Medieval Ichthyoarchaeology and Historical Ecology of Salmo sp. Fishes Across the North Sea Basin

This doctoral thesis research is primarily concerned with the medieval history of human exploitation of fishes belonging to the Salmo genus, investigated through the study of archaeological material recovered from sites surrounding the North Sea. A large-scale review of ichthyoarchaeological material from North Sea medieval sites provides insight into long-term trends in presence and absence of Salmo sp. fishes, as well as providing a framework for targeted sampling of fish bones for further analysis. An assemblage of fish bone material from archaeological sites located in the Netherlands, England, Scotland and Denmark has been subjected to osteological, bulk stable isotope (SI), and collagen peptide barcoding (ZooMS) analysis. A total of 286 samples with associated ZooMS and/or SI data are presented here, 194 from Salmo sp. fish and 92 from comparative marine, migratory and freshwater fish species. In addition to archaeological datasets and bone material, a complementary review of medieval and historical documents ranging from tax records and purchase orders, to bestiaries and monastic texts was conducted to assess medieval conceptions of salmon and trout.

This interdisciplinary research provides a series of observations about the status of Salmo sp. fishes in the medieval North Sea basin, as well as resulting in a new combined biomolecular approach to identifying behavioural ecotypes of these fish in the archaeological record– specifically migratory Atlantic salmon, migratory sea trout, and freshwater brown trout. This thesis demonstrates that there is a higher-than-expected presence of migratory sea trout within the medieval North Sea archaeological record, and the ecotype data reported here highlights the complex archaeobiogeography of the Salmo genus in the region. It also discusses regional variations in Salmo ecotype exploitation and isotopic characteristics, as well as socially-stratified procurement trends which demonstrate changes in cultural and economic “value” of Salmo sp. fish throughout the region and through time.