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Where in the World? Part Four: The Zooarchaeology of Asia - Ep 48
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RE-POST: Sorry for the duplicate episode. Had to post a correction! Ignore if you've already heard Ep 48.
Welcome to episode three of a miniseries focusing on the zooarchaeology of various world regions. This episode is centred around Asian zooarchaeology, focusing on the natural history and anatomy of the most prominent wild and domesticated species found throughout the continent. Tune in to learn how pandas were mistaken for tapirs, grunting oxen and oracle bones.
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Transcript
Introduction to Archaeo Animals Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network.
Exploring Zooarchaeology in Asia
00:00:15
Speaker
Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of Archaeo Animals, the podcast all about zoarchaeology. I'm your host, Alex Fitzpatrick, and with me, as always... Si buona, salangas. See, now I'm like trying to do the ASMR thing, but I can't because I'm a New Yorker and I'm too loud. Maybe we'll do that for an episode. We'll do an entirely ASMR episode, you know? The bone whisperers? Yeah, just bang a bone. Just bang the bone on the mic.
00:00:46
Speaker
Anyway, today's episode we are.
00:00:50
Speaker
returning, not really returning, we've been doing this series this whole time, but we are doing another episode in our mini series that we've called Where in the World, which is letting us finally break out of our British shells and enter other parts of the world to take a look at the zoo archaeology there. And we're going continent by continent for ease. So a lot of space to cover, but we'll try to do our best. And today we'll be looking at Asia.
00:01:19
Speaker
Yes, so roughly, as for the other episodes, the way it's going to work, so we'll cover some of the wild species that are prominent in this region, and then we'll focus on the domesticates. And finally, what is allegedly your favourite? The case studies.
00:01:37
Speaker
our so-called favourite part of the episode, but I think it's a good part of the episode, so let's get- I think we can't take a hint, because we've said it so many times, you would have thought that someone would have reinforced that on social media, going, yes, it is our favourite part of the episode, but it's been very quiet, so I think we just can't take a hint. It's called manifesting, Simona.
00:02:00
Speaker
We're manifesting it into reality. Anyway, we will, as Simona said, start with the wild species that are native to this region
Debate on Tiger Subspecies
00:02:09
Speaker
of the world. And we'll start with the tiger. And as always, Simona will be doing the Latin because I cannot. Thank you. Thank you.
00:02:20
Speaker
And although historically the tiger was distributed throughout Asia, today it is mostly found in the southeast and northeast Asia. And interestingly, this is something I didn't know until we started doing the research for this episode, I didn't realize that
00:02:39
Speaker
The topic of tiger subspecies was such a huge side of debate among geneticists. I guess that's not really our lane. But yeah, there seems to be a general lack of consensus as to how many actually exist, which is, I mean, to be fair, I don't think I could tell you how many subspecies there were from most animals off the top of my head.
00:03:06
Speaker
So it's not really a thing you can easily see by bone, is it? No, probably just something at the genetic level. And also if you realize, put it into perspective, I mean, there's so many subspecies, but because you know, originally, that's such a wide range. I mean, it's a big continent. Pretty big.
00:03:26
Speaker
would see a lot of variation there, but yeah, probably at a genetic level, mostly not in terms of skeletal remains. Yeah, so it's not really something we personally get to cover, although again, you know, I assume you can see it through, say, a DNA
00:03:43
Speaker
work, things like that. And obviously, as AD network becomes more commonplace, I'm sure that there'll be some sites where zooarchaeologically they'll get down to the subspecies, which is pretty cool, to be honest. So it's been
00:03:59
Speaker
a massive debate among geneticists and biologists as to how many subspecies there are among tigers, but genome sequencing in 2018 may have finally narrowed down the actual number to around six subspecies, and for once I won't make Simone read all the Latin names because there's tons of Latin names for her to read in this episode, but
00:04:24
Speaker
Just to say, list the common ones, you have the Bengal tiger, the Amur tiger, the South China tiger, the Sumatran tiger, the Indo-Chinese tiger, and the Malayan tiger. Speaking of tigers, my cat is now staring at me and she's leaving because she's bored of this podcast.
00:04:43
Speaker
So. So she's the only real tiger. She's the only real tiger has left. Now she's just sat behind me, so it's fine. We do have a tiger in our midst for this episode.
Cultural Significance of Tigers
00:04:54
Speaker
Anyway, tigers have held a cultural importance throughout the Asian continent, both in the past and also in the present. Remains have historically been used as amulets and as medicine, particularly in Chinese traditional medicine, which is
00:05:13
Speaker
I think a lot of people think of Chinese traditional medicine as mostly plants and herbs, and it definitely is. But Chinese traditional medicine also uses a lot of animal parts and also things like stones and metals. It's a very big kind of
00:05:29
Speaker
fields that I'm obviously very interested in. But yeah, tiger remains have been used as medicine in Chinese traditional medicine, but I believe laws have now made that a lot more difficult, unsurprisingly. And speaking of China, tigers are also the third animal in the Chinese zodiac. They represent the earth element. And it's not just China, though. In Korea, the tiger is seen as a guardian against evil. And
00:05:57
Speaker
This is where we have to shoehorn one of our favorites, so get that bingo card out. Guess who would import tigers? The Phoenicians. Oh. No, don't be silly, Simona. It's the Romans. They would import tigers as part of their menageries and combat theater.
00:06:20
Speaker
Duh. Think of that. I mean, who else? But yes, you do find tigers being depicted on Roman mosaics, of course, for a lot of the combat theater scenes or even sort of seen tigers or similar sort of wild animals being sort of corralled from the wild Romans.
00:06:44
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I feel like you wouldn't be wrong for the most part if you see any kind of non-European animal and you're like, the Romans probably took that back with them, right? Like, I feel like there's a smaller list of species they didn't take back. So the ones that they didn't voluntarily take, they took with them by mistake. True. We have a whole episode about that kind of
00:07:12
Speaker
straggler animals, and you can find that in our backlog. But how have we finally reached Roman exhaustion? Oh, you say that. Sure, that's just tempting you at this point. I'm looking forward to finding out how we get Romans into our episode on Australia. Oh, well, we'll find a way.
00:07:34
Speaker
That's true. Anyway, we'll move on to our next species, the giant panda.
Giant Pandas: Classification and Icon of China
00:07:40
Speaker
Just to see find any research to see if the Romans grabbed any of those from the wild. Yeah, the giant panda.
00:07:47
Speaker
Aeluropoda melanoleuca is rarely found in China and you have two subspecies. The Aeluropoda melanoleuca melanoleuca, just stress it twice, you know, which is, you know, your typical black and white giant panda that usually like it tends to be more in people's imagination. The kindling panda, the Aeluropoda melanoleuca kinlegensis. I hope you wrote that down.
00:08:14
Speaker
And this other subspecies is light brown and white in colour. Now, prior to the 19th century, the giant panda was classified in Chinese as mole. However, this was also the name for a mythical creature that had the trunk of an elephant, the feet of a tiger, the eyes of a rhino and the tail of a cow. I'm trying to picture that. Well, I mean, you don't really have to imagine it because
00:08:40
Speaker
The reason why there's some confusion is some French expert made the mistake of thinking that moi referred to a tapir, which is basically what they look like.
00:08:56
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, actually, if people do want to look it up, it's spelled M-O, yeah, phonetically. It does look like, you kind of can't blame them, because it does look like a taper. Oh, okay. But I mean, obviously, this has had a knockdown effect on archaeological interpretations of material culture depicting the bow.
00:09:18
Speaker
the mythical creature, causing archaeologists to infer that the tapir had held a much higher symbolic importance than it actually had, as of course the iconography of the mythical creature was used to repel evil.
00:09:36
Speaker
Yeah, anyway, giant pandas remain the icon of China and they're cool and they're not tapirs. So jot that down. Have we learned anything today? Yes, pandas are not tapirs.
00:09:50
Speaker
To be fair, I can't believe I'm making this kind of giving them the leeway. But for people who don't know, Chinese language can be very difficult because you can have the same word and then depending on the way you use the tones, they could mean like six different things. So
00:10:11
Speaker
It's not surprising to me that there was this kind of weird mix up with the mall. And to be honest, I, as some listeners may know, I'm Chinese American. So I do know some Chinese, but I am most likely doing the tones wrong in this episode. So apologies to any Chinese speakers who are going, oh, my gosh, the tones are wrong. She is nobody what she's saying. She's saying something completely different. Apologies for that. But yeah, so
00:10:40
Speaker
Yeah, I just found a photo, you know, to be fair. It looks so much like it.
00:10:49
Speaker
Like, you can't really fault them. If I looked at that, I'd be like, that's a tapir. And if you look back at some of the archeological kind of depictions of what people thought were tapirs and were actually the moa, you would also think that. So, I mean, I think it's only something that's kind of within the last couple of decades has really had a real evaluation, but it's interesting for sure. So pandas, not tapirs.
00:11:17
Speaker
Very important lesson.
Cultural and Historical Role of Asian Elephants
00:11:20
Speaker
Anyway, I think we should get to our last wild species, which is the Asian elephant.
00:11:30
Speaker
Now, we have covered the African elephant previously, so there's not that much different to really talk about, at least, you know, biologically, anatomically. The Asian elephant is spread throughout South and Southeast Asia and has three subspecies.
00:11:51
Speaker
Okay, here we go. The Eliphos Maximus Maximus, so like the big, big, you know, which is the Sri Lankan elephant. Eliphos Maximus Indicus, which is the mainland Asian elephant, and Eliphos Maximus Sumatranus, the Sumatran elephant. Good job.
00:12:09
Speaker
I'm always impressed by your ability. I mean, it makes sense. I know that you are Italian, so it's not that difficult, but that is extremely difficult for me. And I took four terms of Latin, so good job. I just read it with an Italian accent.
00:12:29
Speaker
I mean, it's a good tip for people who are trying to speak Latin. Any any high school or college students out there who are taking Latin right now, take some other advice. If you don't remember how to pronounce something, just do it in Italian accent. You'll probably make your way through. Oh, I'm getting really horrible scenes now.
00:12:53
Speaker
Anyway, so getting back to the elephant. During the Mesolithic, meat was likely scavenged from fallen elephants with actual elephant hunts, probably being rare given, you know, it's a bit difficult, I think, to hunt an elephant, particularly with
00:13:11
Speaker
kind of low grade or not as sophisticated weaponry. So understandable, I feel like. It's a high risk, a high gain, but also very high risk. I think one of them sort of touches you ever so slightly. You're pretty much done for probably.
00:13:28
Speaker
True, this is extremely true. Now, during the Neolithic, elephant remains, particularly the ivory from his tusks, would become much more prevalent in archaeological contexts as worked artifacts. Elephants would become, unsurprisingly, a very important part of cultural iconography, particularly in Harappan material culture, which we will talk about later. Spoiler alert.
00:13:56
Speaker
And in places like Kerala, India, the elephant is actually a central component to local rituals and festivals having been historically woven into local legends and lore to the point that I think there's like 700 elephants that are owned by either organizations or individuals in Kerala. So big, big importance on elephants there.
00:14:23
Speaker
And I think that's kind of going to be the running theme this episode, not elephant, but the kind of running theme of iconography and cultural importance that exists today. And I think we've touched upon this in previous episodes, but it is interesting to see how far some of this iconography lasts and how much we still have these kind of associations with certain species that
00:14:51
Speaker
are actually thousands of years old. You know, like how we all mistake the tapier for a panda. It makes me wonder particularly about a lot of the interpretations we have, like of representations of animals. Yeah, I guess. Sorry, I don't know what I'm saying. No, I think if I'm understanding what you're about to say, I'm reading your mind correctly across time and space.
00:15:18
Speaker
I feel like it could be a tricky thing in it's almost chicken and egg, do we? And make this interpretation because we already think this way about said animal, or is this more of a interpretation that has like contextual evidence? That makes sense. But not related at all. I want to know what's the deal with the cats riding the snails in illuminated manuscripts?
00:15:46
Speaker
Again, that's, you know, a very common cultural thing that exists to this day. All those snails being ridden by cats. Because I feel like that would have been a beautiful sort of folklore legend that's been lost to time. And now it's just memes. Yeah, now it's just on that weird medieval guy's Twitter, which makes me laugh every single time I see it.
00:16:08
Speaker
And I think as we ponder these very deep questions as to whether or not cats riding snails has deeper cultural connotations, I think we will take a break and we'll come back and talk a bit more about domesticates, all those really different domesticated species. And it's definitely not going to be very similar to the last couple of episodes. And it's definitely not going to be just various iterations of cattle. Oh, no.
Domestication and Diversity of Cattle
00:16:38
Speaker
And we are back with Archaeo Animals, the podcast all about zoarchaeology. And we are talking about the zoarchaeology of Asia today as part of our Where in the World mini series. And now we'll be looking at the domesticated species from this region that definitely won't be just several different species of cattle at all. Well, so much slightly, like, furrier than others.
00:17:07
Speaker
Yeah, but yeah, OK. I'll be honest, folks, it's we did talk about this in a previous episode, I think, but domesticated species kind of similar throughout the world. And obviously we do get different species. But unsurprisingly, we all have very similar needs and so very similar types of species were domesticated.
00:17:34
Speaker
So yes, we tried to go for domesticated species that are not quite what we'd find sort of across the board. So like moving aside from our chickens and our sheep. Although we obviously do cover those in various different species. And I think that's been one of the kind of interesting things about this mini series is seeing how
00:17:57
Speaker
You know, even though we have every place kind of seems to have their own cattle, their own sheep, their own chicken, really something adjacent to that. There are slight differences that are very, you know, regionals specific, culturally specific. So.
00:18:16
Speaker
constants and variables, I guess, which is interesting. I guess that's not capital that I find quite interesting, not quite species, but various breeds of a given species are all the Imperial Chinese chicken breeds.
00:18:34
Speaker
mainly, well they're kept throughout the world now, but mainly sort of us all the lentil chickens because we're laying eggs that are really not good. But there's some beautiful breeds of birds. Yes, definitely. And we love our duck in China.
00:18:54
Speaker
I could have done duck to talk about that sentry egg, which is still very gross to me. Apologies to my Chinese family members. I don't get it. Anyway, we won't be talking about ducks or birds at all. Sorry, did you have something to say?
00:19:13
Speaker
Yeah, very much not birds, really. So we will start with the water buffalo.
Origins of Water Buffalo Domestication
00:19:21
Speaker
Buballus buballis. It's a very cute name. Oh, it's so cute. I love that name so much. So originally from South and Southeast Asia, they are actually found throughout Europe, which I actually didn't know.
00:19:38
Speaker
And like many of these species, there are different types. So there are two distinct types of water buffalo. So there's the river buffalo, which is found mainly in India and the swamp buffalo, which is found in southeast and eastern Asia. Yeah, like about the water buffalo being found in Europe. So normally when you do find sort of buffalo meat, it does tend to be water buffalo. Oh, I know that. Interesting.
00:20:08
Speaker
wonder why now easy to keep i don't know
00:20:12
Speaker
So the modern day water buffalo is domesticated. There is, unsurprisingly, again, another theme in these episodes. There's some debate as to where the water buffalo was actually domesticated. And it's originally been assumed that it was domesticated in China, but more recent, or at least within the past decade, there's been genetic research that has suggested otherwise
00:20:40
Speaker
One of the things about this, we were talking about how there's only so many species that can get domesticated. One of the things we'll find in this episode with all the different cattle we'll be talking about is that Asia, and to be honest, China as well,
00:21:00
Speaker
Being as big as of a continent it is, it's very vast and varied when it comes to the types of environments that you deal with. So a lot of these domesticated cattle are domesticated because of the very specific adaptations and characteristics that make it useful for the certain area they're in. So with water buffalo, per se,
00:21:23
Speaker
they're suited to working in paddy fields because of the wet and muddy environment and is also used as a pack animal. So that is exactly why you got a water buffalo, not necessarily say your everyday bus towers. And it's so if you if you think or you look at images of say rural China, these are the kind of domesticates you'll find in patties.
00:21:53
Speaker
And it's also, as well as being used as a pack animal and as a beast burden, is also used for dairying, for meat, which is known as cara beef. And their horns, which they do have very distinctive horns, they're used in traditional instruments such as the kaval of the Balkans and Anatolia and the nei of the Middle East.
00:22:18
Speaker
Next is another favourist as far as scientific names go. There's the domestic yak. Boss Grunians. Just literally the grunting ox or the hairy cattle for obvious reasons if you look up a photo. The yak is found primarily in the Himalayas and northeast Asia and the domesticated species that we have now descends from the wild yak.
00:22:45
Speaker
obviously. Boss Mutus, which again, sort of makes me chortle, because boss Mutus, it makes me like Mutus. Can you think of the mute? Like the mute? As opposed to when it got domesticated and it started grunting.
00:23:03
Speaker
I mean, what if I'm just like wild, just like running free and then like, oh, no, like you'll be a beast of bird and work here, like just grunting all the time. This is the Yakut, useful as pack animals, and they provide meat as well as secondary products in the form of wool and dairy. The butter made from the milk is arguably quite famous, famously part of Tibetan tea. For parts of the Himalayas without trees, their dung is also
00:23:30
Speaker
quite vital as a fuel resource. The importance of the analysis in general to the inhabitants of Tibet can be seen in material culture as well. So with iconography, again, another one of the running themes found in sculpture and pottery as well as remains left in context of note.
00:23:47
Speaker
Yeah, the thing about using the dung as fuel is that's one other thing that I just generally never really thought about, which is, oh, there's a lack of trees in the Himalayas, huh? Like, yeah. Let's use something else. If only there were a big ox that's grunting all the time.
00:24:04
Speaker
As well as I feel like I had to put a note to mention the Tibetan tea, because when I was a kid and was really getting interested in world cultures and anthropology and things like that, I remember reading about Tibetan tea, which is basically just tea, and they would put yak butter in it.
00:24:25
Speaker
And I was so obsessed with that concept, and I'm still am, and I'm very curious. I would love to have it one day, because it's fascinating to me. I want to know what that tastes like.
00:24:36
Speaker
Oh, just look at it. Yaxo with the little saddles. Oh, they look so cute. They're so cute. They are so adorable. But yeah, they're also just extremely important to the inhabitants of Tibet and is just so seen and so much for the iconography there. And they're very cute. So why not? Why wouldn't you put it there? I mean, come on, I get it.
00:24:59
Speaker
And again, they're also just so important because of, let's be real, it's extremely cold up there. So having such a resource for thick wool as well as very calorie heavy dairy that can be used to keep you fueled and warm up there. Again, it's that kind of example of a species domesticated for very specific reasons.
00:25:27
Speaker
And I guess we'll go to our next cattle, going away from the Himalayas and a bit down further to the Bali cattle. So it is a domesticated descendant of the wild Bantang.
00:25:44
Speaker
Thank you. Potentially from a domestication event from about 3,500 years ago. So the Bali cattle are found in Southeast Asia and like the other domesticated bawans we've kind of talked about this episode, they are actually used mostly for plowing rice paddies as well as for their meat.
00:26:06
Speaker
And in addition, they're known for being particularly resistant to most diseases and have very high fertility rates, so they are very hardy, domesticated animal to have around. And you can understand why people domesticate these animals. And I believe they do sometimes cross-breed them with other bovine, but for the most part, I believe the balicadel are just doing their thing, being themselves.
00:26:35
Speaker
We have a very hardy animals going around Google. Shout out to hardy animals everywhere around the world. Hashtag hardy animals. Hashtag chunky does.
00:26:50
Speaker
And our last bovine for the day is the Gail, boss from Thales. Just yeah, another type of ox. I mean, like, clearly again, another like take away of today. So repeat after me. So one, pandas are not tapirs. And number two, is there a surprising amount of diversity of bovids in Asia?
00:27:17
Speaker
which actually surprises no one probably. But yeah the guile are also known as the drunk ox and are found in southern and eastern Asia. So the guile are considered to be only semi-domesticated so I think reindeer.
00:27:33
Speaker
So, I guess more of a managed species, but they still sort of have a very significant cultural and economical importance among many ethnic groups in India. Sorry, because even though he's been silent for the entire episode, our producer Tristan is very much still here and thinks it's great to distract us with jokes on the chat of recording software.
00:27:59
Speaker
But yes, going back to the Gaio, I was talking about its significance of cultural and economic importance among many ethnic groups in India. So that includes the Naga and the Adi. And the Gaio is often seen as a symbol of social status and is used ritually as sacrifices. Originally, you should have already mentioned that at the beginning, it originates from the wild Gaur, also known as the Indian bison, so Beeson Gaurus.
00:28:29
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, unsurprisingly, the reason why that was at the end of that note is because there's been a lot of debate as to the domestication status of the guile. And again, another running theme is that
00:28:46
Speaker
looking at genetics is really hard and still very much a difficult thing. So a lot of these species we've been talking about, it's only been in the last, say, decade or so that we've really gotten an understanding as to where they may have been domesticated from. And I think one of the issues is that, you know, as we were saying, there's so many different species of Bovids in Asia.
00:29:11
Speaker
There's a potentiality to kind of crossbreeding and things like that. So you could, you know, without genetics make arguments for some kind of similar lineage among a lot of these bovids. But yeah, we are making progress in that area, I guess.
00:29:32
Speaker
I think we have a new hashtag here looking at the guile. Chunky horns. They are chunky horns. It's got real chunky horns.
00:29:42
Speaker
I think that's actually one of the things I was really interested in when we were doing this episode is that even though we have done, let's see, one, two, three, four different kind of cattle species for this part of the episode, they're all very different looking. I mean, they all do. If you looked at them, you would say, oh, that's like a cow, right? But there are very distinctively different from each other, which is kind of
00:30:09
Speaker
cool to see. I mean, Asia is a massive continent that's obviously going to have a lot of biodiversity there. But I think when we're kind of grouping them into these groups of domesticates, and even though at the end of the day, these species are more or less used, or at least bred for very similar purposes, whether it's to do
00:30:34
Speaker
being pack animals, doing plowing, being used for secondary products, they're still themselves very different, very diverse.
00:30:46
Speaker
Well, because I guess also in a way, they're not all cattle, strictly speaking. Oh, yeah, of course, they're not. Some don't even want most don't even belong to the genus boss, I believe it's just the valley cattle that does. And in fact, it is the animal that most resembles sort of your stereotypical sort of cattle.
00:31:04
Speaker
Even though they seem to have horns a little bit all over the place, it seems to be a lot of individual variation on the shape of the horns, because they tend to be quite small, but some are facing down, some are facing up, and some go backwards like a goat, which is very interesting to see on a cattle like animal. But yes, I mean, the majority of them are not really cattle per se, they are just, yeah, big bovids. Big boys, big bovid boys. Big chunky boys. Hashtag.
00:31:34
Speaker
Well, I think the moment we start making hashtags, I think it's time to take a break for a bit. And we'll come back with, as we said before, the part of the show that only us think is the best part of the show. But whatever what we say goes, we will see you after this break for the case studies.
00:31:54
Speaker
And we are back with Archaeo Animals, the podcast all about zoology. We are doing our episode on the zoology of Asia as part of our Where in the World miniseries, where we've been looking at the zoology of various regions and continents throughout the world, because God knows that we need to stop talking about Britain all the time.
00:32:19
Speaker
It's been interesting though. I can't lie. It was a good, it's a good way to get us out of our shell and talking about different species and different, there's all different types of things that we wouldn't really be talking about stuck to our expertise. Oh, absolutely. So yeah, we are at the case studies, as always the parts that we will just demand that people
00:32:48
Speaker
make it their favorite part of the episode. I don't know why we started doing that, to be completely honest. Maybe because it's our favorite, really.
00:32:57
Speaker
I mean, yeah, I think it's I always see the part of the episode where everything comes together. We usually spend the first two parts talking about very specific technical things. And the case studies lets us bring everything together, the contextual stuff and, you know, the history of the actual excavation sometimes. Or, you know, we just kind of have a laugh.
00:33:25
Speaker
Yeah, that's the thing, because in a way, like, it really depends from episode to episode, but it tends to be sort of a more not quite practical approach. But like, depending on how sort of in depth, how much time we have to go sort of more in depth, you see the actual sort of zoo archaeology being uncovered on site. And so the interpretation of the evidence found on site, and not just sort of the notionistic
00:33:51
Speaker
sort of discussion about like various domesticates and wild species and their relevance. Yeah, I think it's like the first two parts of the episodes we're talking about, you know, what we know about the species, the kind of knowledge that already exists. And then the case studies are just examples of applying that knowledge, perhaps.
00:34:15
Speaker
on an archaeological site. As one tends to do in these situations. In the field there is archaeology. We start off with a nice Bronze Age site.
Harappa's Animal Seals and Early Domestication
00:34:30
Speaker
It's the zoo archaeology of Harappa, Pakistan. As I said, it's a Bronze Age site located in Punjab, Pakistan, and it's part of the broader Indus Valley civilization.
00:34:41
Speaker
The site itself was an elaborate city and an important part of the Indus Valley trade routes, eventually becoming a major centre for culture and economy. During urbanisation, inhabitants likely utilised animal husbandry as part of this subsequent strategy, supplemented through fishing and various other marine resources. Ivory was commonly found as raw material on site, implying an abundance of elephant remains or elephants as a resource.
00:35:08
Speaker
either in or around sites or in that general area. Similarly, there have been many elephant skeletal remains and elephant iconography in Harappan contexts. Some have argued that this could indicate not only the cultural significance of the elephant, but potentially evidence of early elephant aiming and management. The arguably the most famous set of artifacts coming out of Harappa are the animal seals, which
00:35:36
Speaker
We could argue are important to zoocological understandings of the past. So like real animals so to speak found on these seals included bulls, bison, elephants, tigers and also mythical creatures including a unicorn or I mean like a bovine creature with one horn. Get horned hybrid creatures including tigers and elephants
00:35:59
Speaker
three headed bovins and human animal hybrid creatures because we also we always love one of those like the human animal things. The latter may actually be depictions of mythological stories that have since been lost to time. Again, going back to what we were discussing a couple segments ago. Yeah, about like what sort of remains we find now a certain iconography of how many of these are actually part of sort of stories and traditions that
00:36:28
Speaker
are so far removed into the past that we've...
00:36:31
Speaker
don't really know what they represent anymore. In terms of like non mammalian sort of depictions on these seals, you do find birds as well, including what some are believed to have been chickens, which again, as in turn being used as evidence towards potentially early domestication of the chicken here. But again, that is debatable, because we don't necessarily have the corresponding sort of skeletal evidence to corroborate that theory.
00:36:58
Speaker
Yeah and I guess it is hard because you're basing it on iconography and especially a lot of these sites iconography can be so stylistic and so artistic removed from a realistic portrayal that it can be tricky but I do like and I don't think we get to really do this maybe in episodes like this when we're talking about a very specific culture or region but I don't think we really get a chance to kind of chat about
00:37:26
Speaker
zoo archaeological adjacent things. So, artifacts that are depictions of animals that aren't necessarily animal remains themselves, because even if they aren't, you know, osteological remains, it's not something that you could really do zoo archaeological analysis, the way that we talk about it.
00:37:47
Speaker
to it is important to the way we we look at animals because obviously zorogology isn't just animals are being bred or eaten or hunted it's also the animals that we you know think about uh was it good to think with is the the phrase for animals but
00:38:06
Speaker
it's important to kind of think about how artistically we detect animals and how we depict animals and our stories and culturally, because that affects what we do to the animals that we actually interact with. Because in a way, it adds another piece of the puzzle, because you get the more scientific side of things with the skeletal elements and the analysis of your assemblage on site.
00:38:33
Speaker
But the end of the day, sort of what we do, I like to think is that we're, we're not just looking at necessarily a substance and primary secondary products, but then we're trying to reconstruct human animal relationships in the past in a way the depictions of those animals and the way they're depicted also contributes to what the relationship was there.
00:38:53
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. I mean, you know, to use maybe a more modern depiction, but it's the one I think about whenever talking to people and telling them why it's important we look at not only animal bones, but also the way animals are used and how at least we can interpret animal use in more artistic things is, say, Jaws, the film, which
00:39:16
Speaker
you know, really put a dent in the way general public viewed sharks. Obviously, people are always probably afraid of sharks, but it's that kind of shark mania really intensified after that film came out. And, you know, it's something that you can arguably see even in the deep past, you know, if there was folklore about a certain species that put it in a very negative light that if
00:39:42
Speaker
affects the way people see that species and how they interact with it, and obviously vice versa. So here in Harappa, we have so much evidence of potentially elephant, even if it wasn't early elephant taming or management, still elephant use in ivory and things like that. And that gets reflected in the iconography, the fact that iconography becomes very prevalent in Harappan culture.
00:40:09
Speaker
context and cultures. Obviously, it was used so much in everyday life that it gets kind of juxtaposed. No, no, that's not the word. It gets applied really to the way people think about it artistically. So it's interesting. Merle Yeah, like it's like going back to the bird depiction. So it looks like chicken. I mean, I guess also, yes, it could be an early representation of a chicken. But I wonder, like the wild ancestor of the chicken, like the jungle fowl. Yeah, it doesn't look too dissimilar from
00:40:39
Speaker
a standard chicken. Yeah. Not terribly so. I think that that was part of the reasoning as to why people were using it as potential evidence of early chickens there. But again, a bit with stylistic depictions, it can be very tricky. But who knows, you know, if we, you know, the real debate against that is that there really isn't any corresponding skeletal evidence. So
00:41:08
Speaker
There could be someday, but definitely interesting to think about.
00:41:11
Speaker
there's like all sorts of variables because then what if the remains didn't preserve for one reason or another or they were disposed somewhere far away from the settlement it's just it's one of those things it's the it's the underlying anxieties of archaeology that will always remain throughout time until we get time machines like as good as our skills and our technology gets we will always have that tiny smidge of
00:41:41
Speaker
maybe we're missing something. But I kind of like that. I kind of like having that. Maybe it's because it gives me a slight out for being wrong sometimes, if not all the time. Because we've not found it yet. No, we didn't find it yet. It's fine. It's fine. I'm fine.
00:41:58
Speaker
Anyway, from this very deep conversation we just had, we will be going to our next case study, which is the Zu archaeology of Yinshu.
Oracle Bones and Ancient Chinese Rituals
00:42:08
Speaker
So, Yinshu is a word that actually refers to the ruins of the city of Yin, which is located in the Hanan
00:42:17
Speaker
province of China. And it was likely an important capital during the Shang Dynasty. I believe even in the terminology, yin is often associated with the word Shang. So there was definitely association there. So it was most likely an important capital around that time. So yinxu is arguably most notable for the many, many oracle bones that have been recovered from the site.
00:42:45
Speaker
And I've realized that I think this is the first time we're talking about oracle bones, which I love oracle bones, so that's surprising. I think we may have mentioned it in a very, very early episode. I've got a very faint recollection. Probably about ritual.
00:43:02
Speaker
Actually, yes, very likely, most definitely. Because it's like the thing I would think about immediately, despite the biases, I guess, about me being Chinese. Orgobones are also referred to, at least in Chinese traditional medicine, as longgu.
00:43:21
Speaker
or dragon bones. They are often made from either oxcapula or turtle pastron which is the underside of the turtle shell and they're usually made from fragments of those kind of bones and they will get questions carved into them that also have
00:43:41
Speaker
been known to represent some of the earliest chinese script that we have which is also extremely interesting and just to get a bit more nerdy about it if you look at what early chinese script looks like it is you can pinpoint the kind of
00:43:58
Speaker
similarities between it and more modern Chinese scripts in terms of the way that the characters have been kind of transformed and modernized. And I think that's one of the only easy things about learning Chinese, so I learned Chinese a bit late in life.
00:44:19
Speaker
And I still struggle with reading Chinese, but there's certain characters that you can see. They come from this early kind of characters and you can kind of tell what they're trying to to display, like a field being kind of a square and things like that. So it's really interesting to see the kind of transformation and yet the retaining of traditional things in that. Anyway, so you would get
00:44:48
Speaker
a ox scapulae or a turtle pester, and you would scrape off the meat from the bone, you would then polish and smooth the surface as best as possible, and then you would drill little pits or holes into the surface, and then you would start to carve in your questions. You would usually carve in
00:45:09
Speaker
a kind of like a dedication or something depending on you know who and where you were getting this done then you would kind of carve in the question you were asking and then you would have a heat source so like a poker or a piece of wood with like fire on it you would insert it into one of the pits or holes that were made until the bone itself cracked.
00:45:32
Speaker
and then you would take these cracks and you would interpret them. I don't know if you really have great understanding of how the cracks were specifically interpreted, but it's, again, it's extremely interesting and that kind of fortune telling is very prevalent still in a lot of Chinese, modern day Chinese culture. And another really important part of yin chu is
00:45:58
Speaker
the Tomb of Fu Hao, also known as Fu Ha Mu. It's interpreted as the burial place of Fu Hao, who was not only the wife of Shang ruler Wu Ding, but also a military general in her own right, which is extremely cool.
00:46:19
Speaker
And along with various bronze artifacts, including loads and loads of weapons, which I think is part of the reason why that interpretation came to pass, there were the remains of 15 human attendants and six dogs were also buried there, and they were all likely sacrificed at burial.
00:46:40
Speaker
And it should also be noted that this tomb was excavated by the person who many refer to as the first lady of Chinese archaeology herself, Zhong Zhen Shao, so gay child lasers.
00:46:55
Speaker
A lot of a lot of feminism in that case study. Oh, yeah. But yeah, there's some embarrassingly no little about ancient Chinese tombs and burial archaeo and feeder archaeology. So I was very happy to also kind of put that into this case study as well as the oracle bones, because I just love to have an excuse to talk about oracle bones. Yeah, I think we might have mentioned the ritual episode.
00:47:25
Speaker
That makes sense. I think it's, you know, obviously many other cultures have used bones to do divination and things like that, particularly taking fragments and doing, you know,
00:47:41
Speaker
Is it technically called pyromancy? Yeah, this is technically pyromancy because what you're interpreting is the firecracking, which is also, I guess, interesting from a taphonomic perspective. You would have evidence of slight burning, direct burning, really, on a lot of these bones.
00:48:06
Speaker
because you'll give you information about the temperature that we're heated at as well because where they charred, where they calcined, a bit of both.
00:48:13
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, actually, realistically, the oracle bones are like a treasure trove of taphonomic characteristics between obviously the fire element, but also the actual preparation, the fact that oracle bones are often having to be scraped and then polished and smoothed and having the actual pits made as well. It's very intricate, particularly
00:48:38
Speaker
I mean, they are obviously using much hardier bone like ox scapulae, which is pretty hardy. But clearly, it's a lot of processing. I guess you would reconstruct that through the taphonomic evidence that you have. So you'll know the flesh would be removed, one because you might find sort of slicing or cut marks on the bone to take the flesh off.
00:49:04
Speaker
but also in the way that it burns, because if you put a meat bearing element on the fire to say, you know, your stereotype when you see your cartoon sort of joint a bone with a little bit of the femur stick in the cartoon femur sticking out, you know, just picture that for a moment. Obviously, you know, like the bone that sticks out is going to char
00:49:24
Speaker
while the beer that's bearing the meat is not going to be as heat affected, because it's cushioned by all that flesh all around. Because if the heat gets distributed sort of roughly evenly, like it's safe to say that there was no meat attached to that bone. And well, and I forgot about the polishing. Yeah, with some polishing in there as well.
00:49:43
Speaker
Oh yeah, you gotta polish it. You gotta make it nice if you're gonna use it for divination purposes, you know, obviously. But I guess it's fitting though that we end this episode on some ritual because it's one of our favorite things to talk about. And yeah, I think that's it for us. As usual, you can find us wherever you get your podcasts.
00:50:06
Speaker
You can listen to our backlog at archaeologypodcast.work.com. Also think about becoming a member. Help support all the podcast shows there as well as ourselves. Get some bonus content maybe at ASMR Zoo Archaeology episode down the way. If you want to hear some bones getting shattered or something, we'll think about it. Maybe just become a member and you'll see.
00:50:32
Speaker
You can find us on Twitter at archaeoanimals and tell your friends to listen, subscribe, follow, what all the other fun stuff and leave a review because I like to be validated. I need to be validated. So yeah, validate me, validate me.
00:50:51
Speaker
All right, well, as always, I'm Alexis Patrick, Simada Falanga, and we will see you next time for our next episode. That sounded like it would say something more exciting, but oh well.
00:51:05
Speaker
It's fine. We'll have another episode. It's fine. See you later. Bye. Bye.
00:51:35
Speaker
Thanks for listening!
00:51:40
Speaker
This episode was produced by Chris Webster from his RV traveling the United States, Tristan Boyle in Scotland, DigTech LLC, Culturo Media, and the Archaeology Podcast Network, and was edited by Chris Webster. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork.com.