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Lookup NU author(s): Professor Geoffrey Bailey
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The worldwide increase in shell midden deposits on coastlines during the Holocene has been variously explained as the result of human population growth, economic intensification, changes in the visibility of midden deposits with changes in sea level, or climatic and environmental changes. Since coastlines are relatively unstable in geological and ecological terms, and since many archaeological sequences span periods of major climatic change, a critical issue is the ability to disentangle palaeoenvironmental from cultural and anthropogenic effects. We draw on a case study from the cave sequences of northern Spain to illustrate the problems and possibilities of palaeoeconomic and palaeoenvironmental interpretation, using studies of palaeogeographical context and analysis of abundance, taxonomic representation, ecological tolerances, size, growth structures, and other physical and chemical characteristics of the molluscs themselves. We demonstrate that the dominant, but by no means exclusive, factor in archaeologically visible long-term changes in shell-gathering behavior is environmental change rather than cultural change. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Author(s): Bailey GN, Craighead AS
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Geoarchaeology
Year: 2003
Volume: 18
Issue: 2
Pages: 175-204
ISSN (print): 0883-6353
ISSN (electronic): 1520-6548
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/gea.10057
DOI: 10.1002/gea.10057
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