A forager-herder trade-off, from broad-spectrum hunting to sheep management at Aşıklı Höyük, Turkey.
Aşıklı Höyük is the earliest known preceramic Neolithic mound site in Central Anatolia. The oldest Levels, 4 and 5, spanning 8,200 to approximately 9,000 cal B.C., associate with round-house architecture and arguably represent the birth of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic in the region. Results from upper Level 4, reported here, indicate a broad meat diet that consisted of diverse wild ungulate and small animal species. The meat diet shifted gradually over just a few centuries to an exceptional emphasis on caprines (mainly sheep). Age-sex distributions of the caprines in upper Level 4 indicate selective manipulation by humans by or before 8,200 cal B.C. Primary dung accumulations between the structures demonstrate that ruminants were held captive inside the settlement at this time. Taken together, the zooarchaeological and geoarchaeological evidence demonstrate an emergent process of caprine management that was highly experimental in nature and oriented to quick returns. Stabling was one of the early mechanisms of caprine population isolation, a precondition to domestication.
School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721-0030; mstiner@E-mail.arizona.edu.
Mary C
MC
Stiner
Archeosupport, Boterdiep 14-11, 9712 LN, Groningen, The Netherlands;
Hijlke
H
Buitenhuis
Department of Prehistory, Istanbul University, Laleli 34134, Istanbul, Turkey;
Güneş
G
Duru
School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721-0030;
Steven L
SL
Kuhn
School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721-0030;Institute for Archaeological Sciences, Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen, 72070 Tübingen, Germany;
Susan M
SM
Mentzer
Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06269-2176;
Natalie D
ND
Munro
Veterinary Sciences Department, Institute of Palaeoanatomy, Domestication Research and the History of Veterinary Medicine, Ludwig-Maximilian University, D-80539 Munich, Germany.
Nadja
N
Pöllath
Department of Geosciences.
Jay
J
Quade
Ephoreia of Palaeoanthropology-Speleology Southern Greece, 11636 Athens, Greece; and.
Georgia
G
Tsartsidou
Department of Prehistory, Istanbul University, Laleli 34134, Istanbul, Turkey;
Mihriban
M
Özbaşaran
D000822:Animal Husbandry / Q000379:methods*; D000818:Animals; D001106:Archaeology / Q000379:methods; D004032:Diet; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D005260:Female; D005843:Geography; D006041:Goats; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008460:Meat; D012418:Ruminants; D012756:Sheep; D013997:Time Factors; D014421:Turkey
caprine domestication; stabling deposits; zooarchaeology