Did Bronze Age Europeans Keep Foxes As Pets?
By Rosie McCall
22 FEB 2019, 16:15
Dogs may have firmly established their role as man's best friend but new evidence published in Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences suggests their Bronze Age ancestors
faced some competition – in the form of the nifty and more mischevious common fox, aka Vulpes vulpes.
Archaeologists digging at Can Roqueta (Barcelona) and Minferri (Lleida) in the Iberian Peninsula discovered the remains of four foxes amongst a total of 64 human burials. Also present at the sites were the bones of a wolf, 32 dogs, and 19 hoofed mammals, revealing a funeral practice common to the early to late Bronze Age of burying the dead alongside domesticated animals.
In one grave, for example, archaeologists found the body of an old man next to the skeleton of a single cow and the legs of several goats. In another, an individual (potentially female) laid to rest by the bodies of two dogs and two cows. And in a third, the bones of a young woman accompanied by two foxes, a goat, and a bovine horn.
By analyzing carbon and nitrogen isotopes in the bone collagen, the team was able to deduce the diets of the animals and their owners. They found that the diet of the dogs more closely resembled that of the humans than did the diets of the other mammals.
More:
https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/did-bronze-age-europeans-keep-foxes-as-pets/
= new reply since forum marked as read
