Oliver Craig

Ceramics were subjected to organic residue analysis from two collections: a series of middle Copper Age (Bodrogkeresztúr) vessels hitherto known as 'milk jugs', curated in the Magyar Nemzeti Múzeum, Budapest, and a collection of early Baden (Boleráz) vessels from the recently discovered settlement of Gyo"r-Szabadrét-domb, in western Hungary. The aim of the analyses was to establish whether or not these

ABSTRACT Havnø is a stratified Danish kitchen midden which spans the Late Mesolithic Ertebølle and the Early Neolithic Funnel Beaker cultures, ca. 5000-3500 cal. B.C. This paper presents the results of a study conducted on the fish bones recovered from a complete column sample taken from all levels of a stratified midden. The material is quantified and estimations of total fish lengths are provided. Interpretation focuses on taphonomy, relative importance of the fish represented, especially the European eel (Anguilla anguilla), significance of threespined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus), distribution of fish bones, possible fishing methods employed, and season(s) of capture.

The stable carbon (δ(13) C) and nitrogen (δ(15) N) isotope values of bone collagen are frequently used in paleodietary studies to assess the marine contribution to an individual's diet. Surprisingly, the relationship between stable isotope these values characteristics and the percentage of marine foods in diet has never been effectively demonstrated. To clarify this relationship, the stable isotope values and radiocarbon dates of nine humans and one sheep from Herculaneum, all who perished simultaneously during the AD 79 eruption of Vesuvius, were determined. Significant differences were found in the radiocarbon dates which are attributable to the incorporation of "old" carbon from the marine reservoir. The magnitude of the observed differences was linearly correlated with both δ(13) C and δ(15) N values allowing the response of each isotope to increasing marine carbon in collagen to be independently verified. Regression analyses showed that for every 1‰ enrichment in δ(13) C and δ(15) N, 56 years and 34 years were added to the radiocarbon age, respectively. Predictions of the maximum marine reservoir age differed considerably depending on which stable isotope was considered. This discrepancy is attributed to some degree of macronutrient scrambling whereby nitrogen from marine protein is preferentially incorporated in collagen over marine carbon. It is suggested that the macronutrient scrambling explains the observed relationship between δ(13) C and δ(15) N from Roman coastal sites and should be considered when interpreting any diet which is not dominated by protein. Nevertheless, without knowing the degree of macronutrient scrambling in different dietary scenarios, the accuracy of dietary reconstructions is severely compromised.

Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analyses were undertaken on human and faunal remains from two Neolithic sites in Southern Germany; the LBK settlement at Herxheim and the middle Neolithic cemetery at Trebur. Stable isotope data were used to reconstruct the diets of individuals buried at these sites and to look at dietary variation between groups classified by their sex, age,

We welcome the comments of Mike Richards and Rick Schulting; however, rather than attempting to close the debate on the isotope evidence and the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition, as suggested in their introduction, we agree that the issues raised should be ...

Pottery was a hunter-gatherer innovation that first emerged in East Asia between 20,000 and 12,000 calibrated years before present (cal bp), towards the end of the Late Pleistocene epoch, a period of time when humans were adjusting to changing climates and new environments. Ceramic container technologies were one of a range of late glacial adaptations that were pivotal to structuring subsequent cultural trajectories in different regions of the world, but the reasons for their emergence and widespread uptake are poorly understood. The first ceramic containers must have provided prehistoric hunter-gatherers with attractive new strategies for processing and consuming foodstuffs, but virtually nothing is known of how early pots were used. Here we report the chemical analysis of food residues associated with Late Pleistocene pottery, focusing on one of the best-studied prehistoric ceramic sequences in the world, the Japanese Jōmon. We demonstrate that lipids can be recovered reliably from charred surface deposits adhering to pottery dating from about 15,000 to 11,800 cal bp (the Incipient Jōmon period), the oldest pottery so far investigated, and that in most cases these organic compounds are unequivocally derived from processing freshwater and marine organisms. Stable isotope data support the lipid evidence and suggest that most of the 101 charred deposits analysed, from across the major islands of Japan, were derived from high-trophic-level aquatic food. Productive aquatic ecotones were heavily exploited by late glacial foragers, perhaps providing an initial impetus for investment in ceramic container technology, and paving the way for further intensification of pottery use by hunter-gatherers in the early Holocene epoch. Now that we have shown that it is possible to analyse organic residues from some of the world's earliest ceramic vessels, the subsequent development of this critical technology can be clarified through further widespread testing of hunter-gatherer pottery from later periods.

We undertook combined stable carbon, nitrogen and sulphur isotope analysis of marine and terrestrial faunal remains from two prehistoric coastal shell middens in Denmark. The aim of the investigation was to establish whether sulphur isotopes were useful in discriminating ...

Extraction of amplifiable DNA-from degraded human material in the forensic context remains a problem, and maximization of yield and elimination of inhibitors of the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) are important issues which rarely feature in comparative studies. The present work used PCR amplification of three DNA sequences (HLA DPB1, amelogenin and mitochondrial) to assess the efficiency of three methods for extracting DNA (sodium acetate, magnetic beads and glass-milk) from 32 skeletal samples and 25 blood stains up to 43 years old. The results, analyzed using multivariate statistics, confirmed that the extraction method was crucial to the subsequent detection of amplification products; the glass-milk protocol performed better than sodium acetate, which was better than magnetic beads. Successful amplification also depended on gene sequence, multiple copy mitochondrial sequences performing best; however, with the singly copy sequences, the longer HLA DPB1 (327 bp) being detected just as often as the shorter amelogenin (106/112 bp). Amplification products were obtained more frequently from blood stains than bone, perhaps reflecting differences inherent in the material, and from younger compared with older specimens, though plateauing seemed to occur after 10 years. PCR inhibitors were more frequent in sodium acetate extracts.

In situations where badly burnt fragments of bone are found, identification of their human or non-human origin may be impossible by gross morphology alone and other techniques have to be employed. In order to determine whether histological methods were redundant ...