Prehistoric seal carcass exploitation at the Shag Mouth site,New Zealand

Seal populations in New Zealand declined dramatically during the prehistoric period. The loss of this important resource significantly affected the foraging practices at the Shag River Mouth site. Previous research documented substantial changes to the diet with the decline of seals and the corresponding decline in foraging efficiency. In this study, I examine how New Zealand foragers altered their use of seal carcasses as the availability of these marine mammals declined. Otariid seal data from the Shag River Mouth site in southern New Zealand are analyzed to test changes in butchery/transport and skeletal element breakage patterns expected with resource depression and declining foraging efficiency. This research shows that at Shag Mouth, seal carcasses were used more intensively over time. However, bone breakage patterns showed little change in the exploitation of within-bone nutrients.     

The effects of resource depression on foraging efficiency, diet breadth, and patch use in southern New Zealand

While many studies have examined human impacts on prehistoric environments, few have explicitly examined how foragers adapt to the changing environmental situations that they have created. The goal of this analysis is to study the relationship between human foraging economies and human-related environmental change in southern New Zealand. Foraging theory is used to generate predictions about subsistence change resulting from the declining abundance of important resources such as moas and seals. In particular, these predictions examine changes in (1) the kind of resources exploited (foraging efficiency), (2) the number of resources utilized (diet breadth), and (3) the habitats exploited (patch choice). The predictions are tested using the large assemblage of vertebrate faunal remains from the well-stratified and well-dated Shag River Mouth site. This study shows that using foraging theory models to structure analysis provides a more fine-grained spatial and temporal resolution of subsistence change in southern New Zealand than has been previously achieved.     

Factors affecting Early Stone Age cut mark cross-sectional size: implications from actualistic butchery trials

Early Stone Age cut marks are byproducts of hominins' tool-assisted animal carcass consumption and provide a potential avenue of inference into the paleoecology of hominin carnivory. If diagnostic cut mark characteristics can be linked to flake and core tool use or the completion of distinct butchery actions, it may be possible to infer ancient tool preferences, reconstruct the consumption of specific muscular tissues, and illuminate landscape-scale stone resource use. Recently, diagnostic morphological criteria including cut mark width and depth have been used to identify marks made by different classes of experimental and archaeological stone tools (Bello, S.M., Parfitt, S.A., Stringer, C., 2009. Quantitative micromorphological analyses of cut marks produced by ancient and modern handaxes. Journal of Archaeological Science 36: 1869–1880; de Juana, S., Galan, A.B., Dominguez-Rodrigo, M., 2010. Taphonomic identification of cut marks made with lithic handaxes: an experimental study. Journal of Archaeological Science 37: 1841–1850; Dominguez-Rodrigo, M., de Juana, S., Galan, A. B., Rodriguez, M., 2009. A new protocol to differentiate trampling marks from butchery cut marks. Journal of Archaeological Science 36: 2643–2654). The work presented here adds to this experimental butchery database by using measurements of cut mark cross-section taken from bone surface molds to investigate how stone tool characteristics including flake versus core tool type, edge angle, and tool weight, influence cut mark width and depth, ultimately testing whether cut mark size is a useful indicator of tool identity. Additionally, these experiments investigate the influence of contextual factors, including butchery action, carcass size, and bone density on cut mark size. An experienced butcher used replicated Oldowan flakes and bifacial core tools in experimental trials that isolated skinning, bulk and scrap muscle defleshing, and element disarticulation cut marks on goat and cow skeletons. This sample explores cut mark traces generated under realistic butchery scenarios and suggests the following results: 1) Core and flake tools were equally efficient at completing all butchery tasks in size 1 and 3 bovid carcasses. 2) Samples of cut mark width and depth produced by core and flake tools were similar and cut marks could not be accurately classified to a known tool type. 3) Skinning and disarticulation activities produced significantly wider and deeper marks than defleshing activities. 4) Cut marks on cows tended to be wider and deeper than those on goats. 5) Cut mark width is negatively correlated with bone density when carcass size and bone portion are taken into consideration. These results suggest that a general quantitative model for inferring tool type or edge characteristics from archaeological cut mark size is not warranted.     

Skeletal element abundances in archaeofaunal assemblages: economic utility,sample size,and assessment of carcass transport strategies

Economic utility indices provide a means of interpreting butchery and transport decisions reflected in the relative abundance of skeletal elements. Because of destructive taphonomic processes, interpreting skeletal element abundances in terms of carcass transport strategies requires that faunal analysts consider only those elements which accurately reflect their original abundances following human discard. In this study we use resampling techniques to examine the impact of sample size on correlations between high-survival skeletal element frequencies and economic utility in four simulated population assemblages reflecting distinct carcass transport strategies. Correlations alone do not accurately reflect the true relationship between bone abundance and economic utility as particular transport strategies have a tendency to generate high frequencies of Type II errors as sample size decreases. We show that the Shannon evenness index can be used as a quantitative means of distinguishing between bone assemblages characterized by subtle variations in skeletal element abundances. The evenness index can also be used to evaluate whether observed correlations reflect sampling error. Results from our simulations are applied to three published faunal assemblages to evaluate likely carcass transport strategies.     

Experimental study of cut marks made with rocks unmodified by human flaking and its bearing on claims of ∼3.4-million-year-old butchery evidence from Dikika, Ethiopia

In order to assess further the recent claims of ∼3.4 Ma butchery marks on two fossil bones from the site of Dikika (Ethiopia), we broadened the actualistic-interpretive zooarchaeological framework by conducting butchery experiments that utilized naïve butchers and rocks unmodified by human flaking to deflesh chicken and sheep long limb bones. It is claimed that the purported Dikika cut marks present their unexpectedly atypical morphologies because they were produced by early hominins utilizing just such rocks. The composition of the cut mark sample produced in our experiments is quite dissimilar to the sample of linear bone surface modifications preserved on the Dikika fossils. This finding substantiates and expands our earlier conclusion that—considering the morphologies and patterns of the Dikika bone surface modifications and the inferred coarse-grained depositional context of the fossils on which they occur—the Dikika bone damage was caused incidentally by the movement of the fossils on and/or within their depositional substrate(s), and not by early hominin butchery. Thus, contrary to initial claims, the Dikika evidence does not warrant a major shift in our understanding of early hominin behavioral evolution with regard to carcass foraging and meat-eating.     

An Experimental Study of the Anatomical Distribution of Cut Marks Created by Filleting and Disarticulation on Long Bone Ends

Analogical frameworks created through experimentation are a vital part of taphonomic studies for interpreting the archaeological record. Understanding the anatomical location of cut marks is crucial for interpreting the butchery behaviour of humans in the past, as well as for indirectly inferring the subsistence and economic function of archaeological sites. Two experimental/ethnoarchaeological studies have provided taphonomists with analogues to interpret filleting and disarticulation butchery behaviours from archaeofaunal assemblages. However, these analogues were made with limited control and both involved the use of metal knives. The present work provides the first systematic and controlled study of cut mark distribution on long bones made with stone tools, aimed at differentiating cut marks created by filleting or defleshing from those inflicted during disarticulation. It also studies the variability of cut mark distribution according to stone tool type (simple flakes, retouched flakes and handaxes). The results show some differences with previous studies made with metal tools and offer an updated analogue to interpret butchery (filleting, dismembering and skinning) from prehistoric contexts.     

Characterization of New Zealand obsidian using PXRF

New Zealand has some of the most active areas of rhyolitic volcanism in the world and this has produced numerous obsidian sources in the northern half of the North Island. In total archaeologists have recognized 27 named locations from which obsidian can be obtained scattered across 4 geological source regions. Shortly after colonization in the late 13th century AD Polynesian settlers began transporting this material some thousands of kilometers throughout the country and across the sea in small quantities to distant neighbors in the Kermadecs and Chatham islands. Although considerable research has been conducted on obsidian sourcing in New Zealand the complexity of geochemical source discrimination and the lack of a practical method of non-destructive geochemical analysis has hindered progress. We present the results of our use of PXRF to provide geochemical data on New Zealand obsidian sources and to compare the use of discriminant analysis and classification tree analysis to discriminate among sources and attribute archaeological samples to sources. Our research suggests that classification tree analysis is superior to discriminant analysis in sourcing studies. A large case study using an important settlement phase site (S11/20) from the Auckland region demonstrates the utility of the methods and the results support a model of high degrees of mobility and interaction during the early settlement of New Zealand.     

Human Palaeoecological Interactions and Owl Roosting at Tron Bon Lei,Alor Island,Eastern Indonesia

We report on tetrapod (Reptilia, Amphibia, Mammalia, Aves) vertebrates recovered during excavations at Tron Bon Lei rockshelter on the south coast of Alor Island, eastern Indonesia. These include both archaeological specimens recovered from a 1 m² test pit dating from ～21 kya cal BP to the late Holocene, and a modern eastern barn owl deposit recovered nearby. To discern between the depositional processes that accumulated the small numbers of micro- and macrovertebrate remains from the archaeological deposits, the taphonomic signature of the natural assemblage was quantified and compared to the archaeological record. The taphonomic data indicates that the tetrapod archaeofaunal remains are a combination of barn owl predation of microfauna and human predation of larger fauna. This approach provides new information on human-tetrapod interactions on Alor in Wallacea during the late Quaternary, including an apparent increase in cave site use and hunting intensity during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition, sea turtle butchery and probable transport, and extinctions of previously unknown giant to large rat species.     

What Explains the Carcass Field Processing and Transport Decisions of Contemporary Hunter-Gatherers? Measures of Economic Anatomy and Zooarchaeological Skeletal Part Representation

This paper uses rationale derived from central place foraging models to explore the factors that guide the carcass processing and transport decisions of modern hunters. Using data derived from butchering experiments, I test different economic indices that purportedly reflect the field processing and transport decisions of contemporary African Hadza hunter-gatherers. The results show that no single index predicts part processing and transport for the species examined in this analysis. Processing and transport decisions are, however, patterned in ways that are consistent with theoretical predictions. While similar processes likely guide carcass treatment and transport decisions among all hunter-gatherers, different ecological, social, and historical constraints define the range of solutions to problems involving carcass treatment. In this specific example, intertaxonomic differences in carcass size and bone properties constrain how the trade-offs between field processing and transport costs are resolved. I conclude by suggesting ways in which analysts might make use of central place foraging rationale and models to explain variation in skeletal representation and abundances across time and space.

The pectoral fin spines of European catfish Siluris glanis; cultural artifacts or food remains?

The urban archaeological site of Nicopolis ad Istrum in north central Bulgaria, which has multiple periods of use and abandonment, has produced a large and varied ichthyofauna. A number of bones of the European catfish Siluris glanis have been identified and have been interpreted as both food remains and bone artifacts. It was found that a percentage bias in the distribution of S. glanis bones from the Roman period of occupation called for further analysis. The investigation attempts to identify the reason or reasons for the apparent overrepresentation of the pectoral fin spines of this species. Taphonomic factors are considered along with butchery and an actualistic study of butchery on modern S. glanis material. Studies from north Africa are used to illustrate the possible function of the spines. The conclusions drawn are that a high proportion of the pectoral fin spines were brought into the site, possibly as personal artifacts. Their use is open to debate; no clear functional use can be determined from the archaeological material, although it cannot be ruled out that they were used for medicinal purposes or as charms.     

Examining histology to identify burned bone

Early research suggests that examination of the microscopic internal structure is a valid method for distinguishing burned from unburned bone in the archaeological record. This study compares burned and unburned modern bones with archaeological bones from Sibudu Cave (ca. 60,000 years ago) and Cave of Hearths (over 200,000 years ago) to more fully describe the heat-induced histological changes to bone. We also explore the effects of diagenesis on those changes to determine if histological evidence of burning preserves through fossilisation and diagenetic processes and can be successfully used to identify ancient burning. Application of this technique can help in addressing various issues, including the origins of controlled use of fire and understanding animal butchery and disposal.     

“Random” hunting and the composition of faunal samples from archaeological excavations: A modern example from New Zealand

The ability of analyses of the age- and sex-composition of faunal samples from archaeological excavations to permit reliable inferences concerning prehistoric culling practices and, in particular, to distinguish between wild and domesticated animals is investigated by examining the demographic composition of 14 groups of red deer (Cervus elaphus) shot at random from a helicopter in the Southern Alps of New Zealand in early 1975. It is concluded that such “random” hunting can produce samples of bones that are apparently biased with respect to age and/or sex. The implications of these findings for prehistoric studies are discussed briefly with particular reference to the exploitation of red deer in Italy and Switzerland, and greater caution in excavating and analysing faunal samples is urged.     

Taphonomy of ungulate ribs and the consumption of meat and bone by 1.2-million-year-old hominins at Olduvai Gorge,Tanzania

The phenomenon of equifinality complicates behavioral interpretations of faunal assemblages from contexts in which Pleistocene hominins are suspected bone accumulators. Stone tool butchery marks on ungulate fossils are diagnostic of hominin activities, but debate continues over the higher-order implications of butchered bones for the foraging capabilities of hominins. Additionally, tooth marks imparted on bones by hominins overlap in morphology and dimensions with those created by some non-hominin carnivores, further confounding our view of early hominins as meat-eating hunters, scavengers or both. We report on the manual/oral peeling of cortical layers of ungulate ribs as taphonomically diagnostic of hominoid/hominin meat- and bone-eating behavior that indicates access to large herbivore carcasses by hominins at the site of BK, Olduvai. Supporting these inferences, we show that certain types of rib peeling damage are very rare or completely unknown in faunas created by modern carnivores and African porcupines, but common in faunas modified by the butchery and/or consumption activities of modern humans and chimpanzees, during which these hominoids often grasp ribs with their hands, and then used their teeth to peel strips of cortex from raggedly chewed ends of the ribs. Carnivores consume ungulate ribcage tissues soon after kills, so diagnostic traces of hominin butchery/consumption on ribs (i.e., peeling and butchery marks) indicate early access to ungulate carcasses by BK hominins. Tooth marks associated with the peeling and butchery marks are probably hominin-derived, and may indicate that it was not uncommon for our ancestors to use their teeth to strip meat from and to consume portions of ribs. Recognition of rib peeling as a diagnostic signature of hominoid/hominin behavior may also aid the search for pre-archaeological traces of hominin meat-eating.     

Mass Migration and the Polynesian Settlement of New Zealand

This paper reintroduces the concept of mass migration into debates concerning the timing and nature of New Zealand’s settlement by Polynesians. Upward revisions of New Zealand’s chronology show that the appearance of humans on the landscape occurred extremely rapidly, and that within decades settlements had been established across the full range of climatic zones. We show that the rapid appearance of a strong archaeological signature in the early 14th century AD is the result of a mass migration event, not the consequence of gradual demographic growth out of a currently unidentified earlier phase of settlement. Mass migration is not only consistent with the archaeological record but is supported by recent findings in molecular biology and genetics. It also opens the door to a new phase of engagement between archaeological method and indigenous Maori and Polynesian oral history and tradition.     

The prehistoric sources of Palliser Bay obsidian

A sample of 210 pieces of archaeologically derived obsidian from settlement sites in Palliser Bay, New Zealand, was subjected to X-ray fluorescent analysis, in order to define the petrographic sources exploited by these prehistoric groups. It was found that the material had been derived from sources at Mayor Island, Huruiki, Rotorua, Cooks Bay, Purangi, Ongaroto and Taupo, and with the exception of the last 3, all were being quarried as early as the 12th century AD. Problems were encountered in assessing the significance of trends in source exploitation which had been proven on other grounds, and these suggested that future analyses must involve far larger archaeological samples.     

A Spanish Man‐o‐War in New Zealand? The 1864 wreck of Grafton and its lessons for pre‐Cook shipwreck claims

This paper considers the 1864 wreck of Grafton in the Auckland Islands, and its implications for wreck analysis and pre‐Cook exploration claims. The captain of Grafton, Thomas Musgrave, stated that the schooner was built from the wreck of a Spanish man‐o‐war, and archaeological analysis of the wreck found that the timbers are a tropical South American species, and had possibly been reused. The implications of this are clear; it is possible that timbers that originated in pre‐Cook (1769) ships lie in New Zealand, but without a full understanding of the historical and archaeological context of any such timbers, including their reuse in later ships, it is not possible to claim proof of pre‐Cook European exploration of New Zealand.     

Cut and Tooth Mark Distributions on Large Animal Bones: Ethnoarchaeological Data from the Hadza and Their Implications For Current Ideas About Early Human Carnivory

Distributions of cut and tooth marks on the bones of large animals found in archaeological sites are increasingly used as sources of inference about the relative importance of hunting and scavenging in early human diets, and (by extension) about the role of meat-eating in human evolution. Here we review the empirical basis for these inferences in light of ethnoarchaeological data from the Tanzanian Hadza, a modern East African foraging population. Comparison of the Hadza data with those produced by other actualistic work indicates that while there may be a relationship between cut and tooth mark distributions and order of consumer access (human- versus carnivore-first), it is less clear-cut than many have suggested. Application of these results to the analysis of Plio-Pleistocene archaeological collections is further complicated by inconsistencies in the ways cut and tooth marks have been defined and counted, and by significant differences between patterns observed in modern control samples and those reported at ancient sites. These observations indicate that cut and tooth mark analyses are unlikely to speak effectively to questions about early human carnivory in the absence of: (1) better-warranted, more comprehensive expectations about the potential range of variation in past human carcass acquisition strategies, (2) a larger, more rigorously designed set of control experiments that model the archaeological consequences of these strategies, and (3) a larger, more consistently analysed archaeological data base. Even if these requirements are met, the idea of meat-eating as an important catalyst in the evolution of early humans will remain highly problematic, mainly due to problems involving the frequency and short-term reliability of carcass access.     

Pollen taphonomy and airfall sedimentation in a tropical cave: the West Mouth of The Great Cave of Niah in Sarawak,Malaysian Borneo

This paper investigates the taphonomy of predominantly biogenic sediments and pollen in the key archaeological site in the West Mouth of the Great Cave of Niah, Sarawak. Strong spatial patterning of sediments and pollen were found, with a zonation related to distance into the cave. Near the cave mouth, sedimentation is silty and derived from waters running down the cliff outside the cave, with leaves from external vegetation. Pollen assemblages are similar to forest floor samples outside the cave, and thus are of airfall or wash origin. In the interior of the West Mouth, sedimentation is highly organic and composed largely of bird droppings. Pollen assemblages in the interior are strongly but regularly biased, with ‘over-representation’ of mangrove and riverine taxa resulting from the recruitment of pollen by bats and swiftlets foraging preferentially in these zones, over 7 and over 2 km from the cave, respectively. The significance of these findings for the understanding of humid tropical cave sequences and particularly for the current reassessment of Niah Cave is discussed.     

Single carcass of Mammuthus primigenius with lithic artifacts in the Upper Pleistocene of northern Italy

This paper presents the find of a Mammuthus primigenius carcass and associated Mousterian implements from the Last Glacial site of Asolo, in north-eastern Italy. We review the exploitation of proboscidean carcasses at Lower and Middle Paleolithic sites of Africa, Europe and the Levant, including evidence of elephant killing, and summarize recent research on hafting and use of Mousterian points as spearheads already before the end of the Middle Pleistocene. The bones and implements from Asolo are described in detail; we provide information on other Italian sites with mammoth remains and on the Mousterian record of the north-eastern quadrant of the peninsula. A possible impact fracture has been detected on a Levallois point from Asolo; its interpretation is based on comparisons to similar scars found on spear points of verified function from archaeological sites of later age, and on experimental material. We conclude that the evidence of Asolo is consistent with information from a number of Western European sites supporting a picture of Neanderthals as capable hunters of large game, such as woolly mammoth.     

Shell tool use by early members of Homo erectus in Sangiran,central Java,Indonesia: cut mark evidence

Sangiran has been known as a source of fossil Homo erectus but is better known for the absence of archaeological tools. Cut mark analysis of Pleistocene mammalian fossils documents 18 cut marks inflicted by tools of thick clamshell flakes on two bovid bones created during butchery at the Pucangan Formation in Sangiran between 1.6 and 1.5 million years ago. These cut marks document the use of the first tools in Sangiran and the oldest evidence of shell tool use in the world.