Publications by authors named "Suzanne E Pilaar Birch"

Stable isotope data have made pivotal contributions to nearly every discipline of the physical and natural sciences. As the generation and application of stable isotope data continues to grow exponentially, so does the need for a unifying data repository to improve accessibility and promote collaborative engagement. This paper provides an overview of the design, development, and implementation of IsoBank (www.

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The Bronze Age village of Politiko-Troullia, located in the foothills of the copper-bearing Troodos mountains of central Cyprus, was occupied ~2050-1850 cal BCE. Excavated evidence shows that community activities included copper metallurgy (ore processing, smelting and casting), crop cultivation, and rearing of livestock. Faunal analysis reveals day-to-day subsistence practices that included consumption of sheep, goat, cattle, and pig, as well as community-scale ritual feasting focused on fallow deer, Dama dama mesopotamica.

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The movements of ancient crop and animal domesticates across prehistoric Eurasia are well-documented in the archaeological record. What is less well understood are the precise mechanisms that farmers and herders employed to incorporate newly introduced domesticates into their long-standing husbandry and culinary traditions. This paper presents stable isotope values (δC, δN) of humans, animals, and a small number of plants from the Hexi Corridor, a key region that facilitated the movement of ancient crops between Central and East Asia.

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The origins of agriculture in Southwest Asia over 10,000 years ago and its subsequent spread into Europe during the Neolithic have been the focus of much archaeological research over the past several decades. Increasingly more sophisticated analytical techniques have allowed for better understanding of the complex interactions that occurred amongst humans, animals, and their environments during this transition. The Aegean Islands are critically situated where Anatolia and the mainland Greece meet, making the region pivotal for understanding the movement of the Neolithic into Europe.

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The zooarchaeological research presented here investigates Neolithic and Chalcolithic (ca. 6500-5000 cal. BC) animal exploitation strategies at Uğurlu Höyük on the Turkish island of Gökçeada in the northeastern Aegean Sea.

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Zooarchaeological and paleoecological investigations have traditionally been unable to reconstruct the ethology of herd animals, which likely had a significant influence on the mobility and subsistence strategies of prehistoric humans. In this paper, we reconstruct the migratory behavior of red deer (Cervus elaphus) and caprids at the Pleistocene-Holocene transition in the northeastern Adriatic region using stable oxygen isotope analysis of tooth enamel. The data show a significant change in δ18O values from the Pleistocene into the Holocene, as well as isotopic variation between taxa, the case study sites, and through time.

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