Author, as appears in the article.: Robert Sala; Leopoldo Pérez; Alfred Sanchis; Cristo M. Hernández ; Bertila Galván; Carolina Mallol
Department: Història i Història de l'Art
URV's Author/s: SALA RAMOS, ROBERT; Leopoldo Pérez; Alfred Sanchis; Cristo M. Hernández ; Bertila Galván; Carolina Mallol
Keywords: Experimental Archaeology Archaeological hearths Burnt bones
Abstract: Although the occurrence of burned bones in the archeological record has been widely investigated, very few studies have focused on the distinction of temporality in burned bones assemblages, which would be useful in helping to identify human activity areas, as well as distinguishing combustion residues from those resulting from other activities. In this work, we present the results of an experiment designed to characterize direct/indirect thermal alteration of rabbit bones, based on macroscopic and microscopic surface features. These results are then compared with an archeological burned bone assemblage associated with various Middle Paleolithic combustion structures from El Salt Stratigraphic Unit X (Alicante, Spain). In the experimental assemblage, we observed that rabbit bones tossed into a fire were strongly altered, while bones thrown on the cooled ashes and lying on the surface beneath the fire or slightly buried, were not. We observed a strong thermal surface alteration of fresh bone (color changes, high degrees of fragmentation, cracks and structural changes on the cortical surface), while dry bone showed only color changes. Taking this data into account when analyzing the archeological assemblage, we observed surface features corresponding to thermally altered fresh bone and others more like thermally altered dry bone. Crucially, the archaeological specimens are associated with black layers of combustion structures and exhibit signs of trampling. The results suggest that fresh bones were trampled into human occupation surfaces and were subsequently unintentionally or indirectly burned due to their position beneath hearths, along with other dry bones present there. Our study shows that investigating ways to distinguish temporality in burned bones may be a good tool for isolating different depositional events and thus contributing to archeological palimpsest dissection.
Research group: Autoecologia Humana del Quaternari
Thematic Areas: History Historia Història
ISSN: 2352-409X
Author identifier: s/n; s/n; s/n; s/n; s/n; s/n
Record's date: 2017-01-19
Last page: 309
Journal volume: 11
Papper version: info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion
Licence document URL: https://repositori.urv.cat/ca/proteccio-de-dades/
Entity: Universitat Rovira i Virgili
Journal publication year: 2017
First page: 287
Publication Type: Article Artículo Article
Repositori URV