Protecting Michigan State's Material Culture
Hi! My name is Jerielle and I’m a first year CAP fellow, working on my PhD in forensic anthropology. I have an undergraduate degree in biology and a masters degree in forensic anthropology. Unlike many other CAP fellows, my interests lean more towards (human) skeletal …
This summer was an eventful one for the Campus Archaeology Program field crew! We monitored construction, conducted several pedestrian and shovel test surveys, excavated one test unit, conducted lab analysis, and helped with the IB STEM archaeology camp and grandparents university. Plus, we uncovered an …
As you may know from my previous blog posts, I have been working on analyzing the faunal remains from Campus Archaeology excavations. My current research project focuses on the Saints’ Rest trash midden, excavated in several seasons by CAP near the location where Saints’ Rest once stood. Because of the sites’ use as a small public dumping area, the artifacts recovered are expected to reflect the daily life of those living at and nearby Saints’ Rest dormitory. The end goal of this research project, in conjunction with research by Lisa Bright, Amy Michael, Jeff Painter, and Susan Kooiman, is to better understand the everyday lives of the early MSU students.
This work would not have been possible without a trip to the comparative collection at the Illinois State Museum Research and Collection Center. I was able to finish the identifications, including the trickier bones, thanks to the help of Dr. Terrance Martin! Below are a few photos of the archaeological bones compared to the comparative collection skeletons that confirmed their identification.
Now that I have completed the analysis of the faunal (animal) remains uncovered during the excavation, I can begin to interpret the data. From the trash midden, I analyzed four hundred and eighty eight bones, weighting a total of 6655.53 grams! Out of those, I was able to identify 129 bones to an animal family and/or species level. The most prevalent species, accounting for 63% of all identified bone specimens was Bos taurus, otherwise known as cow. Other identified species include domestic pig (Sus scrofa), sheep/goat (Ovis/Capra), domesticated chicken (Gallus gallus), and sucker fish (Catostomidae), as well as one unidentified shell! The remaining 359 bones were unidentifiable mammal bone fragments.
Below are several diagrams, including cow, pig, and sheep/goat skeletons. Within these diagrams, I have highlighted the elements that are present within the Saints’ Rest Midden. As you can see, there are many more cow skeletal elements than pig or sheep/goat including bones from head to (almost) tail. The pig elements were limited to skull, teeth, and a rib, while the sheep/goat bones include only a portion of an eye orbit and scapula.
Preliminary calculations of the minimum number of individual species indicate that there were at least two cows, one pig, one sheep/goat, one chicken, and one sucker fish. Possible species of sucker fish include a common sucker (Catostomus sp.) or redhorse sucker (Moxostoma sp.). The fish bone comes from a species that would typically be found in freshwater rivers and lakes and could have been found locally near MSU (Michigan DNR; Lucas and Baras 2008). Many cow bones showed evidence for butchering, including saw marks and cut marks (29 bones, 38%). At least four bones within the faunal assemblage were cut very distinctly, creating round-cut steaks (see image of round-cut steak below).
All of this information is beginning to give us a glimpse into the food consumption and deposition patterns of the early MSU students and staff. The next step, besides analyzing bones from more deposits, will be to incorporate my findings with those of other CAP researchers in order to form a more complete understanding of the lives of the first MSU students and staff. Stay tuned to learn what we uncover as we combine all of our lines of evidence!
Author: Autumn Painter
Sources:
Michigan DNR: http://www.michigan.gov/dnr/0,4570,7-153-10364_53405-214015–,00.html
Round-cut Steak Image: https://www.thriftyfun.com/Round-Steak-Recipes.html
Migration of Freshwater Fishes by Martyn Lucas and Etienne Baras. John Wiley & Sons (2008)
Over the past year, I have been working on identifying the animal (faunal) bone material excavated by the Campus Archaeology Program. Currently, I have been working on bones that were recovered during the Saint’s Rest excavation. Saint’s Rest was the first dormitory on campus, and …
The analysis of animal bones from historic MSU involves more than the identification of species. While it is important to determine the species that were being consumed, we are also very interested in the specific portions of animals that were being purchased and produced by …
What is zooarchaeology and how is it actually done? This is a question that I get a lot when I talk about my research. Zooarchaeology is the study of non-human animal remains; specifically this involves the identification of animal species from archaeological contexts. However, it’s not as simple as just looking at a bone and easily knowing what it is right away! Typically, within archaeological contexts, animal bones are highly fragmented, leaving the zooarchaeologist with small pieces of an animal skeletal element. This fragmentation could be from both human and natural processes including: the butchering process, disposal practices, trampling, exposure to scavenging animals, and/or weathering.
So how are zooarchaeologists supposed to figure out what the broken bones are if they don’t look like a normal skeletal element, like an entire femur or scapula? To determine the identifications of archaeological animal bones, zooarchaeologists use a comparative collection. A comparative collection is a collection of identified animal bones by species and skeletal element.
Step One:
The first step in analyzing animal remains is to sort the bones by animal class: mammal, fish, reptile/amphibian, and bird. It is possible to separate bones by animal class because each animal class is different, and can be determined visually by zooarchaeologists.
Step Two:
After the animal bones are sorted by class, the next step is to sort them by skeletal element (if possible). These first two steps allow for easier use of comparative collections for specific identifications.
Step Three:
Zooarchaeologists then take the sorted animal remains one item at a time, and based off of their initial evaluations compare each bone to the bones of previously identified species within the comparative collection. For example, if I have a bone that is thicker and/or larger than most of my mammal animal remains from a prehistoric archaeological site that is located in an area that has a lot of white-tail deer (Odocoileus virginianus), I would start by looking at the deer comparative skeleton to identify the bone.
Campus Archaeology
Conducting zooarchaeological research at MSU is a little more difficult than you would expect because there is not an established zooarchaeological comparative collection. However, I have been working with the MSU Museum for the past year on developing one! While it is not finished, we have selected complete skeletons that have been reviewed and deemed fit to be included in the comparative collection. After I finish as much analysis as I can using the MSU Museum comparative collection, I will take the remaining unidentified animal bones to Springfield Illinois, to use the collection at the Illinois State Museum Research and Collection Center.
Currently, I am in the process of pulling out the animal bones recovered during the Campus Archaeology excavations of site from the Early Period of MSU’s history (1855-1870). Below are some photos of the bones that I will be analyzing in the coming months!
With these identifications, we are able to estimate the number of individuals that are found, the seasonality of the resources exploited, meat cuts based off of butchering methods, or even how different pieces of meat from the same animal are distributed. Stay tuned to learn about the results of the animal bone analysis and the methods we use to make our interpretations!
Author: Autumn Painter
Analyzing and interpreting past food practices has always been one of my passions. This year for CAP, I will be working with Susan Kooiman to explore and recreate the food environment during the Early Period of MSU’s campus (1855-1870), as explained in Susan’s previous blog post. While …
If you missed my poster two weeks ago at the Midwest Historical Archaeology Conference hosted at MSU, I’m also going to share my research here on the CAP blog. The poster, entitled “What’s for Supper? Food preferences and availability at the Agricultural College of the …
Thinking about sustainability, particularly in a historical context, is a complicated task. I knew little about sustainability before starting this project, but the idea was nevertheless enticing, and I began researching the meaning of the term. Definitions are numerous and multifaceted and most are not useful for archaeological research, but the aspect called “sustainable development” adds tangibility. Sustainability in its simplest form means to maintain the current system, implying conservation. Sustainable development means to consider the potential needs of the future while living within carrying capacity. The foundations of modern sustainability were in place well before MSU’s agricultural experiments were envisioned and gained momentum over time. The years leading up to the Revolutionary War constituted the very first “Buy American” movement. Nineteenth century agrarian idealism led to advances in agricultural efficiency. Depression-era advocates of permanent agriculture considered the needs of future generations. From an archaeologist’s perspective, both ecological and economic factors are potential evidence for examining sustainable development in the past.
Determining the level of sustainable development at MSU over time at first seemed overwhelming because of the long history of the University and the sheer amount of possible evidence, both archaeological and historical. As a starting point, I began analyzing the faunal remains excavated on campus, with the hope of seeing a pattern in what early students ate and how they acquired their meat. I have been recording species, approximate age, and standard cut. Most remains came from a trash deposit at Saints’ Rest, excavated in 2008-09, one of the earliest historic sites on campus. The bones appear to have been butchered by hand, but it is yet unclear if the animals were acquired locally or were owned by the Agricultural College. Digging in the archives should help me to solve that mystery!
Food production is an important aspect of sustainable development, and the results from an agricultural school will be especially interesting. For the project, I will also be looking at transportation and construction at MSU since 1857. Changes in these three variables over time will allow us to see changes in sustainability on campus and how it fits within the greater historical context of development in the United States.
Author: Grace Krause
With any archaeological assemblage, excavation is only a small part of the research process. Preliminary care and identification in the field is not designed to hold up for long-term storage and analysis. You may remember my previous post about the faunal identification process, which was …
