Ethnoarchaeology as a Means of Improving Integration: An Ethnozooarchaeological Study from Cyprus and Its Contribution to the Integration of Zooarchaeology with Archaeobotany and Other Lines of Archaeological Evidence

Abstract

Ethnoarchaeology in Europe has been relatively neglected over the last few decades. This trend has been partly justified by the fact that modernisation in the twentieth century has swept away any remaining traditional practices, especially those pertinent to animal and plant exploitation. This reality not only renders pressing the need to record any surviving traditional practices but, even more importantly, raises the question whether the study of partly, or even significantly, altered practices is useful to archaeological method and interpretation. Through an ethnozooarchaeological study of sheep and goat husbandry in Cyprus, this study highlights the benefits of geographically relevant information and evaluates them as methodological and interpretational tools for archaeology. Ethnoarchaeological studies also have significant potential towards more efficient integration of different archaeological subdisciplines due to the fact that the various components of the agricultural systems studied are visibly interrelated and de facto integrated. The presented study focused on zooarchaeological issues, but it inevitably produced a wealth of information pertinent to plants in sheep/goat diet; seasonal patterns in the interaction between herds; cultivated, wild and fallow vegetation; overall use of the landscape; transactions between herders; and other aspects that can provide useful analogies for the interpretation of relevant archaeological data.