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Reconstructing animal management practices at Greek Early Iron Age Zagora (Andros) using stable isotopes

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Abstract

The Early Iron Age was an important period of Greek history during which the Greek city states emerged and the two earliest works of western literature, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, were likely composed. This paper introduces the results of faunal isotope analyses (carbon and nitrogen) from the settlement of Zagora on Andros (900–700 BC), the first such study to focus on agriculture from the Greek Early Iron Age. Due to limited post-abandonment activity, Zagora provides us with a unique opportunity to investigate agricultural practices at a well-preserved settlement from the period. Amongst our findings we identify possible evidence of specialised cattle management as well as evidence that suggests agriculture may have intensified during the final decades of the settlement’s occupation.

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Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the Cycladic Ephorate of Antiquities and the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sport for permission to study and analyse the material. We would also like to thank the Archaeological Society at Athens, the Australian Archaeological Institute at Athens and its former director Alexander Cambitoglou† and director Stavros Paspalas, and the Zagora Archaeological Project and its directors Lesley Beaumont, Paul Donnelly, Margaret Miller and Stavros Paspalas for approving access to the material for analysis. Isotope analyses were funded by the University of Sydney’s Carlyle Greenwell Fund. We are grateful to Stavros Paspalas for his feedback on an earlier draft of the manuscript and to Beatrice McLoughlin for making the legacy Zagora faunal report publicly accessible. We would also like to thank the three anonymous reviewers whose suggestions helped improve this article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Archaeology, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, 2006, Australia

    Rudolph Alagich & Margaret C. Miller

  2. Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sport, 106 82, Athens, Greece

    Katerina Trantalidou

  3. Department of Archaeology and History, La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC, 3086, Australia

    Colin Smith

  4. Laboratorio de Evolución Humana, Departamento de Historia, Geografía y Comunicación, Universidad de Burgos, 09001, Burgos, Spain

    Colin Smith

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  1. Rudolph Alagich
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Correspondence to Rudolph Alagich.

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Alagich, R., Trantalidou, K., Miller, M.C. et al. Reconstructing animal management practices at Greek Early Iron Age Zagora (Andros) using stable isotopes. Archaeol Anthropol Sci 13, 9 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12520-020-01249-1

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