Morning session - part 1 11:15-12:45
Lifting the Lid on the Hebridean Neolithic: Using Organic Residue Analysis to Reconstruct Foodways in the Hebridean Social Landscape
Daniel Brown (1) - Lucy Cramp (1) - Duncan Garrow (2)
University of Bristol, Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, Bristol, United Kingdom (1) - University of Reading, Department of Archaeology, Reading, United Kingdom (2)
Keywords: Neolithic, Ceramics, Organic Residue Analysis
This contribution will present key results of my doctoral project which focuses on the analysis of dietary practices and the subsequent interpretation of foodways and the related societal frameworks of the early farming communities of the Early-Middle Neolithic of the Outer Hebrides, Scotland c. 3700-3200 BCE. The project utilises cutting-edge organic residue analysis of Neolithic Hebridean pottery lipids from islets, domestic sites and tombs – both GCMS analysis to scan for specific trace biomarkers, and stable isotope analysis to determine the origins of animal fats and subsequently to determine what foodstuffs were cooked and eaten in these vessels.
Hebridean crannogs are artificial islets set within lochs. Underwater surveys have recovered large quantities of Neolithic ceramics from the loch-beds surrounding some of these islets. It has been proposed that these islet sites were important centres for the formation of community identity via ‘commensal activities’ such as feasting (Copper and Armit 2018). Therefore, by re-constructing the dietary patterns of these sites, the role of food in these commensal dynamics can be explored.
My work extends previous analyses of pottery residues from four Hebridean islets, bringing in additional crannog sites for comparison and increasing the representation of key forms of pottery to test hypothesised differences in use. I have compared these results with those from both domestic and tomb contexts and have determined a difference in dietary patterns between these different types of sites. This also means that there was likely a difference in both the activities and the social meaning of these sites.
Reference:
Copper, M. and Armit, I. 2018. A Conservative Party? Pots and People in the Hebridean Neolithic. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society (84): 257-275
