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Tooth-beads, antlers, nuts and fishes. Examples of social bioarchaeology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 November 2013

Lars Larsson
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Extract

I am sitting at my computer with a purring cat resting its head against the keyboard – a real animal–animal situation and a reciprocal relationship. For 15 years, my wife and I looked after horses that our children had left behind when they moved off into the world. The reason was that the horses belonged, in their own way, to the extended family. So I have no difficulty understanding what Overton and Hamilakis call ‘social zooarchaeology’. As a pet owner who has personally observed the individuality of animals – from hens to horses – I have no problem accepting their view that animals are individuals, something that my urban colleagues often question. When discussing with hunters who have specialized for many years in one type of hunting, they can describe how different individuals in flocks – for example, among red deer and moose – can behave. They spend many hours moving in the terrain and observe the different animal species, not to hunt them but to acquire further knowledge about the animals, sometimes to find out which animals should later be culled, but often only for the sheer pleasure of feeling a kind of relationship between themselves and the animals they follow.

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Discussion
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Archaeological Dialogues , Volume 20 , Issue 2 , December 2013 , pp. 148 - 152
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

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