Meta-analysis of the North Atlantic Cod Fisheries: The Zooarchaeology of the Sixteenth- to Nineteenth-Century Transatlantic Cod Trade

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Animal Bones to Human Behavior" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The distribution and abundance of animal populations have significantly impacted human settlement decisions, mobility, economics, and conflict throughout history. The abundance of cod (*Gadus morhua) in North Atlantic fisheries enticed English, French, and Basque fishermen to the region to catch, salt, and export cod to Europe. Efforts to monopolize economically important cod fisheries in the region led to repeated military conflicts between major European powers. Despite this, the archaeological record of the cod trade in North America and archaeological evidence for the trade of cod from the North Atlantic to other North American and European ports have not been widely studied. Our study focuses on zooarchaeological evidence from the sixteenth through nineteenth centuries. We show that though cod remains are abundant in the regions where they were caught and processed, they show up only infrequently in other North American assemblages. Furthermore, though North Atlantic cod have been previously identified in European assemblages, they are found primarily in regions where cod had been or were still available. These results contribute to our understanding of cod's important economic role in the development of North American trading ports and reveal transatlantic connections in post-medieval Europe.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Animal Bones to Human Behavior   •
• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32309