Regionality and biotope exploitation in Danish Ertebølle and adjacent periods

– exploitation of animal resources at coastal settlements in northern Denmark

Inge Bødker Enghoff
Zoological Museum
Universitetsparken 15
DK-2100 Copenhagen Ø
Denmark
ibenghoff@snm.ku.dk

Click to go to speficic parts of the text:                                                         

• Problem formulation
• Theory
• Methods
• Overview of material
• References

Background and purpose

 Archaeologists have excavated animal bones on Danish stone age settlements for more than 100 years. Analyses of the bones have contributed significantly to our understanding of the life of the stone age people. However, knowledge of their exploitation of animals as a resource remains fragmentary. Among other things, regional comparisons of the economical significance of fish, birds and mammals treated collectively are missing.

 The purpose of the present project is to deliver a regional analysis, based on detailed study of new, high-quality bone assemblages (fish, bird, mammals), compared with archaeological interpretations of the sites and re-evaluation of earlier publications.

The new bone assemblages

 Methods of archaeological excavation and analysis have improved considerably, particularly in the most recent years. As a result, a number of animal bone assemblages with a great potential are now available. The project is based in newly excavated material from stone age settlements on the coast of the Littorina sea in northern Denmark. The finds are grouped in four regions: the north coast of the northernmost island (present-day Vendsyssel), the central part of the Limfjord area, Djursland and North Zealand. Modern excavation techniques have been employed at the sites in question, including sieving of sediment, and the archaeological documentation is solid.

Cultural historical period

 The majority of the finds derive from the Ertebølle culture (5400-3950 BC), but one includes the youngest phase of the preceding Kongemose culture as well, and two reach into the Neolithic ( Funnel Beaker Culture). Thus, it will also be possible to elucidate evolution over time, including the transition from a hunting/fishing culture to agriculture – the most important cultural change in our past.

What the analysis can show

 Similarities and differences between the regions and between individual settlements with regard to patterns of livelihood will be documented and interpreted, as far as hunting, fishing and animal husbandry are concerned. It will be possible to interpret differences either as conscious specialisations or as effects of geographical placement. As the analyses include fish and birds as well as mammals, comprehensive evaluations of the economy of the individual settlements, as well as the season of occupancy – in other words an overall picture of the sustenance strategy will be obtainable.

Examples of specific questions which will be addressed by the project:

• Is the exploitation spectrum of game animals in the northernmost region, which is entirely unresearched in this respect, influenced by geographical isolation?
• Is Lystrup Enge, where particularly many whale bones have been found, a specialised whaling site?

The further perspective

 This basal analysis of human exploitation of the fauna will provide a valuable and necessary framework of reference for subsequent analyses using modern, technological approaches such as isotope analyses.

During the project period, the environmental conditions, and hence the conditions for the wild fauna, were reasonably constant.

Denmark was an archipelago, and throughout the period, a humid, warm, Atlantic climate obtained (the post-glacial temperature optimum). Inland, the Atlantic primeval forest grew. There was a long marine coastline, folded into numerous bays and inlets, providing almost unlimited possibilities for settlers. Temperature and salinity in the sea were higher than today, resulting in increased marine resources. Even though the transition to the Neolithic (3950 BC) was marked by the beginning of a climatic deterioration, the temperature remained higher than today.

Northern Denmark was particularly fragmented. For instance, present day Vendsyssel was a relatively isolated island. The splitting of the land into islands may have resulted min the disappearance of certain animal species (Aaris-Sørensen 1980a) and probably intensified regionalisation.

In the light of the stable climate of the period, any development in the exploitation of animals will chiefly be due to cultural changes. A very obvious example is constituted by the introduction of domestic animals at the transition into the Neolithic (Funnel Beaker Culture). Since there are numerous examples of people remaining on the same settlements across this cultural change the project can elucidate the relative importance of hunting and fishing before and after the introduction of domestic animals. Possible further changes over time, for instance as a result of the introduction of new hunting and fishing techniques (cf., e.g., Enghoff 1999) will be examined as well.

(For instance, a considerable fishing during the Kongemose period for herring has recently been demonstrated at the settlement Tågerup in Scania, whereas there are few herring in the material from the Ertebølle period. The change has been interpreted as a shift from net fishing to trap fishing (Eriksson and Magnell 2000). The analysis of newly excavated material provides a possibility for looking for similar differences in Denmark.)

Regional differences may be correlated with cultural differences which may be indicated by other objects from the excavations. For instance, several blubber lamps were found on the Ertebølle settlement Ronæs Skov, where also many bones from harbour porpoise – a well-known source of blubber – have been found. Regional differences may, however, also be due to natural conditions. For instance, the great importance of flounder fishing from the Norsminde settlement which was situated close to an ideal nursery ground for flounder (Enghoff 1991).

 The project work is done in the Zoological Museum. This museum has the best reference and general collections of animal bones in Denmark (including long series of all relevant species at different ages and of different sizes), the country’s largest archaeozoological library and an active archaeological research environment.

 Pre-treatment of material

 In some cases, sediment samples are fine-sieved in order to secure small bones, especially from fish.

Species identification

 An attempt is made to identify all bone fragments using the above-mentioned reference collection.

 On the basis of the species identification a species list can be produced for each settlement, informing about which animals (fish, birds, mammals) have been exploited. Based on knowledge about the habits of each species, the raw species list allows interpretation of the nature and environment around the settlement, e.g., the character of the surrounding landscape, the presence of nearby freshwater bodies, and their nature. Fish and marine mammals inform about salinity and depth of the seawater off the settlement. Species which are now absent from the area may indicate a different climate, e.g., Dalmatian pelican, black sea bream and stingray. Migrating species which only visit the country during a short period of the year may act as indicators of season, e.g., garpike, mackerel and whooper swan. Presence of certain species may directly indicate particular fishing or catch strategies.

Relative frequency of species

The number of bone fragments identified to species is used to estimate the significance of each species. This method (NISP, Number of Identified Specimens), which is used by most students, has the advantage that raw data are published and may easily be compared between studies.

Since all animal species do not have the same number of bones (e.g., Enghoff 1987), are of the same size (and therefore do not yield the same amount of meat, e.g., Aaris-Sørensen 1998: 185), or have equal chances for preservation in the soil (e.g., Nicholson 1998), the number of fragments identified to species is always accompanied by a discussion. Knowledge of the relative frequency of the species is important for the understanding of which species were of significance for the people at the settlement and may have influenced the decision to live at this place.

In the special cases where calculation of MNI (Minimum Number of Individuals) is relevant, this will also be done. For example, the 83 bones of black sea bream in the shell midden at Bjørnsholm could be shown to derive from at least three individuals of this rare fish species (Enghoff 1993).

Species, size and sex identification based on bone measurements

Selected bone elements from certain animal species are extracted from the samples and are measured according to Von den Driesch (1976) for mammals and birds, and Enghoff (1994) and Wheeler & Jones (1976) for fish.

For some animals, measuring the bones is part of the species identification. For instance, measuring may be necessary for distinguishing between aurochs and domestic cattle (Degerbøl & Freedskild 1970), or between wild boar and domestic pig (Payne & Bull 1988). This aspect of species identification  is extremely relevant in the present project which covers the Mesolithic as well as the Neolithic period.

Standardized bone measurements are sued for estimating the size of the animals. Bone measurement may be directly compared, or they may be transformed into, e.g., height at withers for cattle and other mammals, or to total length of fish. In the case of fish, size distributions may form the basis of estimates of where, how and at which season the fishing took place (Enghoff 1983, 1994).

Bone measurements may also form the basis of gender estimates of the specimens from which the fragments derive.

Age estimates

The age of a mammal may be estimated on the basis of studies of tooth eruption and tooth wear (Hillson 1986). Fusion of epiphyses may also be used. Estimates of the age of the animals are important for interpretation of hunting strategy and season.

C-14 dating

A number of bones will be submitted for C-14 dating.

Updates of previous analyses

Some of the included finds have been subject to partial or preliminary analyses. In these cases the work will consist in bringing knowledge to these finds up to the same standard as that of the newly analysed ones.

Processing and presentation of data

All bone identifications are successively entered in to a database. This procedure facilitates subsequent qualitative analyses, including those whose relevance does not become clear until well into the course of the project.

The ultimate purpose of the project consists of a number of mostly peer-reviewed publications. Some papers will focus on an individual settlement or a group of settlements. At least one paper will present a comprehensive analysis of regionality and exploitation of the biotope (animal resources) on coastal settlements in Danish Ertebølle and adjacent periods.

The comprehensive paper will partly be based on the newly analysed materials, partly on previously published ones (e.g., Aaris-Sørensen 1980b; Enghoff 1987, 1993, 1994). Even though the focus is on coastal settlements in northern Denmark, publications on settlements in the neighbouring areas (southern Denmark and Sweden) be included in the discussions as well (e.g., Enghoff 1991,1998; Eriksson & Magnell 2000; Jonsson 1986, 1988; Noe-Nygaard 1995; Richter & Noe-Nygaard 2003; Rowley-Conwy 1998; Trolle-Lassen 1987).

In addition to the scientific publications, results of the study will be interpreted in the form of popular papers, various university courses, popular lectures, and possibly radio and TV.

The inclusion of all the materials mentioned below takes place in agreement with the responsible arahcaeologists and the archaeozoological section, Zoological Museum.

Region 1: Northern Vendsyssel

Region 2: The central Limfjord area

Region 3: Djursland and environs

Region 4: Northern Zealand

Aaris-Sørensen, K. 1980a: Depauperation of the mammalian fauna of the island of Zealand during the Atlantic period. – Videnskabelige Meddelelser fra dansk Naturhistorisk Forening 142: 131-138.

Aaris-Sørensen, K. 1980b: Atlantic fish, reptile, and bird remains from the Mesolithic settlement at Vedbæk, North Zealand. – Videnskabelige Meddelelser fra dansk Naturhistorisk Forening 142: 139-149.

Aaris-Sørensen, K. 1998: Danmarks forhistoriske dyreverden. – Gyldendal.

Degerbøl, M. & Fredskild, B. 1970: The urus (Bos primigenius Bojanus) and Neolithic domesticated cattle (Bos taurus domesticus Linné) in Denmark. – Det Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskab, Biologiske Skrifter 17,1.

Enghoff, I.B. 1983: Size distribution of cod (Gadus morhua L.) and whiting (Merlangius merlangus (L.)) (Pisces, Gadidae) from a Mesolithic settlement at Vedbæk, North Zealand, Denmark. – Videnskabelige Meddelelser fra Dansk Naturhistorisk Forening 144: 83-87.

Enghoff, I.B. 1987: Freshwater fishing from a sea-coast settlement - the Ertebølle locus classicus revisited. – Journal of Danish Archaeology 5 (1986): 62-76.

Enghoff, I.B. 1991: Fishing from the Stone Age settlement Norsminde. –Journal of Danish Archaeology 8 (1989): 41-50.

Enghoff, I.B. 1993: Mesolithic eel-fishing at Bjørnsholm, Denmark, spiced with exotic species. – Journal of Danish Archaeology 10 (1991): 105-118.

Enghoff, I.B. 1994: Fishing in Denmark during the Ertebølle period. –International Journal of Osteoarchaeology 4: 65-96.

Enghoff, I.B. 1998: Freshwater fishing at Ringkloster, with a supplement of sea fishes. Journal of Danish Archaeology 12 (1994-1995): 99-106.

Enghoff, I.B. 1999: Fishing in the Baltic region from the 5th century BC to the 16th century AD: Evidence from fishbones. – Archaeofauna 8: 41-85.

Eriksson, M. & Magnell, O. 2000: Det djuriska Tågerup. – s. 156-237 i Karsten, P. & Knarrström, B. (red.): Tågerup specialstudier. – Riksantikvarämbetet.

Hillson, S. 1986: Teeth. – Cambridge Manuals in Archaeology. Cambridge University Press.

Jonsson, L. 1986: Fish bones in late Mesolithic human graves at Skateholm, Scania, South Sweden. – British Archaeological Reports, International Series 294: 62-79.

Jonsson, L. 1988: The vertebrate faunal remains from the late Atlantic settlement Skateholm in Scania, South Sweden. – s. 56-88 i: Larsson, L. (red.): The Skateholm Project I. Man and Environment. – Acta Regiae Societatis Humaniorum litteranum lundensis 79.

Nicholson, R. 1998: Bone degradation in a compost heap. – Journal of Archaeological Sciences 25: 393-403.

Noe-Nygaard, N. 1995: Ecological, sedimentary and geochemical evolution of the late-glacial to postglacial Åmose lacustrine basin, Denmark. – Fossils & Strata 37: 1-436.

Payne, S. & Bull, G. 1988: Components of variations in measurements of pig bones and teeth, and the use of measurements to distinguish wild from domestic pig remains. – Archaeozoologia 2: 27-66.

Richter, J. & Noe-Nygaard, N. 2003: A late Mesolithic hunting station at Agernæs, Fyn, Denmark. Differentiation and specialization in the late Ertebølle-culture, heralding the introduction of agriculture? – Acta Archaeologica 74: 1-64.

Rowley-Conwy, P. 1998: Meat, furs and skins. Mesolithic animal bones from Ringkloster, a seasonal hunting camp in Jutland. – Journal of Danish Archaeology 12 (1994-1995): 87-98.

Trolle-Lassen, T. 1987: Human exploitation of fur animals in Mesolithic Denmark – a case study. – Archaeozoologica 12: 86-102.

Von den Driesch, A. 1976: A guide to the measurement of animal bones from archaeological sites. – Peabody Museum Bulletin 1.

Wheeler, A. and Jones, A.K.G. 1976: Fish Remains. – s. 131-245 i : Rogerson, A.: Excavations on Fuller's Hill, Great Yarmouth. – East Anglian Archaeology 2.