Journal
ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND ANTHROPOLOGICAL SCIENCES
Volume 11, Issue 12, Pages 6325-6337Publisher
SPRINGER HEIDELBERG
DOI: 10.1007/s12520-017-0568-4
Keywords
Timor-Leste; Aves; Zooarchaeology; Wallacea; Taphonomy; Palaeoecology; Owl roosting; Pleistocene
Funding
- ARC Laureate Project [FL120100156]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
The significance of the role of birds in hominin evolution in Island Southeast Asia is not clear. Few avian vertebrate deposits have been recovered from archaeological or fossil sites in the region, and their association with either hominin or natural deposition in caves and rock shelters complicates their usefulness in hominin behavioural and palaeoecological reconstructions. In this paper, we assess the taphonomic history of the Pleistocene avian vertebrate remains recovered from Laili Cave, Timor-Leste, dated to between ca. 44.6 to 11.2 ka and in association with abundant lithic material. We use avian taxonomic composition, skeletal element abundance, and bone surface modification data to determine the agent of avian skeletal deposition. Our analyses indicate that the small grassland and woodland birds (quail, buttonquail, song birds), which dominate the assemblage, were deposited by avian predators (probably barn owls) throughout the sequence. Humans possibly hunted the small quantity of larger birds (imperial pigeon, duck). The bird remains suggest that grasslands, woodland savannahs, wetlands, and forest environments were present locally during the Pleistocene.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available