Rick Schulting

Mitochondrial DNA analysis shows a Near Eastern Neolithic origin for domestic cattle and no indication of domestication of European aurochs.

The extinct aurochs (Bos primigenius primigenius) was a large type of cattle that ranged over almost the whole Eurasian continent. The aurochs is the wild progenitor of modern cattle, but it is unclear whether European aurochs contributed to this process. To provide new insights into the demographic history of aurochs and domestic cattle, we have generated high-confidence mitochondrial DNA sequences from 59 archaeological skeletal finds, which were attributed to wild European cattle populations based on their chronological date and/or morphology. All pre-Neolithic aurochs belonged to the previously designated P haplogroup, indicating that this represents the Late Glacial Central European signature. We also report one new and highly divergent haplotype in a Neolithic aurochs sample from Germany, which points to greater variability during the Pleistocene. Furthermore, the Neolithic and Bronze Age samples that were classified with confidence as European aurochs using morphological criteria all carry P haplotype mitochondrial DNA, suggesting continuity of Late Glacial and Early Holocene aurochs populations in Europe. Bayesian analysis indicates that recent population growth gives a significantly better fit to our data than a constant-sized population, an observation consistent with a postglacial expansion scenario, possibly from a single European refugial population. Previous work has shown that most ancient and modern European domestic cattle carry haplotypes previously designated T. This, in combination with our new finding of a T haplotype in a very Early Neolithic site in Syria, lends persuasive support to a scenario whereby gracile Near Eastern domestic populations, carrying predominantly T haplotypes, replaced P haplotype-carrying robust autochthonous aurochs populations in Europe, from the Early Neolithic onward. During the period of coexistence, it appears that domestic cattle were kept separate from wild aurochs and introgression was extremely rare.

The Plateau interaction sphere and late prehistoric cultural complexity

The Plateau culture area of northwestern North America fits the criteria of an interaction sphere. Understanding the general cultural dynamics responsible for the creation of interaction spheres has been poorly developed in archaeological and ethnological theory. Data from the Plateau Interaction Sphere are used to argue that the main factor responsible for the emergence of interaction spheres in transegalitarian societies is the development of an elite class. Elites who seek to maximize their power and wealth at the tribal level do so in part by establishing trading, marriage, ideological, military, and other ties to elites in other communities and regions. They use these ties to monopolize access to desirable regional prestige goods and to enhance their own socioeconomic positions. In conformity with expectations derived from this model, the data from the Plateau demonstrate that interaction sphere goods are predominantly prestige items and that these concentrate in communities that have the greatest potential to produce surplus and to develop socioeconomic inequalities. These same features also seem to characterize well-known interaction spheres elsewhere in the world.

Finding the coastal Mesolithic in southwest Britain: AMS dates and stable isotope results on human remains from Caldey Island, south Wales

The implications of new evidence are presented for the generally high level of marine diet in the coastal Mesolithic populations of Wales. Within these generally high levels, some variations may point to seasonal movement. These data provide a strong contrast with the mainland terrestrial diet of early Neolithic populations in the same area.

Touch not the fish: the Mesolithic-Neolithic change of diet and its significance

Stable isotope analysis has startled the archaeological community by showing a rapid and widespread change from a marine to terrestrial diet (ie from fish to domesticated plants and animals) as people moved from a Mesolithic to a Neolithic culture. This could be a consequence of domestication, or as Julian Thomas (2003) proposed, of a kind of taboo (‘Touch not the fish’). In a key challenge, Nicky Milner and her colleagues (2004) questioned the reality of this nutritional revolution, contrasting the message of the bones and shells found on settlement sites, with the isotope measurements in the bones of people. Here Mike Richards and Rick Schulting, champions of the diet-revolution, strongly reinforce the arguments. The change was real, it seems: so what does it mean? Milner and colleagues respond.

New radiocarbon dates and a review of the chronology of prehistoric populations from the Minusinsk Basin, Southern Siberia, Russia

The results are presented of a new program of radiocarbon dating undertaken on 88 human skeletons. The individuals derived from Eneolithic to Early Iron Age sites?Afanasievo, Okunevo, Andronovo (Fedorovo), Karasuk, and Tagar cultures--in the Minusinsk Basin of Southern Siberia. All the new dates have been acquired from human bone, which is in contrast to some of the previous dates for this region obtained from wood and thus possibly unreliable due to old-wood effects or re-use of the timber. The new data are compared with the existing 14C chronology for the region, thereby enabling a clearer understanding to be gained concerning the chronology of these cultures and their place within the prehistory of the Eurasian steppes.

Building for the Dead: Events, Processes and Changing Worldviews from the Thirty-eighth to the Thirty-fourth Centuries cal. BC in Southern Britain

Our final paper in this series reasserts the importance of sequence. Stressing that long barrows, long cairns and associated structures do not appear to have begun before the thirty-eighth century cal. bc in southern Britain, we give estimates for the relative order of construction and use of the five monuments analysed in this programme. The active histories of monuments appear often to be short, and the numbers in use at any one time may have been relatively low; we discuss time in terms of generations and individual lifespans. The dominant mortuary rite may have been the deposition of articulated remains (though there is much diversity); older or ancestral remains are rarely documented, though reference may have been made to ancestors in other ways, not least through architectural style and notions of the past. We relate these results not only to trajectories of monument development, but also to two models of development in the first centuries of the southern British Neolithic as a whole. In the first, monuments emerge as symptomatic of preeminent groups; in the second model, monuments are put in a more gradualist and episodic timescale and related to changing kinds of self-consciousness (involving senses of self, relations with animals and nature, perceptions of the body, awareness of mortality and attitudes to the past). Both more distant and more recent and familiar possible sources of inspiration for monumentalization are considered, and the diversity of situations in which mounds were constructed is stressed. More detailed Neolithic histories can now begin to be written.

‘In this Chambered Tumulus were Found Cleft Skulls …’: an Assessment of the Evidence for Cranial Trauma in the British Neolithic

Interpersonal violence is a powerful expression of human social interaction. Yet a consideration of violence in the past has done relatively little to inform our discussions of the British Neolithic. Here, we present the results of an examination of some 350 earlier Neolithic crania from mainly southern Britain. Of these, 31 show healed or unhealed injuries suggestive of interpersonal violence. We suggest a conservative estimate of 2% fatal cranial injuries, and 4 or 5% healed injuries. These data are used as a platform to discuss possible contexts for, and consequences of, violence. We argue that, regardless of its actual prevalance, the reality or the threat of interpersonal violence can have an important affect on both the behaviour of individuals and the structure of society.

Holocene environmental change and the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in north-west Europe: revisiting two models

Abstract Two previously proposed models relating the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition to environmental change in north-west Europe are critically re-examined in the light of accumulating palaeoenvironmental data, and a realistic appraisal of spatial and temporal resolution. The first deals with declining marine productivity in the western Baltic, and the other with a proposed shift to drier, more continental conditions across north-west Europe. Both models are found to be unsatisfactory, although the case for southern Scandinavia seems to hold greater potential, at least for this region. Problems arise in the spatial scale over which climate change models are intended to apply, and over poor chronological resolution. Understanding the extent and nature of climate change at the relevant period, c. 6000/5800 cal. BP, is far from straightforward, as is the chain of causality between this and the adoption of mixed farming as a way of life.

Calcined bone provides a reliable substrate for strontium isotope ratios as shown by an enrichment experiment

RATIONALE Strontium isotopes ((87) Sr/(86) Sr) are used in archaeological and forensic science as markers of residence or mobility because they reflect the local geological substrate. Currently, tooth enamel is considered to be the most reliable tissue, but it rarely survives heating so that in cremations only calcined bone fragments survive. We set out to test the proposition that calcined bone might prove resistant to diagenesis, given its relatively high crystallinity, as the ability to measure in vivo (87) Sr/(86) Sr from calcined bone would greatly extend application to places and periods in which cremation was the dominant mortuary practice, or where unburned bone and enamel do not survive. METHODS Tooth enamel and calcined bone samples were exposed to a (87) Sr-spiked solution for up to 1 year. Samples were removed after various intervals, and attempts were made to remove the contamination using acetic acid washes and ultrasonication. (87) Sr/(86) Sr was measured before and after pre-treatment on a Nu Plasma multi-collector induced coupled plasma mass spectrometer using NBS987 as a standard. RESULTS The strontium isotopic ratios of all samples immersed in the spiked solution were strongly modified showing that significant amounts of strontium had been adsorbed or incorporated. After pre-treatment the enamel samples still contained significant amounts of (87) Sr-enriched contamination while the calcined bone fragments did not. CONCLUSIONS The results of the artificial enrichment experiment demonstrate that calcined bone is more resistant to post-mortem exchange than tooth enamel, and that in vivo strontium isotopic ratios are retained in calcined bone.

Patterns of violence-related skull trauma in neolithic southern scandinavia

This article examines evidence for violence as reflected in skull injuries in 378 individuals from Neolithic Denmark and Sweden (3,900-1,700 BC). It is the first large-scale crossregional study of skull trauma in southern Scandinavia, documenting skeletal evidence of violence at a population level. We also investigate the widely assumed hypothesis that Neolithic violence is male-dominated and results in primarily male injuries and fatalities. Considering crude prevalence and prevalence for individual bones of the skull allows for a more comprehensive understanding of interpersonal violence in the region, which is characterized by endemic levels of mostly nonlethal violence that affected both men and women. Crude prevalence for skull trauma reaches 9.4% in the Swedish and 16.9% in the Danish sample, whereas element-based prevalence varies between 6.2% for the right frontal and 0.6% for the left maxilla, with higher figures in the Danish sample. Significantly more males are affected by healed injuries but perimortem injuries affect males and females equally. These results suggest habitual male involvement in nonfatal violence but similar risks for both sexes for sustaining fatal injuries. In the Danish sample, a bias toward front and left-side injuries and right-side injuries in females support this scenario of differential involvement in habitual interpersonal violence, suggesting gendered differences in active engagement in conflict. It highlights the importance of large-scale studies for investigating the scale and context of violence in early agricultural societies, and the existence of varied regional patterns for overall injury prevalence as well as gendered differences in violence-related injuries.