Collagen Peptide Fingerprinting (ZooMS) of Archaeological Worked Bone from Southern Florida

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Archaeological investigations have demonstrated extensive connections among hunter-gatherer populations across the vast southern Florida landscape facilitated by a complex aquatic ecosystem. The prehistoric inhabitants expressed regionally specific differences in material culture, including and bone artisanship, but engaged in nearly identical subsistence practices related to animal use. While some burial practices from the Late Archaic to Belle Glade (Woodland/Mississippian) periods indicate differences in the types of animals interred with humans, little is understood in terms of how animals were integrated into human ideology and social identity. Species used to manufacture bone ornaments offers one window into the ideological/symbolic roles of animals, but has remained largely unstudied, primarily because the degree to which bones have been modified into desired objects erases identifying features unique to species. Our paper presents new results using collagen peptide fingerprinting, or Zooarchaeology by Mass Spectrometry (ZooMS), to identify morphologically ambiguous worked bone artifacts, which clarifies the importance of different animal species with respect to ideological beliefs held by native inhabitants to south Florida. We argue that the animals used for bone artifact manufacture may have held special meanings for the different groups that made and used them.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 33283