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Explaining Uncertainty Avoidance in Meciaprojects: Resource Constraints, Strategic Behaviour, or Institutions?
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RBINS Staff Publications 2021
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Exploitation des ressources végétales et pratiques alimentaires dans le nord de la France entre les Xe et XIIe siècles : études carpologiques de la motte castrale de Boves (Amiens, Somme) et des sites environnants
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Les analyses carpologiques d’un ensemble de six sites situés, pour la plupart, en région Picardie, nous permettent d’appréhender l’exploitation des ressources végétales et les pratiques alimentaires de la France septentrionale entre le Xe et le XIIe siècle. En dépit de biais taphonomiques importants, dus à un matériel conservé par minéralisation et carbonisation, très érodé, une grande variété d’espèces a pu être identifiée. Les assemblages carpologiques montrent que les Blés nus et le Seigle sont les céréales dominantes. De nombreuses légumineuses sont mentionnées mais le Pois et la Vesce cultivée sont les plus abondants, accompagnés de la Féverole. La grande quantité des restes de fruitiers retrouvés, souligne une fructiculture en plein essor de telle sorte que la question sur la mise en culture des « petits fruits des bois » ou l’exploitation des milieux forestiers pour ces denrées est posée. La Vigne semble très bien implantée dans la région. Des restes récurrents de figue nous questionnent sur le statut importé de méditerranée des fruits ou cultivé localement de l’arbre. Sur les six sites étudiés, quatre sont de milieux aisés. Les indices carpologiques caractéristiques du niveau socio-économique d’un site sont principalement discutés à la lumière des pratiques alimentaires. Enfin, le processus de minéralisation est abordé et son induction par des pratiques d’assainissement au sein des latrines/fosses dépotoirs est suggérée. Archaeobotanical investigations of six medieval sites in Northern France (Picardy) have provided charred and mineralised plant remains (seeds and fruits). Despite some taphonomical constraints of the different preservation of these plant assemblages, archaeobotanical analysis revealed valuable information on the diet, the agriculture and the horticultural production of the medieval population in Northern France between 10th and 12th Century AD. The archaeobotanical results were influenced by the different types of features from which macro-remains were retrieved and by the reliability of the samples. The main crops plants were naked wheat and rye. The pulses, pea and common vetch are the major common crops with field bean. Fruits are very abundant and attest a wide-spread fructiculture. The number of recorded remains from the “wild forest fruits” raises the question of their probable cultivation or of their exploitation in forest. The Vineyard seems very well implanted in the region. Recurring macrorests of fig question about the status imported of Mediterranean fruits or cultivated locally by the tree. The social context of 4 archaeological sites is high. The potential of archaeobotanical data helping to identify social differences by defining archaeobotanical indicators of social level is to be discussed from the food practices and the diet. Finally, the mineralization process is approached and its induction by practices of purification within latrines / pits garbage dumps is suggested.
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Exploitation of desert and other wild game in ancient Egypt: the archaeozoological evidence from the Nile Valley
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Bone evidence for wild game found at Late Palaeolithic to New Kingdom sites in the Egyptian Nile Valley is summarised. The compiled data indicate that hartebeest, aurochs and gazelle were the main species hunted during the Late Palaeolithic and Epipalaeolithic. Populations of hartebeest and aurochs were essentially limited to the Nile Valley proper, whereas gazelles could be found in semi-desert and desert environments as well. The population densities of hartebeest and aurochs were probably never very high because of the narrow floodplain, especially in Upper Egypt, and the seasonal effect of the inundations of the Nile. From the Neolithic onwards, domestic livestock took over the role of game as the most important meat provider. Nevertheless, hunting continued to be practiced, and bones of wild game seem to be more important in contexts associated with elite sections of society and/or with ritual activities. Populations of hartebeest and aurochs declined after the Palaeolithic, no doubt because of competition with humans and their flocks. During the Predynastic period, the decline is most clear in Upper Egypt, where from then onwards, the emphasis shifts to gazelles. The Predynastic elite cemetery at Hierakonpolis (locality HK6) yielded the oldest osteological evidence of keeping wild animals in confinement. During the Old to New Kingdom periods, game animals continue to be found in small quantities and from then on, the populations of aurochs and hartebeest may also have started to decline in Lower Egypt. The animals found in the archaeozoological record of the Dynastic period differ from those in the iconographic sources, both quantitatively and qualitatively, except for the gazelles which occur frequently both in the faunal remains and on depictions. The discrepancies can partly be due to the fact that very few ritual, archaeological contexts with fauna are available. The most striking observation from this survey is that true desert animals, such as addax, oryx and ibex, are extremely rare in the archaeozoological record of all periods of the Nile Valley and that the sparse bone finds hence contradict the abundant occurrence and exploitation of these animals suggested by Dynastic iconographical data.
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RBINS Staff Publications
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Exploring sexual dimorphism of human occipital and temporal bones through geometric morphometrics in an identified Western-European sample
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Abstract Sex estimation is a paramount step of bioprofiling in both forensic anthropology and osteoarchaeology. When the pelvis is not optimally preserved, anthropologists commonly rely on the cranium to accurately estimate sex. Over the last decades, the geometric morphometric (GM) approach has been used to determine sexual dimorphism of the crania, in size and shape, overcoming some difficulties of traditional visual and metric methods. This article aims to investigate sexual dimorphism of the occipital and temporal region through GM analysis in a metapopulation of 50 Western-European identified individuals. Statistical analyses were performed to compare centroid size and shape data between sexes through the examination of distinct functional modules. Regression and Procrustes ANOVA were used to examine allometric and asymmetrical implications. Discriminant functions, combining size and shape data, were established. Significant dimorphism in size was found, with males having larger crania, confirming the major influence size has on cranial morphology. Allometric relationships were found to be statistically significant in both right and left temporal bones while shape differences between sexes were only significant on the right temporal bone. The visualization of the mean consensus demonstrated that males displayed a larger mastoid process associated with a reduced mastoid triangle and less projected occipital condyles. This exploratory study confirms that GM analysis represents an effective way to quantitatively capture shape of dimorphic structures, even on complex rounded ones such as the mastoid region. Further examination in a larger sample would be valuable to design objective visualization tools that can improve morphoscopic sex estimation methods.
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RBINS Staff Publications 2022
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Exploring species level taxonomy and species delimitation methods in the facultatively self-fertilizing land snail genus Rumina (Gastropoda: Pulmonata)
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RBINS Staff Publications
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Exploring the bushmeat market in Brussels, Belgium: a clandestine luxury business
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RBINS Staff Publications 2021
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Exploring the potential of Lake Hamana (Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan) to hold a long and reliable sedimentary record of paleo-earthquakes and -tsunami along the Nankai-Suruga Trough.
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Coastal Lake Hamana is located near the convergent tectonic boundary of the Nankai-Suruga Trough, along which the Philippine Sea slab subducts underneath the Eurasian Plate, giving rise to repeated tsunamigenic megathrust earthquakes (Mw≥8). A good understanding of the earthquake- and tsunami-triggering mechanisms in terms of rupture mode and recurrence pattern in time and space, is crucial in order to better estimate the complexity of seismic risks for the densely populated Enshu-nada coast. Based on existing historical data of paleoseismicity (last ~1300 years), the easternmost segment (Tōkai segment) of the Nankai-Suruga Trough appears to exhibit a seismic gap and is expected to rupture in the near future, causing the next “Tōkai earthquake”. Studying the sedimentary infill of Lake Hamana may help to fine-tune hazard assessment in the area of interest. Thanks to its extensive accommodation space, the Hamana lake basin is considered to be a good archive of past “big wave” events. Fieldwork (Oct.-Nov. 2014) comprised a reflection-seismic survey for imaging the lake’s stratigraphic features, based on which favourable locations for gravity coring were selected. A systematic sampling of bottom sediments from different sites enables us to evaluate vertical as well as lateral changes in depositional environment, including event deposits generated by tsunamis and tropical storms (i.e. typhoons). An important part of the study is dedicated to qualitatively distinguish sedimentary facies of storm deposits from the ones generated by tsunamis, since this is an essential step in correctly assessing future hazards. For identification of marine tsunami incursions, a set of sedimentological, geophysical, geochemical and micropaleontological analyses are applied on the core sediments in a multi-proxy approach. Radionuclide dating provides the necessary timeframe and information on prevailing sedimentation rates. Sites bearing the potential of recording complete and long event histories will be sampled with long cores.
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Exploring the potential of Lake Hamana to hold a long and reliable sedimentary record of paleotsunamis along the Nankai-Suruga Trough
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RBINS Staff Publications 2016
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Exploring the shell-based taxonomy of the Sri Lankan land snail Corilla H. and A. Adams, 1855 (Pulmonata: Corillidae) using mitochondrial DNA
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RBINS Staff Publications 2017
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Exploring the use of Cytochrome Oxidase c Subunit 1 (COI) for DNA barcoding of free-living marine nematodes
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Background: The identification of free-living marine nematodes is difficult because of the paucity of easily scorable diagnostic morphological characters. Consequently, molecular identification tools could solve this problem. Unfortunately, hitherto most of these tools relied on 18S rDNA and 28S rDNA sequences, which often lack sufficient resolution at the species level. In contrast, only a few mitochondrial COI data are available for free-living marine nematodes. Therefore, we investigate the amplification and sequencing success of two partitions of the COI gene, the M1-M6 barcoding region and the I3-M11 partition. Methodology: Both partitions were analysed in 41 nematode species from a wide phylogenetic range. The taxon specific primers for the I3-M11 partition outperformed the universal M1-M6 primers in terms of amplification success (87.8\% vs. 65.8\%, respectively) and produced a higher number of bidirectional COI sequences (65.8\% vs 39.0\%, respectively). A threshold value of 5\% K2P genetic divergence marked a clear DNA barcoding gap separating intra-and interspecific distances: 99.3\% of all interspecific comparisons were 〉0.05, while 99.5\% of all intraspecific comparisons were 〈0.05 K2P distance. Conclusion: The I3-M11 partition reliably identifies a wide range of marine nematodes, and our data show the need for a strict scrutiny of the obtained sequences, since contamination, nuclear pseudogenes and endosymbionts may confuse nematode species identification by COI sequences.
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