Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dzt6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T12:15:08.717Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Faunal Introductions to the Balearic Islands in the Early 1st Millennium Cal BC

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 August 2017

Damià Ramis ,
Montserrat Anglada ,
Antoni Ferrer ,
Lluís Plantalamor  and
Mark Van Strydonck
Damià Ramis*
Affiliation:
Museu de Menorca, Avda. Dr. Guàrdia, s/n, 07701 Maó, Spain
Montserrat Anglada
Affiliation:
Museu de Menorca, Avda. Dr. Guàrdia, s/n, 07701 Maó, Spain
Antoni Ferrer
Affiliation:
Museu de Menorca, Avda. Dr. Guàrdia, s/n, 07701 Maó, Spain
Lluís Plantalamor
Affiliation:
Museu de Menorca, Avda. Dr. Guàrdia, s/n, 07701 Maó, Spain
Mark Van Strydonck
Affiliation:
Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Jubelpark 1, B-1000 Brussels, Belgium
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Only domestic mammals (sheep, goat, cattle, pig, and dog) and two rodent species constituted the faunal package introduced to the Balearic Islands by the early settlers in the 3rd millennium cal BC. Later animal introductions in the archipelago were thought to occur by the end of the 1st millennium cal BC due to contacts with Punic merchants or, more than likely, to the Roman conquest of the islands. Recently, several faunal remains belonging to different vertebrates (red deer, chicken, and rabbit) were found in the Talayotic site of Cornia Nou (Minorca), in contexts that date to the early 1st millennium cal BC. A series of radiocarbon (14C) dates was made directly on samples of small species to exclude the possibility of infiltration into lower layers. The obtained results show that chicken and rabbit were already present on Minorca in the early 1st millennium cal BC. Chicken is recorded in Phoenician colonies in south Iberia as early as the 8th century cal BC. Rabbit, on the other hand, is indigenous to the Iberian Peninsula. These new faunal introductions recorded in Minorca could be related to the Late Bronze and Phoenician maritime activity.

Keywords

animal introductionBalearic IslandsMediterraneannavigation
Type
Applications
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 59 , Special Issue 5: 8th International Symposium, Edinburgh, 27 June – 1 July, 2016 Part 1 of 2 , October 2017 , pp. 1415 - 1423
Copyright
© 2017 by the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

Selected Papers from the 8th Radiocarbon & Archaeology Symposium, Edinburgh, UK, 27 June–1 July 2016

References

REFERENCES

Albarella, U. 2016. Defining bone movement in archaeological stratigraphy: a plea for clarity. Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences 8:353–358.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alcalde, G. 1999a. Cova des Mussol. Informe técnico del análisis de huesos de roedores. In: Lull V, Micó R, Rihuete C, Risch R, editors. La Cova des Càrritx y la Cova des Mussol. Ideología y sociedad en la prehistoria de Menorca. Barcelona: Consell Insular de Menorca. p 443.Google Scholar
Alcalde, G. 1999b. Estudio arqueozoológico de restos de los roedores de la Cova des Càrritx. In: Lull V, Micó R, Rihuete C, Risch R, editors. La Cova des Càrritx y la Cova des Mussol. Ideología y sociedad en la prehistoria de Menorca. Barcelona: Consell Insular de Menorca. p 543–548.Google Scholar
Anglada, M, Ferrer, A, Plantalamor, L, Ramis, D, Van Strydonck, M. 2013. La sucesión de ocupaciones entre el Calcolítico y la Edad Media en el yacimiento de Cornia Nou (Menorca, Islas Baleares). Espacio, Tiempo y Forma. Serie I, Nueva Época (Prehistoria y Arqueología) 6:269–299.Google Scholar
Anglada, M, Ferrer, A, Plantalamor, L, Ramis, D, Van Strydonck, M, De Mulder, G. 2014. Chronological framework for the early Talayotic period in Menorca: the settlement of Cornia Nou. Radiocarbon 56(2):411–424.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anglada, M, Ferrer, A, Plantalamor, L, Ramis, D. 2017. Continuïtat cultural en època de canvis: la producció i preparació d’aliments a Cornia Nou (Maó, Menorca) durant els segles IV-III aC. In: Prados F, Jiménez H, Martínez, JJ, editors. Menorca entre Fenicis i Púnics. Murcia: Universidad de Murcia. p 139–158.Google Scholar
Botto, M. 2013. Fenicios, nurágicos y tartesios: modalidad y finalidad del encuentro entre gentes y culturas diversas en el paso del Bronce Final al Hierro I. In: Campos Carrasco JM, Alvar Ezquerra J, editors. Tarteso. El emporio del metal. Córdoba: Almuzara. p 197–210.Google Scholar
Botto, M. 2016. The Phoenicians in the central-west Mediterranean and Atlantic between ‘precolonization’ and ‘first colonization’. In: Donnellan L, Nizzo V, Burgers GJ, editors. Contexts of Early Colonization. Papers of the Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome 64. Rome: Palombi Editore. p 289–309.Google Scholar
Boudin, M, Van Strydonck, M, van den Brande, T, Synal, H-A, Wacker, L. 2015. RICH – a new AMS facility at the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Brussels, Belgium. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research B 361:120–123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carenti, G, Wilkens, B. 2006. La colonizzazione fenicia e punica e il suo influsso sulla fauna sarda. Sardinia, Corsica et Baleares Antiquae 4:173–186.Google Scholar
Castrillo, M. 2005. Fenicis i púnics a Menorca: vint-i-cinc anys d’investigació i noves dades aportades per lês àmfores feniciopúniques a l’illa. Fonaments 12:149–168.Google Scholar
Cucchi, T, Vigne, J-D, Auffray, J-C. 2005. First occurrence of the house mouse (Mus musculus domesticus Schwarz & Schwarz, 1943) in the Western Mediterranean: a zooarchaeological revision of subfossil occurrences. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 84:429–445.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Grossi Mazzorin, J. 2005. Introduzione e diffusione del pollame in Italia ed evoluzione delle sue forme di allevamento fino al Medioevo. In: Fiore I, Malerba G, Chilardi S, editors. Atti del 3° Convegno Nazionale di Archeozoologia, Siracusa 3-5 novembre 2000. Studi di Paletnologia 2. Rome: Collana del Bullettino di Paletnologia Italiana. p 351–360.Google Scholar
Delibes De Castro, G, Fernández-Miranda, M. 1988. Armas y utensilios de bronce en la prehistoria de las Islas Baleares. Studia Archaeologica 78. Valladolid: Universidad de Valladolid.Google Scholar
Depalmas, A. 2014. New data from fortified coastal settlement of Cap de Forma, Mahon, Menorca (Balearic Islands). Radiocarbon 56(2):425–437.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Depalmas, A, Marras, G. 2003. L’isola del vento. Archeo 219:34–41.Google Scholar
Giardino, C. 1995. Il Mediterraneo occidentale fra XIV ed VIII secolo a.C. Cerchie minerarie e metallurgiche. BAR International Series 612. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gómez Toscano, F, Fundoni, G. 2010–2011. Relaciones del Suroeste con el Mediterráneo en el Bronce Final (siglos XI–X a.C.). Huelva y la isla de Cerdeña. Anales de Arqueología Cordobesa 21–22:17–56.Google Scholar
Hernández Carrasquilla, F. 1992. Some comments on the introduction of domestic fowl in Iberia. Archaeofauna 1:45–53.Google Scholar
Hernández-Gasch, J. 2009. Les Illes Balears en època tardoarcaica. In: Nieto X, Santos M, editors. El vaixell grec arcaic de la cala Sant Vicenç. Girona: Generalitat de Catalunya. p 273–292.Google Scholar
Hernández-Gasch, J. 2009–2010. El comerç tardoarcaic a les illes Balears: vells problemes, dades recents, nous plantejaments. Mayurqa 33:113–130.Google Scholar
Longin, R. 1971. New method of collagen extraction for radiocarbon dating. Nature 230:241–242.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lull, V, Micó, R, Rihuete, C, Risch, R. 1999. La Cova des Càrritx y la Cova des Mussol. Ideología y sociedad en la prehistoria de Menorca. Barcelona: Consell Insular de Menorca.Google Scholar
Monnerot, M, Vigne, JD, Biju-Duval, C, Casane, D, Callou, C, Hardy, C, Mougel, F, Soriguer, R, Dennebouy, N, Mounolou, JC. 1994. Rabbit and man: genetic and historic approach. Genetics Selection Evolution 26:167–182.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Montero, I, Gornés, S, De Nicolás, J, Gual, J. 2005. Aproximación a la metalurgia prehistórica de Menorca entre el 2000 y el 650 cal a.C. Mayurqa 30:289–306.Google Scholar
Nadal, J. 1998. Informe sobre los restos faunísticos correspondientes al yacimiento de Son Real. In: Hernández Gasch J, Son Real. Necrópolis de la edad del hierro. Estudio arqueológico y análisis social. Arqueomediterrània 3. Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona. p 219–222.Google Scholar
Perry-Gal, L, Erlich, A, Gilboa, A, Bar-Oz, G. 2015. Earliest economic exploitation of chicken outside East Asia: evidence from the Hellenistic Southern Levant. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 112:9849–9854.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Quintana, J, Ramis, D, Bover, P. 2016. Primera datació d’un mamífer no autòcton (Oryctolagus cuniculus [Linnaeus, 1758]) (Mammalia: Lagomorpha) del jaciment holocènic del Pas d’en Revull (barranc d’Algendar, Ferreries). Revista de Menorca 95:185–200.Google Scholar
Ramis, D. 2014. Early island exploitations: productive and subsistence strategies on the prehistoric Balearic Islands. In: Knapp AB, Van Dommelen P, editors. The Cambridge Prehistory of the Bronze and Iron Age Mediterranean. New York: Cambridge University Press. p 40–56.Google Scholar
Ramon, J. 2007. Excavaciones Arqueológicas en el Asentamiento Fenicio de Sa Caleta (Ibiza). Cuadernos de Arqueología Mediterránea 16. Barcelona: Universitat Pompeu Fabra.Google Scholar
Ruiz-Gálvez, M. 1997. The west of Iberia: meeting point between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic at the end of the Bronze Age. In: Balmuth M, Gilman A, Prados-Torreira L, editors. Encounters and Transformations. The Archaeology of Iberia in Transition. Monographs in Mediterranean Archaeology 7. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. p 95–120.Google Scholar
Sanders, EAC. 1979. The animals found in the cave of Son Boronat (Mallorca) and some preliminary notes on possible changes in the subrecent rodent populations of Mallorca. Bolletí de la Societat Arqueològica Lul·liana 37:51–58.Google Scholar
Sanders, EAC. 1984. Evidence concerning late survival and extinction of endemic Amphibia and Reptilia from the Bronze and Iron Age settlement of Torralba den Salort (Alaior, Menorca). In: Hemmer H, Alcover JA, editors. Història Biològica del Ferreret. Monografies Científiques 3. Palma: Moll. p 123–128.Google Scholar
Sykes, N. 2012. A social perspective on the introduction of exotic animals: the case of the chicken. World Archaeology 44:158–169.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van Strydonck, M, van der Borg, K. 1990–1991. The construction of a preparation line for AMS-targets at the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage Brussels. Bulletin of the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage 23:228–234.Google Scholar
Vives-Ferrándiz, J. 2015. Mediterranean networks and material connections: A view from Eastern Iberia and the Balearic Islands (12th–8th centuries BC). In: Babbi A, Bubenheimer-Erhart F, Marín-Aguilera, B, Mühl S, editors. The Mediterranean Mirror. Cultural Contacts in the Mediterranean Sea between 1200 and 750 B. C. Mainz: Verlag des Römisch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums. p 279–291.Google Scholar