Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-mp689 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T08:00:42.580Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The origins and spread of stock-keeping: the role of cultural and environmental influences on early Neolithic animal exploitation in Europe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 November 2013

Katie Manning ,
Sean S. Downey ,
Sue Colledge ,
James Conolly ,
Barbara Stopp ,
Keith Dobney  and
Stephen Shennan
Katie Manning
Affiliation:
1Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY, UK
Sean S. Downey
Affiliation:
1Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY, UK
Sue Colledge
Affiliation:
1Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY, UK
James Conolly
Affiliation:
2Department of Anthropology, Trent University, Peterborough, ON, K9J 7B8, Canada
Barbara Stopp
Affiliation:
3Institut für Prähistorische und Naturwissenschaftliche Archäologie (IPNA), Spalenring 145, CH-4055 Basel, Switzerland
Keith Dobney
Affiliation:
4Department of Archaeology, University of Aberdeen, St Mary's, Elphinstone Road, Aberdeen AB24 3UF, UK
Stephen Shennan
Affiliation:
1Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY, UK
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

It has long been recognised that the proportions of Neolithic domestic animal species—cattle, pig and sheep/goat—vary from region to region, but it has hitherto been unclear how much this variability is related to cultural practices or to environmental constraints. This study uses hundreds of faunal assemblages from across Neolithic Europe to reveal the distribution of animal use between north and south, east and west. The remarkable results present us with a geography of Neolithic animal society—from the rabbit-loving Mediterranean to the beef-eaters of the north and west. They also demonstrate that the choices made by early Neolithic herders were largely determined by their environments. Cultural links appear to have played only a minor role in the species composition of early Neolithic animal societies.

Keywords

EuropeNeolithiczooarchaeologyherding strategiesfood production systems
Type
Research articles
Information
Antiquity , Volume 87 , Issue 338 , December 2013 , pp. 1046 - 1059
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 2013

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

Arbogast, R.-M., Jeunesse, C. & Schibler, J. (ed.). 2001. Rôle et Statut de la Chasse dans le Néolithique ancien danubien (5500-4900 av. J.-C.) (Internationale Archäologie 1). Rahden:Marie Leidorf.Google Scholar
Berger, J.-F. 2005. Sédiments, dynamique du peuplement et climat au Néolithique ancien, in Guilaine, J. (ed.) Populations néolithiques et environnements: 155–212. Paris: Errance.Google Scholar
Binder, D., Jallot, L. & ThiÉBault., S. 2002. Fiche 9: les occupations néolithiques des Petites-Bâties (Lamotte-du-Rhône, Vaucluse), in Association pour la Recherche Archéologique en Languedoc Oriental (ed.) Archéologie du TGV Méditerranée. Fiches de synthèse. Tome 1. La Préhistoire (Monographies d'Archéologie Mediterranéenne 8): 103-22. Lattes:CNRS.Google Scholar
Bocquet-Appel, J.-P. & Bar-Yosef, O. (ed.). 2008. The Neolithic demographic transition and its consequences. New York: Springer.Google Scholar
Bonsall, C., Macklin, M., Anderson, D.E. & Payton, R.W.. 2002. Climate change and the adoption of agriculture in northwest Europe. European Journal of Archaeology 5: 9–23.Google Scholar
Cappers, R.T.J. & Raemaekers, D.C.M.. 2008. Cereal cultivation at Swifterbant? Neolithic wetland farming on the North European plain. Current Anthropology 49: 385–402.Google Scholar
Collard, M., Edinborough, K., Shennan, S. & Thomas, M.G.. 2010. Radiocarbon evidence indicates that migrants introduced farming to Britain. Journal of Archaeological Science 37: 866-70.Google Scholar
Colledge, S., Conolly, J. & Shennan, S.. 2005. The evolution of Neolithic farming from SW Asian origins to NW European limits. European Journal of Archaeology 8: 137-56.Google Scholar
Conolly, J., Colledge, S.Dobney, K.Vigne, J.-D.Peters, J.Stopp, B.Manning, K. & Shennan, S.. 2011. Meta-analysis of zooarchaeological data from SW Asia and SE Europe provides insight into the origins and spread of animal husbandry. Journal of Archaeological Science 38: 538-45.Google Scholar
Conolly, J., Manning, K., Colledge, S.Dobney, K. & Shennan, S.. 2012. Species distribution modelling of ancient cattle from early Neolithic sites in SW Asia and Europe. The Holocene 22: 997–1010.Google Scholar
Coward, F., Shennan, S.Colledge, S.Conolly, J. & Collard, M.. 2008. The spread of Neolithic plant economies from the Near East to northwest Europe: a phylogenetic analysis. Journal of Archaeological Science 35: 42–56.Google Scholar
Crawley, M.J. 2005. Statistics: an introduction using R. Chichester: Wiley.Google Scholar
Cymbron, T., Freeman, A.R.Malheiro, M.I.Vigne, J.-D. & Bradley, D.G.. 2005. Microsatellite diversity suggests different histories for Mediterranean and northern European cattle populations. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 272: 1837-43.Google Scholar
De Jager, A.L. & Vogt, J.V.. 2010. Development and demonstration of a structured hydrological feature coding system for Europe. Hydrological Sciences Journal 55: 661-75.Google Scholar
Dohle, H.-J. 1993. Haustierhaltung und Jagd in der Linienbandkeramik: ein Ü berblick. Zeitschrift fur Archäologie 27: 105-24.Google Scholar
Dohle, H.-J. 1997. Husbandry and hunting in the Neolithic of central Germany. Anthropozoologica 25/26: 441-48.Google Scholar
ESRI Environmental Systems Resource Institute. 2009. ArcMap 9.2. Redlands (CA): ESRGoogle Scholar
Euroevol, . n.d. The cultural evolution of Neolithic Europe. Available at: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/euroevol/EUROEVOL/Home.html (accessed 17 December 2012).Google Scholar
Harman, M. 2009. The animal bones, in Ritchie, A. (ed.) On the fringe of Neolithic Europe: 48–59. Edinburgh: Society of Antiquaries of Scotland.Google Scholar
Hijmans, R.J., Cameron, S.E.Parra, J.L.Jones, P.G. & Jarvis, A.. 2005. Very high resolution interpolated climate surfaces for global land areas. International Journal of Climatology 25: 1965-78.Google Scholar
Legendre, P. & Legendre, L.. 1998. Numerical ecology. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Manning, K., Stopp, B., Colledge, S., Downey, S.Conolly, J.Dobney, K. & Shennan, S.. 2013. Animal exploitation in the early Neolithic of the Balkans and central Europe, in Colledge, S., Conolly, J., Dobney, K., Manning, K. & Shennan, S. (ed.) The origins and spread of domestic animals in southwest Asia and Europe: 237-52. Walnut Creek (CA): Left Coast.Google Scholar
Mccormick, F. 1984. Large mammal bone, in N. Sharples (ed.) Excavations at Pierowall Quarry, Westray, Orkney. Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 114 108-11.Google Scholar
Perrin, T. 2008. La néolithisation de la vallée du Rhône et de ses marges, in Grimaldi, S. & Perrin, T. (ed.) Mountain environments in prehistoric Europe: settlement and mobility strategies from the Palaeolithic to the Early Bronze Age (British Archaeological Reports international series 1885): 121-30. Oxford: Archaeopress.Google Scholar
R Development Core Team. 2011. R: a language and environment for statistical computing. Vienna: R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Available at: http://www.R-project.org/ (accessed 3 July 2012).Google Scholar
Rowley-Conwy, P., Gourichon, L., Helmer, D. & Vigne, J.-D.. 2013. Early domestic animals in Italy, Istria, the Tyrrhenian Islands, and southern France, in Colledge, S., Conolly, J., Dobney, K., Manning, K. & Shennan, S. (ed.) The origins and spread of domestic animals in southwest Asia and Europe: 283–311. Walnut Creek (CA): Left Coast.Google Scholar
Schibler, J. & Jacomet, S.. 2010. Short climatic fluctuations and their impact on human economies and societies: the potential of Neolithic lake shore settlements in the Alpine foreland. Environmental Archaeology 15(2):61–70.Google Scholar
Schulting, R. 2013. On the northwestern fringes: earlier Neolithic subsistence in Britain and Ireland as seen through faunal remains and stable isotopes, in Colledge, S., Conolly, J., Dobney, K., Manning, K. & Shennan, S. (ed.) The origins and spread of domestic animals in southwest Asia and Europe: 313-38. Walnut Creek (CA): Left Coast.Google Scholar
Tresset, A. & Vigne, J.-D.. 2001. La Chasse, principal élément structurant la diversité des faunes archéologiques du Néolithique ancien, en Europe tempérée comme en Méditerranée, in Arbogast, R.-M., Jeunesse, C. & Schibler, J. (ed.) Rôle et Statut de la Chasse dans le Néolithique ancien danubien (5500-4900 av. J.-C.) (Internationale Archäologie 1): 129-51. Rahden: Marie LeidorfGoogle Scholar
Tresset, A. 2007. Substitution of species, techniques and symbols at the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in western Europe. Proceedings of the British Academy 144: 189–210.Google Scholar
Vigne, J.-D. 2008. Zooarchaeological aspects of the Neolithic diet transition in the Near East and Europe, and their putative relationships with the Neolithic demographic transition, in Bocquet-Appel, J.-P. & Bar-Yosef, O. (ed.) The Neolithic demographic transition and its consequences: 179–205. New York: Springer.Google Scholar