1.Mammals are a key target group for conservation biology. Insights into the patterns and timing of and driving forces behind their past extinctions help us to understand their present, and to predict and mitigate their future biodiversity loss. Much research has been focused on the intensely debated megafaunal extinctions at the Pleistocene-Holocene transition, whereas the Holocene mammal extinctions have remained less studied.
2.Here, we consider the Holocene extinctions of mammal taxa in the Carpathian Basin, a distinctive and biogeographically well-constrained predominantly lowland region in Central Europe. For the first time, we combine data from palaeontological, archaeozoological, and historical sources for a comprehensive analysis. 3. A total of 11 mammal species, including steppe-dwelling rodents, large carnivores and herbivores, disappeared from the Carpathian Basin during the Holocene. The extinctions are interpreted in the framework of changing habitats and ecosystems, as grasslands and open forests vanished at the westernmost limits of the Eurasian steppe. 4. The temporal distribution of extinctions is non-random; most taxon range terminations are concentrated around two discrete events. Members of the steppe community disappeared between 5000 and 4000 BP, around the Copper AgeBronze Age transition. Large herbivores that found refugia in the forests vanished later, between the 16th and 18th centuries AD. The steppe, forest-steppe ecosystems of the Carpathian Basin suffered a considerable loss in their mammalian fauna, which has significant implications for conservation efforts for the existing similar dry, open habitats in western Eurasia. 5. Further research and better age constraints are needed to establish the causes of extinctions more firmly, but the lack of synchronous and severe climate and vegetation changes and the coincidence with transformations in human history suggest the prime role of anthropogenic disturbance. We conclude that there were two waves of Holocene mammal extinctions of megafaunal character in the Carpathian Basin.
Dietary reconstruction is used to make inferences about the subsistence strategies of ancient human populations, but it may also serve as a proxy to characterise their diverse cultural and technological manifestations. Dental microwear and stable isotope analyses have been shown to be successful techniques for paleodietary reconstruction of ancient populations but, despite yielding complementary dietary information, these techniques have rarely been combined within the same study. Here we present for the first time a comprehensive approach to interpreting ancient lifeways through the results of buccal and occlusal microwear, and δ13C and δ15N isotope analyses applied to the same individuals of prehistoric populations of Hungary from the Middle Neolithic to the Late Bronze Age periods. This study aimed to (a) assess if the combination of techniques yields a more precise assessment of past dietary and subsistence practices, and (b) contribute to our understanding of the dietary patterns of the prehistoric Hungarian populations. Overall, no correlations between microwear and δ13C and δ15N isotope variables were observed, except for a relationship between nitrogen and the vertical and horizontal index. However, we found that diachronic differences are influenced by the variation within the period. Particularly, we found differences in microwear and isotope variables between Middle Neolithic sites, indicating that there were different dietary practices among those populations. Additionally, microwear results suggest no changes in the abrasiveness of the diet, neither food processing methods, despite higher C4 plant resource consumption shown by carbon isotopic signal. Thus, we demonstrate that the integration of dental microwear and carbon and nitrogen stable isotope methodologies can provide complementary information for making inferences about paleodietary habits.
In 1982, a Late Iron Age horse burial was excavated in a large pit at the Iron Age settlement-complex of Sopron-Krautacker. A brief discussion about the horse and its ritual and cultural contexts was published in 1998 by Erzsébet Jerem. A more detailed description of the horse (pit 228) and the sacrificial ritual are the subject of this study. Based on the characteristics of the skull and the postcranial parts, the horse can be classified into a prehistoric type occurring in areas of the Central and Eastern Mediterranean. The nearest comparative horse type is found in the Northern Italian Veneto. Large stature (1.4–1.5 m) Iron Age horses are known at only a few sites in Hungary. According to our present knowledge, large Iron Age horses rarely occur in East-Central-Europe, and are imported from the Eastern-Balkan or the coastal regions of the Eastern Mediterranean.
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