Publications by authors named "Didier Berthet"
Adulis, located on the Red Sea coast in present-day Eritrea, was a bustling trading centre between the first and seventh centuries CE. Several classical geographers-Agatharchides of Cnidus, Pliny the Elder, Strabo-noted the value of Adulis to Greco-Roman Egypt, particularly as an emporium for living animals, including baboons ( spp.).
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- Millions of mummified birds, mainly ibises, have been found in Egypt, raising questions about whether they were farmed or hunted for religious purposes.
- Isotopic analysis of mummified ibises and birds of prey indicates that while ibises had a diet from the Nile, they showed greater dietary variability than ancient Egyptians, suggesting they were not bred locally.
- The findings support the idea that most mummified ibises and all birds of prey were wild animals that were hunted rather than raised for rituals.
Reconstructing the living environment of extinct vertebrates is often challenging due to the lack of proxies. We propose a new proxy to the living environment based on the combined oxygen and sulphur stable isotope analysis of vertebrate hydroxyapatite. We tested this isotopic proxy to 64 biogenic apatite (bones) samples that represent a wide spectrum of the extant vertebrate phylogenetic diversity including crocodiles, snakes, turtles, mammals, birds, lizards, fish and amphibians.
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