Nutritional Benefits of Bone Fat in Rabbits (Leporidae): Implications for Understanding Prehistoric Human Foraging

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Bone fat has been recognized by prehistoric and modern societies as an important source of lipids and other nutrients. Experimental and ethnoarchaeological research have provided a number of archaeological correlates for identifying the role that such nutritional resources were exploited by prehistoric peoples. To date, the bulk of such research has focused on large game resources, yet the nutritional benefits of bone fats may be particularly important for foragers who depend a large degree on small mammals for their subsistence. Here, experimental research is presented to establish the caloric return rates of extracting liquefied bone lipids from leporids, a notoriously fat-poor resource. Using these data in optimal foraging models, including marginal value theorem for carcass processing, will allow us to better understand when intensified culinary processing should be expected and how it affects the overall post-encounter net return rates of leporids. Although the small size and limited meat-fat content of leporids currently ranks them as a lower ranked resource, rabbits may bring more to the table than previously thought when considering both the meat and bone fat calories gained from stewing.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 36988.0