Zooarchaeology (Other Keyword)
1,001-1,025 (1,173 Records)
The objective of this poster is to present an overview of the emergence of pest-host and commensal relationships that emerged between humans and microfaunal species over the course of approximately 1,500 years at the Pre-Pottery Neolithic site of Aşıklı Höyük. My research is focused on the investigation of the frequency and taphonomic contexts of microfaunal remains in a formative village setting. Co-evolution between humans and plants and animals occurred as feedback systems developed because...
Tracking Ancient Animals to Provide an Archaeological Perspective on Wild Mammal Management, Conservation and ‘Rewilding’ (2019)
This is an abstract from the "HumAnE Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Human immigration and biological invasions are high-profile topics in modern politics, but neither are uniquely modern phenomena. Migrations of people, animals and ideas were common in antiquity and are frequently incorporated into expressions of cultural identity. However, the more recent the migration, the more negative modern attitudes are towards them. Native is...
Tracking Individual Raptors in the Archaeological Record Using Stable Isotope Analysis: Some Implications for the Study of Ritual Economies in New Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this poster, we explore a cost-effective method for tracking artifacts made from individual raptors (or birds of prey) through the use of intra-skeletal variation in δ13C, δ15N, δ2H in modern samples of Turkey Vultures (Cathartes aura) and Golden Eagles (Aquila chrysaetos). Current methods of quantification in zooarchaeology, such as the minimum number of...
Tracking Individual Raptors in the Archaeological Record Using Stable Isotopes: Limitations, Possibilities, and Causes of Intraskeletal δ-Value Variation (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Birds in Archaeology: New Approaches to Understanding the Diverse Roles of Birds in the Past" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The ability to track trade of socially valued goods made from raptor bones can give archaeologists a deeper understanding of both human-raptor interactions and networks of exchange. Reconstructing distribution of such goods from production centers, however, requires the ability to identify bones...
Tracking Morphological Changes in the Domestication of Sheep and Pigs: A Comparison (2018)
How do animal morphologies change during domestication? How do different parts of the skeleton adapt to human management? In this poster, I take a quantitative approach to domestication by comparing biometrical data from two species of mammals that were domesticated in the Middle East around the same time (ca. 8000 BC): pigs (Sus scrofa) and sheep (Ovis aries). Both pigs and sheep were domesticated by Pre-Pottery Neolithic B communities in northern Syria/southern Anatolia, but these species...
Trans-Holocene Human Impacts on Endangered California Black Abalone (Haliotis cracherodii) Population Structures: Historical Ecological Management Implications from the Northern Channel Islands (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Human Interactions with Extinct Fauna" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Black abalone (Haliotis cracherodii) were an important subsistence resource in southern California for 10,000 years, first for coastal Native Americans, then as a commercial shellfishery. By 1993, however, black abalone populations declined dramatically, resulting in the closure of the California fishery. Recently, black abalone are showing signs of...
The Transect Survey at 30-something (2015)
In 1977, an American Museum of Natural History team lead by David Hurst Thomas began an ambitious survey of St. Catherines Island, Georgia. The intent was to systematically survey 10% of the island following a series of transect lines using a research design from plant ecology. The survey collected hundreds of small vertebrate samples, none of which met zooarchaeological standards for adequate sample sizes and analysis. These hundreds of small samples, however, proved invaluable because they...
Transplanted at the Coast: The Adaptation of Caribbean Resourcing Practices during the Late Holocene (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Archaeology and Landscape Learning for a Climate-Changing World" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The movement of early agriculturalists from the South American continent during the Early and Late Ceramic Ages (500 BCE–1500 CE) marked a significant transformation of the cultural landscapes of the Caribbean archipelago. These arriving groups expressed a strong cultural identity in their ceramic materials, settlement...
Tree Island Life: Late Archaic Adaptations of a Northern Everglades Community (2018)
The Wedgworth Midden (8PB16175), a Late Archaic tree island site near Belle Glade, Florida, produced large quantities of faunal remains during excavations undertaken by Florida Gulf Coast University in May of 2016. Analysis of these remains allows insight into patterns of resource acquisition and reveals ways in which people adapted to the local environment. Comparison of proportions of taxa from different occupational periods allows us to trace changes in resource use and sheds light on...
A Tropical Treasure Trove: Preliminary Assessment of Archaeological Faunal Remains from Culebra Bay, Guanacaste, Costa Rica (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Advances and New Perspectives in the Isthmo-Colombian Area" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. For over 50 years, excavations in Guanacaste, Costa Rica, have yielded a large amount of well-preserved faunal materials, yet few zooarchaeological studies have been carried out. To explore the research potential of archaeofaunal materials in the region, I will present data from several sites around the Culebra bay area. These...
TThe Use of Shells as Personal Ornaments in Liguria during the Upper Paleolithic: A Review (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Hunter-Gatherer Archaeology of Liguria: Recent Research and Insights" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Personal ornaments are commonly attributed to a modern human dispersal in western Asia and Europe, representing a veritable key tool for understanding the human dispersal out of Africa. Objects loaded with symbolic meaning such as beads made from modified marine shells were largely used during the Upper Paleolithic in...
Turkey Domestication and Utilization in an Ancestral Puebloan Community (2015)
The archaeofaunal remains left by the Ancestral Puebloan people who lived in the Goodman Point community provide a chronological record of their interaction with turkey (Meleagris gallopavo). Domestication can be regarded as a co-evolutionary relationship between a plant or animal species and humans that varies in the intensity of mutual dependence. We examine how the Goodman Point residents’ relationship with turkey evolved from the late AD 900s to the 1280’s. Our research involves the analysis...
Turkey Husbandry at Pueblo Bonito and Its Relationship to Turkey-Human Interactions in Chaco Canyon (2018)
Domestic turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) husbandry at Chaco Canyon has been the subject of considerable debate. Previous research has argued, among other things, that turkeys were rare in the Canyon (Akins 1985); that turkeys first were a source of feathers for ritual and ceremonial activities, and only later treated as food (Akins 1985; Badenhorst et al. 2016; Windes 1977); that local wild turkeys were not present in Chaco Canyon and domestic turkeys were imported from the Four Corners region...
Turkey Provisioning, Exchange, and the Isotopic Zooarchaeology of Social Transformations in the Mesa Verde Region (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Isotopic and Animal aDNA Analyses in the Southwest/Northwest" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Changes in resource acquisition patterns are important components of larger social transformations, including shifts in the source areas and transport patterns of important animal resources. In the Mesa Verde region, increasing population aggregation and shifting settlement locations from AD 750 through 1225 also increased...
The Turtlers of Early 18th Century Grand Cayman (2020)
This is an abstract from the session entitled "Innovative Approaches to Finding Agency in Objects" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The turtle fishery off the coast of the Cayman Islands was a well-known supplier of meat for mariners involved in the trans-Atlantic trade of the 18th century. Salted and barreled or taken aboard live, these reptiles played a vital role in shipboard foodways. The Turtle Bone Site, located on the north side of Grand Cayman’s...
Two Valleys Archaeology in an Environmental Humanities Context (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Climate and Heritage in the North Atlantic: Burning Libraries" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This talk discusses the challenges of connecting the currently ongoing Two Valleys Project in Iceland to various scales of research on human ecodynamics of the past and global challenges we face in our time. This interdisciplinary project expands on previous research into human-nature interactions within various marine and...
Under the Scope: Nondestructive Methods of Analyzing Perishable Artifacts in Legacy Collections (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This research presents the macroscopic and microscopic attributes of hair and feathers from the artifact assemblage of North Fork Cave #1, better known as Mummy Cave (48PA201) in Park County, Wyoming. The results of this research enable us to better understand the mammalian and avian resources exploited during the Archaic and Prehistoric periods in the Greater...
The Under-Represented Mullet in SW Florida’s Archaeological Assemblages (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Mullets (Mugil spp.), especially the striped mullet (Mugil cephalus), because of their predictable mass-schooling behavior, are obvious candidates as having been surplus food for the socio-politically complex, Calusa fisher-gatherer-hunters. Moreover, López de Velasco, writing in about 1570, stated that there was in southwest Florida waters a "great fishery of...
Understanding Animal Use at the Wetland Maya Site of Chulub (2018)
Reconstructions of ancient Maya animal use often emphasize the importance of terrestrial species, such as deer, to the overall diet. While these species played an important role, much less attention has been paid to the use of aquatic resources despite the presence of resource rich perennial wetlands in the Maya lowlands. To further understand this crucial area of the Maya-environment relationship, we investigated the site of Chulub located in the Western Lagoon Wetlands of Belize. This site...
Understanding Changes in Lagomorph Proportions within the Homol’ovi Settlement Cluster, Northeast Arizona (2018)
Lagomorphs (rabbits and hares) were a critically important dietary resource for inhabitants of the pre-contact American Southwest, where they typically dominate faunal assemblages. It is useful to examine proportions between genera of lagomorphs—specifically, cottontails (Syvilagus sp.) and jackrabbits (Lepus sp.)—to elucidate information about the past environment and how it might have changed in response to human actions. Based on habitat preferences and predator evasion strategies, the...
Understanding Patterns of Indigenous White-tailed Deer (*Odocoileus virginianus) Exploitation in the North Carolina Piedmont Using Strontium (87Sr/86Sr) Isotope Analysis (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Animal Bones to Human Behavior" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The varied responses by Native communities within the American Southeast to European colonization resulted in a period of dynamic social, economic, and political change. One such response to the colonial encounter was the development of a robust trade in the skins of white-tailed deer. In this paper, I focus on the effects of the deerskin trade on the deer...
Understanding Pleistocene and Early Holocene faunal exploitation at Barrow Island, North-west Australia (2017)
Barrow Island, located 50km off the modern Pilbara coast, contains the longest and richest archaeological record of Pleistocene coastal settlement in northern Australia. During lowered sea levels of the Pleistocene, the island was part of the greater Australian continent. Archaeological survey has revealed an array of sites in cave, rockshelter and open air-settings. The most diverse record has been recovered from a large limestone cave, where repeated visits began at c. 50 ka BP and continued...
Understanding the Interplay between Domesticate Choice and the Environment: The Case of the Humble Australian Sheep (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Questioning the Fundamentals of Plant and Animal Domestication" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Domestication could be described as a drawn out, nuanced dance between humans and animals – a dance that shapes not just the animal actors – but the physical, cultural and economic environment of all the players. Recent examples of this effect abound in areas colonized by Europeans, particularly those with drastically...
The Unexpected Fauna of Pleistocene Saudi Arabia and the Earliest Evidence of Hominin Butchery Activity (2018)
Work in the Nefud Desert, Saudi Arabia, has been fundamental for establishing the importance of the Arabian Peninsula for Pleistocene hominin populations and their dispersals out of Africa. Recent palaeontological and archaeological exploration in the Western Nefud Desert has uncovered numerous fossiliferous palaeolake deposits and associated archaeology. Fossil assemblages include taxa with both African and Eurasian affinities and indicate a greater diversity in large mammals than resides in...
Ungulate Bone Fat Exploitation at the Adoption of Horticulture in Western Iowa (2017)
Fat in the form of bone marrow and/or grease is a valued resource among foragers, and is more frequently exploited during times of subsistence stress. Risk-reduction in the face of resource stress is one potential theory for why prehistoric people incorporated horticulture into existing hunting and gathering practices. During the Woodland period (2800-1350 BP), the tallgrass prairie region of western Iowa provided a rich environment where numerous prey species could be found, including bison and...