An Odontocete (Cetacea) Meat Utility Index

Zooarqueologia dos mamíferos aquáticos e semi-aquáticos da Ilha de Santa Catarina, sul do Brasil

“…O confronto das correntes das Malvinas e do Brasil é a principal responsável por sustentar uma diversidade de cerca de um terço de todas as espécies de cetáceos do mundo (SIMÕES-LOPES & XIMENEZ 1993 (1996); SAVELLE & FRIESEN (1996) e SAVELLE & MCCAR-TNEY (1999) têm apresentado resultados sobre a utilização de mamíferos marinhos na economia alimentar, caracterizando diversas estratégias e atividades dos grupos humanos pré-históricos.…”

The Paleoanthropology and Archaeology of Big-Game Hunting

“…Since Binford's original introduction of the utility concept in the late 1970s, archaeologists have used the indices in a wide variety of different contexts and time periods, and there have been a number of attempts to refine and simplify the indices, and to develop separate indices for a wide range of other animal taxa -big and small; marine and terrestrial; mammal and avian (e.g., Diab 1998;Emerson 1993;Friesen 2001;Giardina 2006;Jones and Metcalfe 1988;Lyman et al 1992;Madrigal 2004;Outram and Rowley-Conwy 1998;Rowley-Conwy, et al 2002;Savelle and Friesen 1996). An analogous approach is even being used in the study of plant foods (see Barlow and Metcalfe 1996).…”

The role of cetacea in prehistoric and historic Atlantic Scotland

“…It is possible to fully butcher a whale, without needing to remove the large and heavy bones. Ethnoarchaeological investigations of modern Inuit beluga and narwhal hunting have revealed that the highly valued mattack (the hide and associated blubber) can be easily separated from the carcass (Savelle & Friesen, 1996). For meat, the portions removed are restricted to the easily detached axial muscle tissues associated with the vertebra.…”