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Why Zooarchaeology Should Not Be the Neglected Step-Child of Archaeology and Zoology

By: David R. Lipovitch

, or animal bone archaeology, is a relatively new sub-field of archaeology. While some work was done as early as the 1870s in trying to understand the role animals played in Near Eastern societies, zooarchaeology did not really reach fruition until the 1960s and ‘70s. This stemmed primarily from attempts among anthropologically oriented archaeologists in the New World to create a more scientific discipline. One of the areas that proved most successful was in addressing animal remains. Previously, animal bones found on Near Eastern archaeological sites were often simply discarded as background noise, but, with capable and interested specialists identifying these remains, dig directors began to keep some (although rarely all) bones for study.

In its earliest stages in the Near East, zooarchaeology was aimed largely at the question of the first domestication of the animals that form the basis for the general Near Eastern way of life. Many of the early practitioners such as Sándor Bökönyi and Juliet Clutton-Brock were trained as zoologists, biologists, veterinarians, or even medical doctors.

They were reliant on the field archaeologists for contextual information and operated solely as specialists identifying animal remains. While this early generation of specialists were simply interested in the bones and not the context, almost all zooarchaeologists today are trained in archaeology. But thanks to the work of these pioneers, the earliest examples of dog, sheep, goat, cow, pig, and camel domestication were identified.

Beyond identifying early domesticates, it was also recognized that zooarchaeology could tell us something about general lifeways. Zooarchaeologists could identify the species that were hunted by prehistoric hunter-gatherers and even tell what time of year they were killed. By looking at pastoralists, we could examine bones and identify what species were being raised as the basis of their economy. But for the most part, when it came to historical periods, zooarchaeology was often relegated to creating the laundry list of species that were common for almost all Near Eastern sites: they had sheep/goats and cows and either they did, or did not, have pigs.

Zooarchaeologists became to many project directors, as the late Brian Hesse put it, little more than talismans – “visible indications of a research project’s participation in scientific archaeology, even when, on closer examinations, it is not clear how the excavators expect to incorporate the biological data into their general accounts of the results of excavation.” This was a terrible waste of a valuable resource, given that animal bone is typically the second largest category of finds after potsherds on Near Eastern sites and can easily number into the hundreds of thousands to millions of fragments on a large site.

Zooarchaeology can contribute far more to our understanding of past societies than just identifying the presence or absence in prehistoric sites of domesticated animals, and laundry lists of species at historical sites. It can instead be used to address important questions that are often difficult to answer through other means. Based primarily upon my own work in Israel and Turkey, I will illustrate how zooarchaeology can provide insights into five of these questions; site function, ethnicity, cult practices, historical change, and site formation processes.

For example, it is often difficult to recognize the function of a site or a part of a site based solely on the architecture, pottery, and small finds. Animal remains can be very useful in this regard. In the case of many prehistoric sites, they can identify whether a site is hunting or fishing camp or an early agriculturalist’s home. On a historic site, such as Achaemenid Period Ashkelon in coastal Israel, one can examine animal species at the site and potentially recognize the existence of a military garrison based on the presence of higher than normal amounts of game animals. Similarly, exotic species left as offerings, such as the fragmentary lion remains discovered at Iron Age Tell Ta’yinat in southern Turkey, may be evidence for the presence of a temple.

Within a site it also may be possible to identify areas for food preparation, as opposed to areas for butchery or food consumption, by examining the different proportions of various body parts to each other. Bill Grantham’s work examining animal part use in the cuisine Golan Heights Druze was a particularly useful first step in studying ancient cuisine and culinary practice and how it might be represented archaeologically. By living and dining with the Druze, Grantham identified which body parts (and by extension which cuts of meat) were used by in food preparation (but not served to the diner, e.g., long bones) and which were food consumption debris (and served on the bone, e.g., heads and ribs).

Identifying ancient ethnic groups at a site is a notoriously difficult question and some argue that it not even possible. Much of what archaeologists have examined in the past was based on the faulty argument that “pots are people” and looked largely at decorative styles to identify ethnic groups. But animal remains, the second most common class of archaeological data, may reflect religious taboos such as the non-consumption of pork seen at Israelite sites in contrast to Philistine sites where pork is prevalent. It may also be possible to identify ethnic cuisines archaeologically. As intrusive populations assimilate, cuisine often remains conservative. For example, uniquely ethnic dishes may be reflected in the consumption of dog meat found at Mycenaean sites, both in Greece and at Tell Ta’yinat. At the latter, other artifactual evidence (including ceramics and Aegean style “spool weights” for looms) also suggests the presence of Sea Peoples originally hailing from the Mycenaean world. Also typical of Mycenaean cuisine is a high consumption of beef and significant amounts of pork, both of which are also found in the earliest Iron Age levels at Tell Ta’yinat.

Religious practices are also notoriously difficult to study archaeologically, but animal remains can help identify sacrificial material by looking at preferences for one portion of the animal over another or the presence or absence of certain elements. Food offerings are also common in mortuary contexts and changing attitudes about death and burial may be reflected in animal remains associated with graves. For example, this was seen in the changing quality, quantity, and diversity of offerings made during the Middle through Late Bronze Ages at the Ashkelon necropolis.

In some cases, it may also be possible to use animal remains to correlate finds with historical events. During the Achaemenid Period at Ashkelon, there are important changes in the nature and quality of the diet represented by animal bones. Periods of economic prosperity and hardship may be identified by the presence of animal species; for example, more goats and game animals might reflect economic hardship, as do choices of meat cuts, where foreleg cuts are generally considered of poorer value than hindlimb cuts. These fluctuations can then be synchronized with known historical events to tighten site chronologies.

Finally, one of the most overlooked contributions made by zooarchaeology are analyses of site formation processes and archaeological collection strategies. By examining the ratios of unidentifiable scrap to large bone fragments, the percentage of small and fragile fish bones recovered, and the percentage of identifiable fragments from a specific context, one can recognize which of these are either poorly preserved or being poorly collected. Close examination of what elements are represented — and more importantly, which are not (for instance, the spongy ends of large longbones) – one can recognize the effects of carnivores and scavengers, such as stray dogs, on a context. The presence of significant numbers of teeth and small stone-sized fragments of bone such as astragali (“knuckle bones”), carpals, and tarsals in the absence of identifiable longbone ends may suggest that a context contains water-deposited wash rather than human-deposited remains. Animal remains can also be used to recognize site abandonment.

The ability of zooarchaeology to illuminate these five big-picture questions alongside others such as seasonality studies, based on examining such criteria as tooth wear, and climatic reconstruction, using the presence of micro-fauna or seasonal fish, should make it clear that zooarchaeology is indispensable and should be treated with as much respect as pottery studies and stratigraphic analyses. Project directors need to recognize the importance of zooarchaeology to a proper understanding of their sites. Very few projects integrate zooarchaeology from the bottom up within their staff structures, enabling them to have a voice in the actual excavation of remains in the field. Most projects, even today, simply marginalise or ignore them. While most projects would not baulk at hiring a photographer or a conservator, zooarchaeologists are often missing from the staff of projects, or are only available part-time based on the limits of funding.

While I have been fortunate to be employed at two sites – Ashkelon and Tayinat – that recognize the importance of zooarchaeology, many sites use less experienced students since they are more cost effective (and sometimes free), or simply do without and hope that at some later date some student will pick up and analyze their collection sitting in storage somewhere. Furthermore, even when zooarchaeologists are taken seriously as specialists in identifying animal remains, it is often forgotten that most current zooarchaeologists are equally as well trained as “field” archaeologists.

Even in the Twenty-First Century a general lack of awareness of the potential of zooarchaeology still leaves some of us feeling like the neglected stepchild who is sometimes tolerated as a necessity but rarely welcomed. If Near Eastern archaeology is to live up to its potential , project directors must universally come to recognize that zooarchaeologists are a necessary – and worthwhile – expense for all modern projects. By embracing zooarchaeology and recognizing the necessity of all excavations to have at least one zooarchaeologist on staff at all times, Near Eastern archaeology can only improve and begin to tackle more significant issues than just artifact typologies and chronologies.

David Lipovitch is Research Affiliate at University of Toronto and Senior Zooarchaeologist for the Tayinat Archaeological Project of the University of Toronto.