Age-Frequency Profiles in Micromammals: A Methodological Epiphenomenon?

Abstract

Using an archaeological black rat (Rattus rattus) assemblage from a medieval site in Portugal, three age-estimation criteria have been applied in an effort to highlight their influence on the mortality profiles produced. These analyses evidenced different techniques producing different results both in terms of cohort frequency distributions and of the mortality spectra derived from them. A thorough understanding of the biology of living populations proves to be an indispensable tool when attempting to make inferences about the agents, whether cultural, biological or taphonomical, producing specific mortality profiles in archaeological assemblages. Although our results stress the risk involved in the construction and interpretation of mortality patterns from non-recent populations in the absence of data from modern analogues, it is concluded that the application of more than one technique on a particular sample may help circumvent some of the drawbacks inherent to each method when used in isolation.