Greetings. I'm working on a Samnite/Roman assemblage from apennine Italy,
and among the canid bones is a mandible with apparent cutmarks across the
hinge. I'm tentatively indentifying it as wolf instead of dog due to the
dentition and size/robusticity compared to other canids from the same site.
The best explanation I can think of for the marks is that the mandible was
removed to keep the upper skull attached to a pelt. Does anyone have similar
examples of cut marks on canid mandibles/evidence of skinning from Roman (or
other) sites?
Thanks,
Elan Love
Oberlin College
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