Animal exploitation in Southwestern Iberia at the end of the second millennium BCE: insights from the Late Bronze Age of Outeiro do Circo (Beja, Portugal)

Abstract

The Late Bronze Age was an important phase in European Prehistory but our understanding of its regional dynamics is unequal. Relevant knowledge of the peopling and material culture of Southwestern Iberia between 1170 and 730 BCE exists, but the exploitation and management of animals remain largely uncharacterized. We generally lack the taphonomical data that could allow for an in-depth understanding of faunal assemblages’ formation, with relevance for the description of depositional environments if paired with relative and absolute chronologies. We present two new absolute dates for the Outeiro do Circo Late Bronze Age and a zooarchaeological and taphonomical analysis of the total recovered faunal assemblage. Caprine, swine, and bovine primary and probably secondary products were of importance, with the hunting of red deer and wild boar being complementary. Other species such as leporids, equids, canids and several molluscs were recovered. The latter are mostly intrusive terrestrial gastropods but the scarce presence of scallops and peppery furrow shells can also relate to exchange networks. Taphonomical indicators of the butchering and consumption of animals and the secondary access by a large canid are well attested in the assemblage, as well as the culinary and non-culinary thermo-alteration of animals’ bones.