Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T11:38:18.996Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Approaches to Faunal Analysis in Archaeology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Patricia Daly*
Affiliation:
Port Washington, New York

Abstract

Analysis of faunal remains from archaeological sites is at least as much an archaeological as a zoological problem since food animal remains are essentially artifactual in nature, their occurrence in deposits being the result of human activity.

This paper examines some of the methods used to make such analyses and suggests the merits and faults of the various approaches. It also suggests some of the kinds of inferences which may be drawn when detailed and careful investigation of faunal material is carried out, preferably by the archaeologist.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1969

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bordaz, Jacques and Bordaz, Victoria 1966 A Critical Examination of Data Processing, with an Evaluation of a New Inverted Data System. American Antiquity, Vol. 31, No. 4, pp. 494501. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Callen, E. O. 1963 Diet as Revealed by Coprolites. In Science in Archaeology, edited by E. S. Higgs and Don Brothwell, pp. 18694. Thames and Hudson, New York.Google Scholar
Clarke, J. G. D. 1954 Excavations at Star Carr. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Cleland, Charles Edward 1966 The Prehistoric Animal Ecology and Ethnozoology of the Upper Great Lakes Region. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cook, S. F. and Treoanza, A. F. 1950 The Quantitative Investigation of Indian Mounds with Special Reference to the Relation of the Physical Components to the Probable Material Culture. University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology, Vol. 40, No. 5, pp. 22362. Berkeley and Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Cornwall, I. W. 1964 Bones for the Archaeologist. Phoenix, London.Google Scholar
Garrod, D. A. E. and Bate, D. M. A. 1937 The Stone Age of Mount Carmel. 2 vols. Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Higgs, E. S. 1964 Sheep in the Iron Age: A Method of Study. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society, Vol. 30, pp. 4236. Gloucester.Google Scholar
Kehoe, T. F. 1967 The Boarding School Bison Drive Site. Plains Anthropologist, Memoir 4, Vol. 12, No. 35, p. 165. Lincoln.Google Scholar
Olsen, S. J. 1961 The Relative Value of Fragmentary Mammalian Remains. American Antiquity, Vol. 26, No. 4, pp. 53840. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olsen, S. J. 1964 Mammal Remains from Archaeological Sites. Part 1, Southwestern and Southeastern United States. Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Vol. 54, No. 1. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Olsen, S. J. 1967 A Note in Regard to Osteological Field Manuals. American Antiquity, Vol. 32, No. 2, p. 231. Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Perkins, Dexter Jr. 1964 The Prehistoric Fauna from Shanidar, Iraq. Science, No. 3626, pp. 15656. Washington.Google Scholar
Perkins, Dexter Jr., and Daly, Patricia 1968 The Potential of Faunal Analysis. An Investigation of the Faunal Remains from Suberde, Turkey. Scientific American, Vol. 219, No. 5, pp. 96106. New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reed, C. A. 1961 Osteological Evidences for Prehistoric Domestication in South West Asia. Zeitschrift fur. Tierrzüchtung und Züchtungsbiologie, Band 76, Heft 1, pp. 318. Hamburg.Google Scholar
Reed, C. A. 1963 Osteo-archaeology. In Science in Archaeology, edited by E. S. Higgs and Don Brothwell, pp. 20416. Thames and Hudson, New York.Google Scholar
Reed, C. A. and Braidwood, Robert 1960 The Environmental Sequence in Northeastern Iraq. In Explorations in Iraqi Kurdistan, edited by R. J. Braidwood and B. Howe, pp. 16375. Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, Chicago.Google Scholar
Rust, A. 1943 Die Alte und Mittelsteinzeit lichen Funde von Stellmoor. Neüminster.Google Scholar
Salwen, Bert 1968 Cultural Inferences from Faunal Remains: Three Examples from North East Coastal Sites. Pennsylvania Archaeologist. Milton, (in press)Google Scholar
Severinghaus, C. W. 1949 Tooth Development and Wear as a Criteria of Age in White Tail Deer. Journal of Wildlife Management, Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 195216. Washington.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wheat, Joe Ben 1967 A Paleo-Indian Bison Kill Site. Scientific American, Vol. 216, pp. 4452. New York.Google Scholar
White, T. E. 1953 A Method of Calculating the Dietary Percentage of Various Food Animals Utilized by Various Aboriginal Peoples. American Antiquity, Vol. 18, No. 4, pp. 3968. Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
White, T. E. 1955 Observations on the Butchering Techniques of Some Aboriginal Peoples Numbers 7, 8, and 9. American Antiquity, Vol. 21, No. 2, pp. 1708. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
White, T. E. 1956 The Study of Osteological Materials in the Plains. American Antiquity, Vol. 21, No. 4, pp. 40104. Salt Lake City.CrossRefGoogle Scholar