Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2010, Page 66

RAMONA HARRISON
Skuggi - CaprineTooth Eruption Stages by Phase
Figure 10. Caprine tooth eruption comparison.
cial bovine management there, the Skuggi
neonatal percentage more closely resem-
bles that of a more typical farmstead and
suggests that at least a portion of the
Skuggi cattle were used for dairying pur-
poses. Presently, the lack of long bone
fusion data may bias the age at death data
towards a younger age. In Phase II, the
Skuggi cattle neonatal percentage is quite
low, but during the early medieval phases,
the percentages increase to about 35-40 %
of neonatal cows culled at Skuggi.
Caprines
The overall higher proportion of
sheep/goat elements in the faunal collec-
tion makes the Skuggi caprines better
suited for a phased age at death profíle
than the cattle collection. Although the
assemblage would also profit from more
elements, an initial caprine long bone
fusion analysis in fígure 9 illustrates a
change in the caprine culling strategy
from the Later Viking Age to the Early
Middle Ages.
The Later Viking Age (Phase II)
caprine long bone fusion data indicates
that less than 30 % of the Skuggi sheep
and goats survived until their second
year, and that only about 10 % lived to be
five years or older. In the early medieval
phases (VI, V), half of the Skuggi
caprines seem to have survived until their
fífth year which means that this period
may have experienced a shift towards
keeping more adult sheep for potential
wool management.
The intra-site caprine tooth eruption
analysis illustrated in figure 10 utilizes
mandibular and maxillary tooth rows of
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