A study of bone remains and butchery patterns from medieval mass-hunting of reindeer in the South Norwegian mountain districts

Hufthammer, Anne Karin; Bratbak, O.F.; Indrelid, Svein

doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2010.12.005

Cited by 11 publications

(18 citation statements)

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“…Indrelid et al (2007) and Hufthammer et al (2011) did this by calculating the most likely number of individuals (MNLI, cf. Knowing the total volume of the bone middens and the number of identified bones from the excavated sections, it should be possible to reconstruct the total number of bones in the middens.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Adams and Koningsberg (2004)) for Sumtangen and estimated the total number of reindeer to be 7800. Hufthammer et al (2011) set the MNI for the reindeer represented in the bone middens at Sumtangen at 5500, based on the analysis of parts of the excavated assemblage. Inclusion of false matches deflates the estimation, while omission of true matches will increase the result.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Generally, butchering results in dismemberment of a culled animal where the animal is being divided into several sets of anatomical parts or consumable parts (Binford 1978;Lyman 1987Lyman , 1994. Hufthammer et al (2011) found a significant difference in bone element distribution between Sumtangen Sørbu, a Roman Iron Age site, and Austbu and Vestbu. (Binford 1978;Lyman 1987Lyman , 1992Lyman , 1994Dewbury and Russell 2007).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The impression created by the butchering marks on the studied assemblage does not reflect this: instead of a gentle approach, rougher techniques seem to have been applied. Hufthammer et al (2011) provided a brief description of the butchery pattern, but did not study the butchery marks in detail; therefore, the location of the butchering marks is pictured in Fig. As mentioned above, and as can be seen in Fig.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Indrelid et al (2007), Hufthammer et al (2011) and Indrelid and Hufthammer (2011) provide a detailed description of the Sumtangen site; it consists of the remains of two huts (Austbu and Vestbu) and several bone middens. Indrelid et al (2007), Hufthammer et al (2011) and Indrelid and Hufthammer (2011) provide a detailed description of the Sumtangen site; it consists of the remains of two huts (Austbu and Vestbu) and several bone middens.…”

Section: Provenance and Age Of The Materialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Heaps of fascinating fragments: reconstructing a medieval reindeer population based on bone middens from the Hardangervidda high mountain plateau, Norway

Beijersbergen

2016

Acta Zoologica

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Takken Beijersbergen, L.M. 2017. Heaps of fascinating fragments: reconstructing a medieval reindeer population based on bone middens from the Hardangervidda high mountain plateau, Norway. -Acta Zoologica (Stockholm) 98: 340-361.The results of a detailed morphological and pathological study on reindeer bones (Rangifer tarandus) from four medieval hunting stations on Hardangervidda are presented. As intensive marrow collecting left almost no bones intact, traditional sexing methods could only sparsely be applied. Alternative methods had to be explored to successfully assign the fragments to a sex. Employing linear discriminant analysis (LDA) on early-and non-fusing skeletal elements, I have shown that (incomplete) calcanei, metapodia and phalanges I and II can be used successfully to assign a specimen to a sex and should no longer be excluded from osteometric analyses. Differences in the demographic compositions of the taphocoenoses lead to the assumption that hunters in the 11th century AD targeted large reindeer bucks, while at the 13th-century sites, the complete biocoenose is represented, albeit in a different ratio. There seems to have been a shift in hunting technique: from selective hunting to mass hunting. Size wise, the reindeer from Hardangervidda were smaller than reindeer from contemporary assemblages from the Dovre area (central Norway), a population that is genetically different. Few pathologically affected bones were encountered in the material, but some cases of infections, bone lesions and a progressed osteosarcoma are described. Liselotte M. Takken Beijersbergen, The Natural History Collections, University Acta Zoologica (Stockholm) 98: 340-361 (October 2017) Takken Beijersbergen Heaps of fascinating fragments 1Not including cranium, vertebrae other than atlas and axis, carpalia, tarsalia other than astragalus and calcaneum, and third phalanges.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%