title: Comparison of isotopic variability in proteinaceous tissues of a domesticated herbivore: a baseline for zooarchaeological investigation.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  A variety of metabolic, dietary and climatic influences on isotopic variation have been established in mammalian hair. The relevance of these factors to collagen isotopic composition is unknown, but would be of great interest to zooarchaeological analyses of faunal skeletal tissue.
  
  
  METHODS
  The relationships between carbon (δ(13)C), nitrogen (δ(15)N), non-exchangeable hydrogen (δ(2)H) and oxygen (δ(18)O) values of defatted, demineralised and gelatinised bone collagen and defatted wool keratin from two sheep flocks (n = 20, 5) in the UK were investigated, including testing for the effects of nutritional plane, sex, pregnancy and season of sample collection. The sulfur composition (δ(34)S values) was also investigated for tissues from the smaller flock.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Bulk collagen was enriched in (13)C over bulk keratin by 2.0 - 2.7‰ and in (2)H by 29 - 40‰ but depleted in (18)O relative to keratin by 1.8‰. Differences in δ(15)N values were within experimental error. The collagen samples were generally more enriched in (34)S than keratin, but this was very variable. Pregnancy, sex and season, but not nutritional plane, significantly affected isotope values but did not change overall keratin-collagen relationships.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This dataset provides a baseline measure of variability and comparability for isotopic investigations into origin and husbandry conditions in archaeological sheep tissues, both collagen and keratin.
authors.affiliation: BioArCh, Departments of Archaeology and Chemistry, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK.
authors.forename: I C C
authors.initials: IC
authors.lastname: von Holstein
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hamilton
authors.forename: O E
authors.initials: OE
authors.lastname: Craig
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Newton
authors.forename: M J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Collins
mesh_terms: D000825:Animal Structures / Q000737:chemistry*; D000818:Animals; D000829:Animals, Domestic; D001106:Archaeology; D002247:Carbon Isotopes / Q000032:analysis; D003094:Collagen / Q000737:chemistry*; D003903:Deuterium / Q000032:analysis; D005260:Female; D060434:Herbivory; D006801:Humans; D007633:Keratins / Q000737:chemistry*; D008297:Male; D013058:Mass Spectrometry; D010103:Oxygen Isotopes / Q000032:analysis; D012756:Sheep; D013460:Sulfur Isotopes / Q000032:analysis; D014935:Wool / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D002247:Carbon Isotopes; D010103:Oxygen Isotopes; D013460:Sulfur Isotopes; D007633:Keratins; D003094:Collagen; D003903:Deuterium