The Movement and Exchange of Dogs in the Prehistoric Caribbean: An Isotopic Investigation

Abstract

This study explores the feasibility of using strontium isotope ( 87 Sr/ 86 Sr) analyses of enamel from domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) to investigate networks of exchange in the prehistoric Circum-Caribbean. Dog teeth were obtained from burial and domestic contexts from two prehistoric sites (Anse à la Gourde and Morel) on Grande-Terre, Guadeloupe (Lesser Antilles). Strontium isotope results were compared with local biosphere 87 Sr/ 86 Sr data at the scale of the site, island and archipelago. The isotope results indicate both local and nonlocal origins with three dogs (30%) identified as nonlocal (one from Anse à la Gourde and two from Morel). The variance in 87 Sr/ 86 Sr ratios of the nonlocal dog teeth is consistent with diverse multiple origins external to the island of Grande-Terre but consistent with origins from other islands of the Lesser Antilles. The diverse origins of the nonlocal dog samples indicate that the prehistoric circulation of dogs occurred at multiple scales from regional to long distance. Significantly, the 87 Sr/ 86 Sr ratios of some of the dog teeth are comparable with values of nonlocal humans at Anse à la Gourde determined in previous studies. It is possible that these comparable 87 Sr/ 86 Sr ratios result from similar natal origins, for example if individuals were migrating to Guadeloupe with dogs. The results of this study contribute to an ongoing regional investigation of the economic, social and political roles of animals and animal remains and the multiscalar networks of prehistoric mobility and exchange in the Circum-Caribbean region.

A Multi-Isotope Investigation of Human and Dog Mobility and Diet in the Pre-Colonial Antilles

“…Previous research has revealed that a substantial proportion (>25%) of the human population at Anse à la Gourde are nonlocals (Booden et al 2008;Hoogland, Hofman, and Panhuysen 2010;, as well as one of the three dogs from this site and two out of seven dogs at Morel (Laffoon et al 2015 (Laffoon 2012;) based on measurements of archaeological rice rat enamel (n = 10), human bone (n = 8), and soil (n = 4) samples.…”

“…New multi-isotope evidence (both strontium and carbon) is presented from both the human and dog samples from El Cabo (humans n = 3; dogs n = 2) and El Flaco (humans n = 5; dogs n = 2), and from the human samples from Morel (n = 7), as well as the enamel carbon isotope results for the Morel (n = 3) and Anse à la Gourde (n = 3) dog samples. These data are compared to, and interpreted in conjunction with, previously published strontium isotope results from the human population at Anse à la Gourde (Booden et al 2008;Hoogland, Hofman, and Panhuysen 2010;) and the dog collections from both Anse à la Gourde and Morel (Laffoon et al 2015) and build upon a limited data set of enamel carbon isotopes from Anse à la Gourde (Laffoon, Valcárcel Rojas, and Hofman 2013) and the wider Caribbean (Table 1).…”

“…Grouard 2001;Grouard, Perdikaris, and Karyne 2013;Hoogland and Hofman 2013;Lawrence 1977;Newsom and Wing 2004;Roe 1995). These diverse contexts and the widespread and varied representations of dog imagery on various other material culture media (wood, stone, ceramic) suggest important but highly variable roles of dogs in pre-colonial Amerindian societies of the Caribbean (Boomert 1987;Grouard, Perdikaris, and Karyne 2013;Laffoon et al 2015;Newsom and Wing 2004;Roe 1995). Grouard and colleagues (2013) have reviewed the chronology, distribution, and context of dog burials for much of the Antilles, and provide compelling evidence that the custom of dog burial is primarily an Early Ceramic Age phenomenon in this region and that dogs in general become less common over time (in the Lesser Antilles) based on decreasing absolute and relative abundances of dog remains in many archaeological assemblages.…”

“…More recently, a broader range of biomolecular methods and approaches have been applied to the Caribbean faunal record to investigate various topics pertaining to patterns of animal paleomobility. These latter include genetic (Kimura et al 2016) and isotopic studies of the anthropogenic introduction of wild or commensal species ; see also Giovas, 2017) and domesticated species (Laffoon et al 2015), and the transport/exchange of animal skeletal resources and artefacts (Laffoon et al 2014, Laffoon, Sonnemann et al 2016. However, to our knowledge, no studies to date have explicitly explored correspondences and contrasts between humans and animals in this region by combining strontium and carbon isotopes analyses.…”

“…For example, recent research (Mickleburgh and Laffoon 2017) has demonstrated that 'Archaic' individuals from Aruba, where multiple lines of archaeological and bioarchaeological evidence have previously suggested distinct hunter-gatherer subsistence practices and highly marine-reliant diets, also possessed extremely enriched enamel δ 13 C values (−5.3 to −3.9‰). In recent years, strontium isotope ( 87 Sr/ 86 Sr) approaches have also been widely applied to studies of human and animal paleomobility, and artefact provenance studies in the Caribbean (Booden et al 2008;Giovas et al 2016;Hofman et al 2012;Hoogland, Hofman, and Panhuysen 2010;Laffoon 2012Laffoon , 2013Laffoon , 2016Laffoon et al , 2014Laffoon et al , 2015Laffoon et al , 2017Laffoon, Sonnemann et al 2016;Valcárcel Rojas et al 2011). The Caribbean region is particularly well suited to the application of the strontium isotope method owing to the geological diversity (Donovan and Jackson 1994) and hence high degree of variability and spatial pattering of bedrock and bioavailable 87 Sr/ 86 Sr. For this region, both large-scale empirical datasets and spatially explicit predictive models of regional isotope landscapes (isoscapes), of bioavailable 87 Sr/ 86 Sr have been developed (Bataille, Laffoon, and Bowen 2012;.…”