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Dear Nellie,
 
Thanks for posting the bone pics - they have been a fascinating distraction! One of the groups of bones (pic img_3599) has the appearance of bones that have been subjected to quite a high through-put of ground water, resulting in patchy dissolution of the surface. Whether that is more likely to have happened in 'cave' or in 'settlement' depends entirely upon the sediments concerned. However, if the 'settlement' context is likely to have been a free-draining, clast-supported limestone rubble in some kind of cut, and maybe not deeply buried below the modern surface, then that would sem to be a likely burial environment for the bones in img_3599.
I'm really basing that on what I have seen of bones from surface and cave contexts in the much cooler karstic landscape of northern England. Shallow surface contexts often yield bones that show patchy dissolution, with little survival of structural organics, whereas cave sediments tend to yield bones with better-surviving organic content and marked superficial staining from minerals in solution. The surfaces of the bones are stained but preserved, rather than dissolved.
However, that's a lot of generalisation, and Yorkshire is not Greece!
 
Best wishes,
 
Terry 
 
 

***********************************
Prof Terry O'Connor
Department of Archaeology
University of York
Kings Manor
York YO1 7EP
 http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/arch/staff/OConnor.htm
Editor, International Journal of Osteoarchaeology
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/jhome/5488

-----Original Message-----
From: Analysis of animal remains from archaeological sites [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Nellie Phoca-Cosmetatou
Sent: 23 March 2007 15:15
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [ZOOARCH] Carstic bone taphonomy- cont.

Dear All,

As a follow up to my email of last week, I've posted 3 photos of bones from a (predominantly) Neolithic site in Greece on the BoneCommons website.

http://www.alexandriaarchive.org/icaz/icazForum/viewtopic.php?p=941#941

They come from two contexts (a cave and a settlement) but the contexts had been mixed together in the same bags, so we don't know which is which... As the bed rock of the whole area is soft limestone, we have been wondering what are the different taphonomic processes that might have caused this differing preservation, and whether we can identify (probably chemically) the provenance of the bones from each of the two contexts.

Any thoughts on the matter would be very welcome! And many thanks to all of you who have already offered advice and suggestions.

Many thanks,

Nellie

------- Forwarded message follows -------
From:                         Self <[log in to unmask]>
To:                             [log in to unmask]
Subject:                    Carstic bone taphonomy
Date sent:                  Tue, 13 Mar 2007 11:15:14 -0000


Dear All,

I'm studying the bones from an old excavation (Neolithic, Greece),
whose context is unclear. I was wondering whether there is a way-
chemical?- of identifying what taphonomic processes were involved.

The bones come from two contexts: one is a cave and the other is a
house/ settlement. The bones from the house were almost quasi- surface
finds- about 50cm deep. As the bags with the bones are mixed, we do
not know which ones come from the cave and which from the house. So we
are wondering whether there is a way of figuring out what taphonomic
processes the bones have undergone to comment on their provenance.

The complicating factor is that the bed rock of the whole area is a
soft limestone. So the question is whether the preservation of the
bones- which some indicate a cave/ limestone taphonomic origin- might
be due to their location in a limestone matrix, thus coming from the
house, and not just to a carstic/ cave environment.

I'm happy to forward photographs of some of the bones if anybody is
interested.

Many thanks for any ideas you might have!
Best wishes,

Nellie


------- End of forwarded message -------

----------------------------
Dr. Nellie Phoca-Cosmetatou
Research Fellow & Tutor in Archaeology and Anthropology
Keble College, Oxford OX1 3PG
Tel:  +44 (0)1865 282395
Fax: +44 (0)1865 272705
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
http://www.keble.ox.ac.uk/academics/about/dr-nellie-phoca-cosmetatou

"Engrave yourself somewhere, in any possible way,
and then again erase yourself with magnanimity"
                                                            O. Elytis