Zooarchaeology What is Zooarchaeology? Recovery and Counting Comparative Collections Subsistence Strategies Seasonality

What is Zooarchaeology?  The Study of animal bones from archaeological sites.  Studies can focus on subsistence, hunting strategies, environmental change, domestication of animals, and ceremonial use of animals.

History of Zooarchaeology  50 years ago archaeologists had bones on their sites and they began asking zoologists to identify them.  Some people became more and more interested and involved in these bones and began to specialize in it.  Today most zooarchaeologists, such as myself, are trained as archaeologists and specialize in zoology. Have taken a lot of zoology classes. Including Malacolgy, Ichthyology, Avian Osteology, Vertebrate Osteology.

Recovery and Counting  Recovery of bones is subjected to bias depending on screen size and soil preservation.  Counting bones is not like counting flakes, flakes are extremely predictable in how they break, whereas bones are not predictable.  Several techniques can be used to count bones: NISP-Number of Identified Specimens, counts each bone fragment as a unit. MNI-Minimum Number of Individuals, first defined by T.E. White in 1953 to account for each animal as an individual unit. need to identify lefts and rights of bones from a given species.

For MNI Given an assemblage (group of bones):  How many individuals? 3 L proximal humeri (upper arm bones) 2 R proximal humeri 4 R distal femurs (upper leg bones) 2 L distal femurs

Meat Utility Indices  MNI can be used to calculate how much meat can be obtained from a given animal.  lbs. of meat=200 lbs.  5 5 lbs. of meat=25 lbs.

Comparative Collections  Cannot identify animal remans without having some comparative collection. modern skeleton for comparative purposes. must have a series of specimens in a particular species, representing different ages and sexes.  Zoologists generally have collections of skulls and animal skins because they are interested in identifying and classifying modern species.  Weights and measurements need to be recorded so that utility indices can be estimated.

Preparation  Maceration-in water  Dermestid Beetles  Bleach-Biz  Simmering-cooking the meat off  University of TN has a skeletal collection of over 12,000 specimens one of the best in the country.

Subsistence Strategies  The primary focus of zooarchaeology is to discover the subsistence techniques used by prehistoric and historic people.  It is important to study behavior through animal remains because most of what humans do is involved with eating. celebrations-some foods have higher status than others. nutritional stress-what do people eat and do when times are lean? i.e. increase diet breadth habitat-a lot of what people eat (primarily prehistoric) is predicted and controlled by their environment.  Other aspect of diet reflects human behavior: age and sex of animals season of site occupation cultural preferences

Strategies  Hunting and Gathering-wild animals  Pastoralism-herding domestic animals  Horticulture-wild and domestic animals  Agriculture-wild and domestic animals

How is seasonality documented?  Presence/Absence Migratory birds Cold-blooded Reptiles/Amphibians Animal young  Skeletal Change Antler Growth Tooth Growth Epiphyseal Fusion  Incremental Growth Structures-Fish Bones most useful are otoliths and spines otoliths are calcareous “ear stones” in the inner ear associated with balance.  Mammalian teeth cementum annuli laid down during the year. dark band slow growth, light band fast growth.

Case Study: Oronsay Island, Scotland  Wilkinson’s study of coalfish from Mesolithic sites on island ( ya)  Otoliths-sectioned and season of death documented.  Found seasonal fishing at four sites Cnoc Sligeach-July to August Cnoc Coig-Sept-November Priory Midden-Winter to Early Spring Caisteal nan Gillean-Spring to Summer  Probably movement of one group from site to site over the course of the year.

Oronsay Island & Coalfish

Cultural Significance

Sacred Objects