The Archaeological Signature of Stews or Grease Rendering in the Historic Period

Abstract

AbstractSmall bone fragments have often been interpreted as the residues of stews or grease extraction. In international historical archaeological research, stew interpretations have often focused on enslaved or underclass groups or on those who had limited access to sufficient amounts of food or faced nutritional deficiencies. These analyses have widely been uncritical, and the small fragment sizes can be better explained as the products of taphonomic processes such as weathering, trampling, and carnivore scavenging. This work presents results from experimentally chopped long bones from cows, sheep, goats, and pigs that identify butchery and fracture patterns that can be used to evaluate past stew interpretations and provide comparative models for future analyses.