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THE CANADIAN FIELD-NATURALIST 





VOL. XXXIII. 



OCTOBER, 1919. 



No. 4. 



ARCH.^OLOGY AS AN AID TO ZOOLOGY.* 



By W. J. WiNTEMBERG. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The important bearing of palaeontology on 

 zoology has long been recognized by zoologists, but 

 it IS not so generally known that archaeology also 

 can give valurole aid to zoology. To the arch- 

 aeologist, however, the saving of the bones and 

 shells of animals found in the course of his ex 

 plorations of the graves, mounds, shell-heaps and 

 village sites of prehistoric man, is important prin- 

 cipally because it is by means of them that he 

 learns something of the kinds of animals used for 

 food, and what animal bones were used as material 

 for artifacts, by prehistoric people. For a long 

 time some archaeologists did not seem to see any 

 further use for such findings, but all now realize 

 how important it is for them to collect all bones 

 of animals, not only for their own purposes, but for 

 the zoologist's also. So much of the earlier arch- 

 aeological exploration, too, was conducted in a 

 prefunctory manner with a view more to secure 

 rarities than anything else. To the mere relic 

 seeker, especially, animal bones are useless rub- 

 bish, and it is surprising that even those from whom 

 better work could have been expected seldom col- 

 lected these bones unless they showed evidence of 

 workmanship. 



In nearly every prehistoric site explored by the 

 archaeologist animal bones and shells are more or 

 less numerous, but they are found less frequently 

 in graves and mounds. The Roebuck prehistoric 

 village site, near Prescott, Ontario, explored by the 

 writer for the Geological Survey, Canada, in 1912 

 and 1915, yielded a large number of shells of fresh- 

 water clams and animal bones, of which about six 

 barrels were collected. From the Baum village 

 site, in Ross county, Ohio, twenty barrels full of 

 bones were sent to the museum of the Ohio Arch- 

 teological and Historical Society in Columbus. One 

 can get an idea from this of the large accumula- 

 tions of shells and bones sometimes found. 



*Besicle.s tho.se whose help i.s acknowiedged in 

 the text, grateful acknowledgments are here ten- 

 dered to all others who kindly supplied me with 

 information. 



The bones of nearly all the larger animals used 

 as food are found. The presence of the smaller 

 birds and such animals as mice, shrews, moles, and 

 bats, which were probably not used as food at all, 

 IS most often not due to human agency, especially 

 when the entire skeletons are present. Mere ab- 

 sence of the bones of a certain animal from shell or 

 refuse heaps, however, does not necessarily mean 

 that its flesh was excluded from the aboriginal 

 menu. Its bones may have been so small as to 

 disappear, or they may have been gnawed to pieces 

 by the aboriginal dog. Some taboo prohibiting the 

 eating of the flesh of certain species may account 

 for the absence of the bones of other animals. 



Some of the bones may owe their preservation 

 to the fact that they were buried in refuse heaps 

 composed mainly of wood ashes. Another factor 

 which probably accounts for the excellent preserva- 

 tion of some is that most of them had been boiled 

 with the meat on them, thus possibly eliminating 

 nearly all the animal matter which might cause 

 decay. A few owe their preservation to partial 

 carbonization. The shells of fresh-water clams 

 found in the refuse in some places are invariably 

 fresh looking with the epidermis intact and the in- 

 side surface still retaining its pearly lustre. 



One has to contend with several difficulties in 

 determining the species of animals to which many 

 of these bones belonged. Many of them have 

 been reduced to indeterminate fragments, possibly 

 in order to extract the marrow and also to make 

 them of a size small enough to go into cooking 

 pots. Others have been fashioned into various im- 

 plements and ornaments; although as in the case 

 of awls, enough of the original shape of the bone 

 sometimes remains to enable one to identify the 

 species of animal to which it belonged. 



As to the probable age of the sites where these 

 bones are found, it will perhaps be unnecessary to 

 say that where no relics of the white man occur, 

 they may be all the way from three hundred to five 

 hundred and perhaps more years old. Algonkian 

 sites in Ontario, and probably in central New York 



