Abstract:

In past decades, researchers primarily focused on the distinguishing characteristics of marks on bone surfaces, such as cut marks, percussion marks and categories of modifications, which are widely considered as direct indicators ancient human behaviors. While earlier investigations often attributed tooth markings found on animal remains to carnivore or rodent consumption habits, recent work by Western archaeologists and ethnoarchaeological researchers consistently demonstrates that humans can inflict a category of modifications on bones during their chewing. In such studies, researchers have also attempted to find ways to distinguish human tooth marks from those produced by other carnivores through actualistic experiments. However, few scholars in China have focused on identifying human tooth marks on animal remains. The current study is thus serving as a complementary work upon prior investigations and at the same time adding to the growing evidence to show that humans do indeed leave discernible dental imprints upon animal skeletal remains during consumption processes—particularly upon flatter or more fragile bones. Damages observed on bones include furrowing, scooping-out, crenulated and saw-toothed edges, longitudinal cracking, crushing, peeling and score. In this paper, we present a detailed description of the types of damages observable on bone surfaces in an experimental human chewing of the bones of sheep. A total of 167 chewed post-cranial bones from different parts of sheep have been examined, including 122 boiled bones and 45 roasted ones. Our experimental observation indicates that, although there is a certain degree of morphological similarity between human tooth marks and those marks caused by carnivores, the former assemblage could still be confidently identified and it thus has the potential to provide us with an independent standard for identifying human actors in faunal remains from the archaeological hominins. On the other hand, the description of human chewing patterns may provide further evidence of exploitation of certain groups of animals where cut-marks are rare, such as small games or birds. Furthermore, this experiment provides valuable materials for the comparative analysis and of human tooth-marked from the Chinese archaeological sites. Additionally, the types of tooth marks observed in this experiment are largely consistent with the findings of Western scientists, indicating that these observations have a considerable degree of universality and can be applied to the study of archaeological materials across a broader geographical range. The present paper is the first attempt made by Chinese archaeologists to document human tooth marks in an actualistic setting and it has the potential to provide us with a novel approach to explore human subsistence strategies in Paleolithic China.

Key words: Human tooth marks, Zooarchaeology, Taphonomy, Experiment, Cannibalism