Zooarchaeology in the 21st Century: Comments on the contributions

Abstract

In this chapter, I comment on all the papers in this volume. My discussion is organized around cross-cutting themes that appear in different chapters: collation, correlation, and causation; temporal, spatial, and analytic scale, new data on extinctions, the response to climatic change, archaeological data as climate proxies, and gaps in the record. Though recognizing areas that require reorientation and reconsideration, I conclude that the papers make important contributions to understanding human-climate-environment interaction as seen through the lens of zooarchaeology.