Tracking turtles in the past: zooarchaeological evidence for human-turtle interactions in the ancient Eastern Mediterranean

Abstract

Abstract

Threatened North African seagrass meadows have supported green turtle populations for millennia

“…Analysed remains from the three archaeological sites most likely derive from exploited breeding or nesting sea turtle populations, as these aggregations would have been easiest to target. Based on regression formulas from breadth of shaft measurements of sea turtle humeri, assumed C. mydas from Kinet Höyük have curved carapace lengths which range from 64 to 98 cm, and assumed C. caretta from Tell Fadous-Kfarabida have a straight carapace length which range from 71 to 78 cm ( 16 ), increasing confidence that turtle bones sampled came from adults. Prior to destructive sampling, all bones were scanned using a three dimensional scanner and reconstructed to have a record of the unsampled specimen.…”

“…Further information about the archaeological sites sea turtle remains come from can be found in ref. 16 , and Dataset S1 , but we describe them in short:…”

“…Sea turtle remains analyzed are from the Middle and Late Iron Ages. In this paper, we refer to the Kinet Höyük sea turtles as dating to approximately ~2,700 years B.P.. During this period, sea turtles account for 10.5% of the zooarchaeological assemblage in minimum number of individuals estimates ( 16 ). The majority (71%) of bones analyzed here are humeri, some of which had previously been analyzed for species ID via osteology and osteometry ( 18 ).…”

“…to the Late Iron Age (~2,700 - 2,500 years B.P.) ( 16 ). We analyzed sea turtle bones from three Levantine archaeological settlements dating back to the Middle and Late Holocene ( Fig.…”

Grouping groupers in the Mediterranean: Ecological baselines revealed by ancient proteins

“…2400 BC–1400 AD (Table S1 ). Kinet Höyük is a coastal settlement site located in present‐day Turkey in the northeastern corner of the Mediterranean in Iskenderun Bay (36.8536° N, 36.1572° E; Çakırlar et al., 2021 ; Gates, 2013 , 2015 ). Archaeological, often fragmented, fish bones were visually identified as groupers or combers using the modern reference collection at the Groningen Institute of Archaeology.…”