s ability to elucidate site formation and function. The second, focused on cattle remains from four assemblages from 7th-6th millennium BCE northwestern Anatolia, showcases how to use the mixture modeling results to compare assemblages to one another and to specific hypotheses. This modeling framework provides a new avenue for investigating long-term trajectories in animal biometry alongside contextual analyses of past human choices in butchery and consumption.

The Globular Amphora Culture in the Eastern Baltic: New Discoveries

Abstract Until now, Šventoji in northwest Lithuania was considered the most northern site of the Neolithic Globular Amphora Culture (hereafter GAC; ca. 3400–2500 cal BC) in Europe. Recently, however, ceramics typologically resembling GAC ware were identified among the materials from the multi-period sites of Abora 1 and Iča in Latvia and further to the north from Tamula in southeast Estonia. Here we present the multi-disciplinary analyses of these ceramics, including their morphology, function and chronology, to ascertain whether they could represent sporadic migrations of GAC groups into the region or exchange and increasing social contacts with the indigenous hunter-gatherers during the period from ca. 3000–2600 cal BC. Overall, our results align with previous studies showing that GAC groups in the Eastern Baltic possibly reorientated their economy from animal husbandry towards fishing, as recently evidenced by the composition of zooarchaeological assemblages, and the organic residue analysis of ceramic vessels, which markedly differ from the GAC communities of Central Europe. Indeed, in several coastal and southern regions of Lithuania, it would appear that some GAC migrants replaced the indigenous Subneolithic forager groups, whilst in other areas, they had little to no impact on the local cultural and economic development.

Zooarchaeological assemblages contextualize the historical ecology and harvest of fur-bearing mammals in Vermont

Shifting baselines can skew species harvest guidelines and lead to potentially inaccurate assessments of population status and range. The North American Fur Trade (~1600–1900 CE) profoundly impacted the continent’s socio-ecological systems, but its legacies are often not incorporated in management discussions. We apply a conservation paleobiology lens to address shifting baselines of nine species of fur-bearing mammals in Vermont, including seven mesocarnivores and two semi-aquatic rodents. Using a database maintained by the Vermont Division for Historic Preservation, we identified 25 existing radiocarbon dates of fur-bearer associated features from 16 archaeological localities spanning the Early-Late Holocene. We also generated 7 new radiocarbon dates on beaver and muskrat bones from the Ewing (VT-CH-005), Bohannon (VT-GI-026), and Chimney Point (VT-AD-329) localities. Our new radiocarbon dates cluster within the Late Holocene, immediately prior to and throughout the European contact period, and overlap with The Beaver Wars. We recover a ~8,000 year record of beaver harvest, affirming the millennial scale importance of beavers, a species that is often the focus of human-wildlife conflict research. Comparison of zooarchaeological occurrences with digitized natural history specimens and community science observations reveals geographic range continuity for most species except for the American marten, which was historically extirpated, and confirms the native status of the red fox. While taphonomic constraints make our dataset a conservative assessment, our case studies demonstrate how wildlife managers can employ zooarchaeological data to better understand long-term properties of coupled socio-ecological systems and highlight the cultural importance of these species to Indigenous trade networks prior to the Fur Trade in Vermont.

Resilience of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) to human hunting in precolonial New England: The faunal remains from the Morgan Site (6HT120), Rocky Hill, Connecticut

Resilience – the ability of a system to withstand and recover from perturbation – has become an important concept for archaeologists and investigating resilient natural resource use and management has important implications for understanding sustainability. In precolonial eastern North America, it has been argued that white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) were resilient to overhunting by humans, but this hypothesis has been only minimally tested. Here, I analyze a zooarchaeological assemblage from the Morgan Site in central Connecticut, dating to the 11th-14th centuries AD, to evaluate whether deer populations at this time experienced any perceptible hunting pressure. These data suggest that deer at the Morgan Site were not being overhunted. Fragmentation of deer skeletal elements for grease and marrow is consistent with intensive exploitation, but the strong dietary dependence on a highly preferred species like deer, evidence for hunting deer in proximity to the site, and minimal juvenile mortality all indicate that deer were not overexploited. Additionally, most of these deer were especially large-bodied. Given the evidence for a lack of hunting pressure, the large body size of deer observed here may have resulted from anthropogenic ecosystem engineering facilitating deer population growth and contributing to the apparent resilience of the species to predation.

Orlando Ribeiro’s work on transhumant pastoralism in north-central Portugal: Guidelines for a research project on ethno-history and archaeology

With very few exceptions, ethnographic data is hardly ever used as a framework for archaeological research in Portugal. However, the systematic work of Orlando Ribeiro (1911–1997) on the traditional forms of transhumant pastoralism in the north-central mountains of Portugal provides a unique ethno-historical framework for studying those practices in earlier times. Combining the abundant field observations and documentary analysis published by this geographer with ongoing archaeological and zooarchaeological research could shed great light on the long history of livestock management in the area. Some of the transhumance variables studied – ranges, itineraries, settlement locations, herd size, duration, community social organization and specific herding practices – serve as research guidelines for future projects. Due to unfavourable taphonomic conditions, zooarchaeological assemblages are scarce and poorly preserved in most of the territory, thus preventing any comprehensive reconstitution of past livestock compositions. This further enhances the importance of Ribeiro’s work.

Tracking the British agricultural revolution through the isotopic analysis of dated parchment

Between the sixteenth and nineteenth century, British agriculture underwent a ‘revolutionary’ transformation. Yet despite over a century of research and the recognised centrality of agricultural developments to industrialisation and population growth, the character or chronology of any ‘revolution’ during this period remains contentious. Enquiry has been hampered by the fragmented and locally specific nature of historic accounts and the broad dating of early-modern zooarchaeological assemblages. To address this, we conducted stable isotope analysis on 658 legal documents written on sheepskin parchment; a unique biological resource that records the day, month and year of use (AD 1499 to 1969). We find these provide a high temporal resolution analysis of changing agricultural practices and episodes of disease. Most significantly, they suggest that if an ‘Agricultural Revolution’ occurred in livestock management, it did so from the mid-nineteenth century, in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars.

Preservation of Mammalian Teeth and Bones Influences Identification of Terminal Pleistocene to Middle Holocene Hunter-Gatherer Subsistence at Ban Rai Rockshelter, Northwest Thailand

Ban Rai Rockshelter in northwest Thailand, dating to the Terminal Pleistocene and Middle Holocene, includes evidence for hunter-gatherer exploitation of mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, and arthropods. Abundant faunal remains, identified throughout site deposits, include macaques (Macaca sp.) and Sambar deer (Rusa unicolor), but these identifications are influenced by an assemblage largely comprised of preserved tooth elements and fragmented bone. Area 3 at Ban Rai has the largest abundance and diversity of faunal remains recovered and identified in this study. Here, we examine the zooarchaeological assemblage from Ban Rai Rockshelter, to understand long-term hunter-gatherer subsistence change, influenced by site preservation, during and after the Pleistocene–Holocene transition. Our results support the presence of the exploitation of arboreal taxa during the Early and Middle Holocene in northwest Thailand.

Cattle drivers from the north? Animal economy of a diasporic Kura-Araxes community at Tel Bet Yerah

Kura-Araxes animal management strategies in the core regions of the tradition and in areas of its 3rd millennium expansion have seen only sporadic study. Recently excavated contexts at Tel Bet Yerah were occupied in the first part of the Early Bronze Age III (c. 2850–2700 BCE) by people using Khirbet Kerak Ware and accompanying artifacts associated with a diasporic Kura-Araxes cultural tradition; they provide a rich zooarchaeological assemblage that may be contrasted with that of the local Levantine population, underscoring social and cultural distinctions maintained by the diasporic community. Focusing on the cattle assemblages in Kura-Araxes sites, their use for traction and transport is explored, as well as their role in maintaining cultural identity.

Unravelling Hominin Activities in the Zooarchaeological Assemblage of Barranco León (Orce, Granada, Spain)

Little is known about the subsistence practices of the first European settlers, mainly due to the shortage of archaeological sites in Europe older than a million years. This article contributes to the knowledge of the subsistence of the first Europeans with new zooarchaeology and taphonomic data from the Palaeolithic site of Barranco León (Orce, Granada, Spain). We present the results of the analysis of the faunal assemblages retrieved in the context of new excavations undertaken between 2016 and 2020. We have followed a standard methodology for the identification and quantification of species, mortality profiles, skeletal representation and taphonomic analysis. With regard to the taphonomic evidence, we have documented the extent of rounding, abrasion and other alterations. Finally, we examined traces from the activities of carnivores and hominins that led to the accumulation and alteration of the bone assemblages. Results indicate that the archaeo-paleontological deposits from Barranco León present a dual-patterned mixed taphonomic origin. The first phase primarily involved waterborne processes (BL-D1), which led to the accumulation of lithic raw materials, a few archaeological stone tools, and some faunal remains with percussion and cutmarks. The second phase (BL-D2) contains several stone tools associated with faunal remains with more anthropogenic alterations, such as cutmarks and percussion marks. After analysing the Barranco León zooarchaeological assemblage, the present study concludes that hominins had access to the meat and within-bone nutrients of animals of diverse sizes. However, the specific carcass acquisition mechanisms that hominins followed are less certain because the presence of tooth marks suggests that carnivores also played a role in the accumulation and modification of the Barranco León faunal assemblage.

An initial assessment of zooarchaeological assemblage sizes from South Africa

An initial assessment of zooarchaeological assemblage sizes from South Africa

No sustained increase in zooarchaeological evidence for carnivory after the appearance of Homo erectus

The appearance of Homo erectus shortly after 2.0 Ma is widely considered a turning point in human dietary evolution, with increased consumption of animal tissues driving the evolution of larger brain and body size and a reorganization of the gut. An increase in the size and number of zooarchaeological assemblages after the appearance of H. erectus is often offered as a central piece of archaeological evidence for increased carnivory in this species, but this characterization has yet to be subject to detailed scrutiny. Any widespread dietary shift leading to the acquisition of key traits in H. erectus should be persistent in the zooarchaeological record through time and can only be convincingly demonstrated by a broad-scale analysis that transcends individual sites or localities. Here, we present a quantitative synthesis of the zooarchaeological record of eastern Africa from 2.6 to 1.2 Ma. We show that several proxies for the prevalence of hominin carnivory are all strongly related to how well the fossil record has been sampled, which constrains the zooarchaeological visibility of hominin carnivory. When correcting for sampling effort, there is no sustained increase in the amount of evidence for hominin carnivory between 2.6 and 1.2 Ma. Our observations undercut evolutionary narratives linking anatomical and behavioral traits to increased meat consumption in H. erectus, suggesting that other factors are likely responsible for the appearance of its human-like traits.