Alan K. Outram

The Earliest Horse Harnessing and Milking

Horse domestication revolutionized transport, communications, and warfare in prehistory, yet the identification of early domestication processes has been problematic. Here, we present three independent lines of evidence demonstrating domestication in the Eneolithic Botai Culture of Kazakhstan, dating to about 3500 B.C.E. Metrical analysis of horse metacarpals shows that Botai horses resemble Bronze Age domestic horses rather than Paleolithic wild horses from the same region. Pathological characteristics indicate that some Botai horses were bridled, perhaps ridden. Organic residue analysis, using δ13C and δD values of fatty acids, reveals processing of mares milk and carcass products in ceramics, indicating a developed domestic economy encompassing secondary products.

Introduction to experimental archaeology

If one takes a scientific and ‘positivist’ view (Popper 1959), then experimentation is part of a ‘hypothetico-deductive’ process. A hypothesis is formulated and then tested to see if it can be ‘falsified’. If falsified then that hypothesis must be discarded and replaced with a new, hopefully better one, which will, itself, then be tested. If a hypothesis resists falsification, and is supported by experimentation, it can be regarded as valid. ‘Valid’, in this sense, does not mean ‘true’, but merely that the principles behind the hypothesis can continue to be used until falsified and replaced by a better set of principles. An experimental, positivist approach can escape the shackles of simple historicism and empiricism, because it allows one to move beyond the limited range of options made available by records of the currently known world. It allows investigation of the counterintuitive and for the possibility of deductive leaps, rather than simply relying upon probabilistic and inductive extrapolations of existing knowledge. Positivism is still the underlying philosophy of modern science. While Kuhn (1962) very clearly outlined his view of how science really works in the fallible and often prejudiced world of human scientists, his critique was not so much a direct challenge to Popper’s ideals, but more of a reality check. Experimentation remains a method that clearly sits within the realms of science. The postmodernist attack on science and method (e.g. Feyerabend 1975) presented instead a philosophy of ‘anything goes’, and gave no special place to testing hypotheses though experimentation. This is not the place to debate, in depth, the nature of the postmodern or post-processual challenge to science, but the reader should note that this volume presents experimental archaeology as a scientific research method. As such, while it is accepted that other theoretical viewpoints will interpret the experiences of experimenters differently, this volume does not take an ‘anything goes’ approach to the topic, but it does investigate a range of styles and approaches to experimental archaeology as science. Having put forward a definition of experimentation, however, it is still not entirely clear what ‘experimental archaeology’ exactly means. If experiment is the mainstay of modern science, then, strictly speaking, is there really any difference between ‘experimental archaeology’ and ‘archaeological science’? Readers of key works dating to when the term ‘experimental archaeology’ was first coming into common parlance (e.g. Coles 1973, 1979;

Fragmentation: The Zonation Method Applied to Fragmented Human Remains from Archaeological and Forensic Contexts

Abstract Scattered and commingled human and animal remains are commonly encountered on archaeological sites, and this contextual relationship begs the question of whether human and animals were treated in a similar manner before burial. The recording system presented here provides a means by which to confront problems of equifinality – that is, when taphonomic alterations create apparently similar patterns and, therefore, confuse behavioural inferences drawn from them. This method hinges on a standardised representation of the zones on human skeletal elements that allow comparison with those described by Dobney and Rielly (1988) for animal remains. It is anticipated that the anatomical descriptions in combination with the zone drawings presented will aid others to apply the method generally across skeletal assemblages of any date. This system could also be used to aid the curation of museum collections and as a complement to forensic recovery.

Widespread exploitation of the honeybee by early neolithic farmers

The pressures on honeybee (Apis mellifera) populations, resulting from threats by modern pesticides, parasites, predators and diseases, have raised awareness of the economic importance and critical role this insect plays in agricultural societies across the globe. However, the association of humans with A. mellifera predates post-industrial-revolution agriculture, as evidenced by the widespread presence of ancient Egyptian bee iconography dating to the Old Kingdom (approximately 2400 bc). There are also indications of Stone Age people harvesting bee products; for example, honey hunting is interpreted from rock art in a prehistoric Holocene context and a beeswax find in a pre-agriculturalist site. However, when and where the regular association of A. mellifera with agriculturalists emerged is unknown. One of the major products of A. mellifera is beeswax, which is composed of a complex suite of lipids including n-alkanes, n-alkanoic acids and fatty acyl wax esters. The composition is highly constant as it is determined genetically through the insect’s biochemistry. Thus, the chemical ‘fingerprint’ of beeswax provides a reliable basis for detecting this commodity in organic residues preserved at archaeological sites, which we now use to trace the exploitation by humans of A. mellifera temporally and spatially. Here we present secure identifications of beeswax in lipid residues preserved in pottery vessels of Neolithic Old World farmers. The geographical range of bee product exploitation is traced in Neolithic Europe, the Near East and North Africa, providing the palaeoecological range of honeybees during prehistory. Temporally, we demonstrate that bee products were exploited continuously, and probably extensively in some regions, at least from the seventh millennium cal bc, likely fulfilling a variety of technological and cultural functions. The close association of A. mellifera with Neolithic farming communities dates to the early onset of agriculture and may provide evidence for the beginnings of a domestication process.

Comparing levels of subsistence stress amongst Norse settlers in Iceland and Greenland using levels of bone fat exploitation as an indicator

Abstract The background to the Icelandic and Greenlandic sites under investigation is outlined and prior work on the Norse economies of the two islands is discussed. The importance of fat in the diet and the use of levels of bone marrow and grease exploitation as an indicator of subsistence stress are explained. The methodology for establishing levels of bone fat exploitation is outlined. This methodology involves the detailed study of fragmentation levels of different types of bone, study of bone fracture types and many other taphonomic indicators. The results of the study are described and discussed. On Greenland, the Norse inhabitants exploited almost all available fat from land mammal bones, leaving only the ribs. It is argued that this indicates a severe level of subsistence stress amongst the Greenlanders that is most likely related to a seasonal dearth in resources. On Iceland, whilst a certain amount of bone marrow is almost certainly exploited, the settlers appear to almost totally ignore the potential to exploit bone grease. This is likely to be indicative of a much more healthy subsistence economy than on Greenland. These results are discussed in relation to differing climate, availability of good soil, fishing practices and seasonal rounds.

Horses for the dead: funerary foodways in Bronze Age Kazakhstan

The authors examine the role of horses as expressed in assemblages from settlement sites and cemeteries between the Eneolithic and the Bronze Age in Kazakhstan. In this land, known for its rich association with horses, the skeletal evidence appears to indicate a fading of ritual interest. But thats not the whole story, and once again micro-archaeology reveals the true balance. The horses are present at the funeral, but now as meat for the pot, detected in bone fragments and lipids in the pot walls.

A Chronology of Bone Marrow and Bone Grease Exploitation at the Mitchell Prehistoric Indian Village

Abstract Bone marrow and bone grease processing at the Mitchell Prehistoric Indian Village (39DV2) has long been suspected but was only recently demonstrated scientifically. The current research details the analysis of fragmented bone assemblages from different points in the chronological sequence of the Mitchell site and establishes the presence of extensive bone marrow processing activities throughout the cultural occupation of the village. This work additionally details the development of an increasingly extensive bone grease processing industry during the middle and latter periods of human occupation at the site.

A bone grease processing station at the Mitchell Prehistoric Indian Village: archaeological evidence for the exploitation of bone fats

Abstract Recent excavations at the Mitchell Prehistoric Indian Village, an Initial Middle Missouri site in Mitchell, South Dakota have revealed a large, clay-lined feature filled with fractured and fragmented bison bones. Fracture and fragmentation analysis, along with taphonomic evidence, suggests that the bones preserved within the feature represent evidence of prehistoric bone marrow and bone grease exploitation. Further, the character of the feature suggests that it served as a bone grease processing station. Bone fat exploitation is an activity that is frequently cited as a causal explanation for the nature of many fractured and fragmented bone assemblages in prehistory, and zooarchaeological assemblages have frequently been studied as evidence of bone fat exploitation. The Mitchell example provides some of the first direct, in-situ archaeological evidence of a bone grease processing feature, and this interpretation is sustained by substantial analytical evidence suggesting bone fat exploitation. This new evidence provides a clearer concept of the nature of bone fat exploitation in prehistory as well as an indication of the scale and degree to which bone grease exploitation occurred at the Mitchell site. Finally, this research demonstrates the importance of careful zooarchaeological and taphonomic analysis for the interpretation of both artifactual remains as well as archaeological features.

Ancient genomes revisit the ancestry of domestic and Przewalski’s horses

Revisiting the origins of modern horses The domestication of horses was very important in the history of humankind. However, the ancestry of modern horses and the location and timing of their emergence remain unclear. Gaunitz et al. generated 42 ancient-horse genomes. Their source samples included the Botai archaeological site in Central Asia, considered to include the earliest domesticated horses. Unexpectedly, Botai horses were the ancestors not of modern domestic horses, but rather of modern Przewalskis horses. Thus, in contrast to current thinking on horse domestication, modern horses may have been domesticated in other, more Western, centers of origin. Science, this issue p. 111 The earliest herded horses were ancestors of feral Przewalski’s horses but not of modern domesticated horses. The Eneolithic Botai culture of the Central Asian steppes provides the earliest archaeological evidence for horse husbandry, ~5500 years ago, but the exact nature of early horse domestication remains controversial. We generated 42 ancient-horse genomes, including 20 from Botai. Compared to 46 published ancient- and modern-horse genomes, our data indicate that Przewalski’s horses are the feral descendants of horses herded at Botai and not truly wild horses. All domestic horses dated from ~4000 years ago to present only show ~2.7% of Botai-related ancestry. This indicates that a massive genomic turnover underpins the expansion of the horse stock that gave rise to modern domesticates, which coincides with large-scale human population expansions during the Early Bronze Age.

Palaeodiet and beyond: stable isotopes in bioarchaeology

Stable isotope analysis arguably constitutes a third ‘isotope revolution’ comparable in impact to the advent of radiocarbon dating and of calibration curves in archaeology (cf. Renfrew 1973). It enabled for the first time direct estimation of the proportions of different dietary inputs (e.g. marine versus terrestrial; C3 versus C4 plants), allowed study of individual diets and intracommunity variation, and opened the way for assessment of mobility through geospecific isotope ranges (Price et al. 1994; Schoeninger, DeNiro and Tauber 1983; Tauber 1981; Vogel and van der Merwe 1977). Moreover, the stable isotope approach has revolutionized the study of lipid residues, permitting much more specific identification of taxa and fat types, including dairy products (Evershed 2008a, 2008b). So fundamental has been the impact of the stable isotope approach in bioarchaeology that it has become a separate sub-discipline with its own scholarly publishing patterns, conferences and graduate programmes. Stable isotope work, of course, also forms part of other allied disciplines (e.g. biochemistry, geochemistry, environmental sciences, geography), and stable isotope specialists working in archaeology are often based in natural and life sciences departments. The surge in archaeological stable isotope research through the 1990s and 2000s was often accompanied by the mantra ‘you are what you eat’ (‘Der Mensch ist was er iβt’. Feuerbach 1850), with an implicit suggestion that isotopic insight into past diet overwrote the more indirect information offered by faunal and floral remains. In isolation, however, the limitations of the stable isotope approach are clear: it provides a ‘broad brush’ picture of diet, and there are significant problems of equifinality. Plant and animal bioarchaeology, on the other hand, identifies a specific set of taxa that were acquired or produced for consumption, while also informing on further aspects of management, processing and deposition, but cannot directly reveal the relative dietary contribution of different sources. The equifinality problem in stable isotope studies is particularly clear when their bioarchaeological context is limited. Instances of high trophic level in human remains from prehistoric central Asia, for example, were broadly interpreted as representing high consumption of freshwater fish (O’Connell, Levine and Hedges 2003), but studies of the faunal and lipid residue evidence – including some recovered using intensive sieving techniques – have failed to confirm significant fish consumption (Outram et al. 2012). Instead, a plausible alternative is that high dependence on pastoral products evidenced through faunal and lipid residue analysis explains the trophic signal. Appropriate reference data for such dietary regimes are, however, limited, and further baseline research would be productive (see also below).