| Themes > Science > Paleontology / Paleozoology > Paleozoology > Fossil Invertebrates > Uses of Fossil Insects in Archaeology |
The applied aspects of fossil insect research can be related to three major fields; archeology, geology (incorporating paleoenvironmental and paleo-climatological reconstruction) and zoogeography. Of course, there are areas of overlap between each of these disciplines, but we would like to give some examples of how each of these areas has incorporated the results of beetle research. Archeological sites, especially in Britain, have been the subject of a number of papers describing associated insect faunas (Osborne, 1973). These include a Bronze Age ceremonial shaft near Wilsford, Wiltshire (Osborne, 1969), a Roman well at Barnsley Park, Gloucestershire (Coope and Osborne, 1967), a Viking-period site at York (Kenward, 1975) and a Medieval site, also at York (Buckland et al., 1974). These fossil faunas associated with early occupation sites provide much interesting information, such as the type and extent of insect infestations in ancient granaries or on cultivated crops. To a lesser degree, we can determine the directions of early trading systems, or even the dis- tribution of disease-carrying organisms such as bed bugs and fleas. Some recent papers on aspects of arthropod remains in archeological sites in Europe, Greenland and Africa are given in Buckland and Sadler (1989), Osborne (1988) and Mumcuoglu and Zias (1988), and more can be found from the references therein. Deposits (not necessarily associated with archeological sites) belonging to Mesolithic, Neolithic and younger periods (from about 10,000 years B.P.) have been examined at a number of locations and show good evidence on the nature of the forest cover and agricultural practices (Kelly and Osborne, 1964; Osborne, 1965; Morgan, 1976). The examination of insect faunas associated with archeological sites in North America has not been conducted on the scale seen in western Europe. Insect fragments, recovered in the late 1970s from the Lubbock (Texas) site, are all contaminants, probably brought into the archeological horizons by parasitic Hymenoptera (Morgan, unpublished data). Elias (1986) has described a fossil insect assemblage from a 13,000 year old archeological site south of Denver, Colorado. At Parkhill, Ontario, deposits close to the Brophy paleo-lndian locality have been processed for environmental data. Unfortunately, the borehole locality is approximately 400 m from the human occupation site, but is believed to be of the same age, based upon stratigraphic interpretation. Results of these findings have recently been presented by Ellis et al. (1996). |
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