Separating Sheep (Ovis aries L.) and Goats (Capra hircus L.) Using Geometric Morphometric Methods: An Investigation of Astragalus Morphology from Late and Final Bronze Age Central Asian Contexts

Abstract

Many qualitative and quantitative methods for the separation of sheep and goat bones are based upon Middle Eastern, Mediterranean and European specimens. However, these methods may not be as applicable in other geographical contexts due to regional morphological variation. In order to address this, both traditional and geometric morphometric methods were applied to sheep, (Ovis aries L.) and goat (Capra hircus L.) astragali from archaeological sites from Kazakhstan dating to the Late and Final Bronze Age (1900-900 BCE). This exploratory research confirmed that qualitative features remained useful for distinguishing between species, while traditional morphometric methods were unable to conclusively support the field identification of species. Geometric morphometric methods found significant morphological differences between species and confirmed group membership while exploring specific qualitative features that were effective in distinguishing between sheep and goat in Central Asian contexts.

Identifying early stages of reindeer domestication in the archaeological record: a 3D morphological investigation on forelimb bones of modern populations from Fennoscandia

“…Geometric morphometrics (GMM) is a quantitative approach which allows the comparison of bone shapes and the visualization of significant morphological changes between groups of specimens while retaining the element of shape information related to size. In recent years, this methodology has been particularly developed to explore domestication and variability between populations, to study both the morphological variations of cranial and dental elements (Cucchi et al 2011 , 2017 , 2019 ; Evin et al 2013 , 2015 , 2017 ; Owen et al 2014 ; Drake et al 2015 ; Bopp-Ito et al 2018 ; Duval et al 2018 ) as well as those of postcranial elements (Bignon et al 2005 ; Curran 2012 ; Barr 2014 ; Hanot et al 2017 , 2018 ; Haruda 2017 ; Haruda et al 2019 ; Pöllath et al 2019 ; Harbers et al 2020 ). Thus, we applied a three-dimensional GMM approach to the computed tomography (CT) images of forelimb bones.…”

Morphometrical distinction between sheep (Ovis aries) and goat (Capra hircus) using the petrosal bone: Application on French Protohistoric sites

“…Tooth and mandible morphology can also provide an element of distinction (Halstead, Collins, & Isaakidou, 2002;Helmer, 2000;Payne, 1985) or ageing criteria (Grant, 1982), as well as mandibles (Zeder & Pilaar, 2010). Different researchers have tried to distinguish the two species using postcranial elements, from the pioneer ones of Boessneck (Boessneck, 1969;Boessneck, Müller, & Teichert, 1964) or Payne, Prummel, and Frisch (Payne, 1969;Prummel & Frisch, 1986) to more recent works (Fernandez, 2001;Haruda, 2016;Salvagno & Albarella, 2017;Zeder & Lapham, 2010) using both linear measurements and geometric morphometrics. Furthermore, those osteological methods are completed by molecular investigations on mitochondrial DNA (Loreille et al, 1997), carbon isotopes (Balasse & Ambrose, 2005), or collagen peptides (Buckley et al, 2010).…”

Close management of sheep in ancient Central Asia: evidence for foddering, transhumance, and extended lambing seasons during the Bronze and Iron Ages

“…While there are similarities in material culture assemblages from the proto-urban site of Kent and pastoral encampment of Turgen (Figure 1), there is little direct evidence for interactions between groups that lived at these sites. Geometric morphometric analyses of sheep from these two settlements in central and southeastern Kazakhstan suggest that herds remained local to their respective environments with no admixture between flocks at the two sites (Haruda 2017).…”