Disseration Research: Bison Density and Bone Bed Structure at Mill Iron, Montana

在Donald K.Grayson博士的监督下，Lee Ann Kreutzer女士将对野牛骨骼进行结构分析，并将结果应用于从蒙大拿州东南部Ekalaka附近的Mill Iron考古遗址发现的动物材料。使用最近开发的定量数字放射成像技术，克鲁策将研究怀俄明大学保存的一系列野牛骨骼，并测量在多个地点收集的不同骨骼元素的骨密度。这将为确定不同骨骼在考古和地质环境中对破坏的相对抵抗力提供依据。然后，她将分析从磨坊铁器遗址发现的野牛遗骸，该遗址可以追溯到大约11,000年前，并产生了丰富的动物遗骸和石器。Kreutzer女士希望通过文化习俗或差异化保存来确定遗骸的骨骼组成在多大程度上是由文化习俗决定的。由于被猎杀动物的骨骼遗骸构成了考古数据的主要类别，考古学家们将极大的注意力集中在对这些材料的分析上。在大多数地点，骨骼部分的分布是非随机的：即。考虑到哺乳动物骨骼中不同种类的骨骼的数量，情况并非如此。考古学家通常声称，这种偏离预期分布的现象反映了文化习俗，并试图用这种观点来解释集合体。最近，有人指出，差异保存可能发挥了主要的图案作用，一些骨骼更频繁地遇到，因为它们能够更好地抵御破坏性力量。克鲁策女士的研究将解决这个问题。这项研究之所以重要，有几个原因。它应该为研究世界上许多时期和地区的大型哺乳动物的考古学家带来有用的信息和分析技术。这也将有助于我们对北美史前的了解，并进一步培养一位有前途的年轻考古学家。

Under the supervision of Dr. Donald K. Grayson, Ms. Lee Ann Kreutzer will conduct a structural analysis of bison bone and apply the results to faunal material recovered from the Mill Iron archaeological site located near Ekalaka in southeastern Montana. Using a recently developed technique, Quantitative Digital Radiography, Ms. Kreutzer will study a series of bison skeletons housed at the University of Wyoming and measure bone density of different skeletal elements collected at multiple sites. This will provide a basis to determine relative resistance of different bones to destruction in archaeological and geological settings. She will then analyze bison remains recovered from the Mill Iron site which dates to approximately 11,000 years ago and has yielded both abundant faunal remains and stone tools. Ms. Kreutzer hopes to determine the extent to which the skeletal composition of the assemblage is determined by either cultural practice or differential preservation. Because skeletal remains from hunted animals constitutes a major class of archaeological data archaeologists have focussed a great deal of attention on the analysis of such materials. In most sites the distribution of skeletal parts is non-random: ie. not what one would expect given the numbers of different kinds of bones in a mammalian skeleton. Archaeologists have generally claimed that such departures from an expected distribution reflect cultural practice and have tried to interpret assemblages in this light. More recently it has been pointed out that differential preservation may play a major patterning role and that some bones are more frequently encountered because they are better able to withstand destructive forces. Ms. Kreutzer's research will address this issue. This research is important for several reasons. It should result in information and analytic techniques of use to archaeologists who study large mammals from many time periods and parts of the world. It will also contribute to our understanding of North American prehistory and further the training of a promising young archaeologist.