The zooarchaeology of cultural and economic change in Roman and late antique southeast Europe

Via meta-analysis of published zooarchaeological data from sites across modern Serbia, Bulgaria and Romania, spanning the late Iron Age to the early Byzantine period, this thesis explores spatial and temporal variation in animal exploitation, and evaluates the timing, pace and extent of wider cultural and economic change on both sides of the Danube limes in southeast Europe. Data are analysed from three regions subject to varying levels of direct Roman control — (a) the Balkan provinces, under long-term Roman occupation, (b) Dacia, a Roman province in the second and third centuries CE, and (c) regions to the northwest and northeast that remained beyond the Empire.

The study identifies little change in the extent of reliance on hunted resources and little change in livestock ratios in occupied regions in the early Roman period, indicating generalised husbandry practice and animal exploitation adapted to the local environment, showing continuity from the late Iron Age. There are clear changes in husbandry in the mid-Roman period, when the emergence of cattle-focused husbandry across the Balkan provinces and Dacia indicates the establishment of a specialised and integrated economic system. The period sees a clear increase in cattle and sheep/goat size. There is a slight decrease in cattle abundance in both regions in the late Roman period; livestock remain large in the Balkan provinces but decrease in size in Dacia. A continued Dacian cattle focus after Roman withdrawal demonstrates that the economic impact of Rome outlasted the period of occupation. In the early Byzantine period, increasing regionalisation in husbandry practice indicates declining economic integration concurrent with declining Roman political control. There is no further change in livestock size in occupied regions despite declining political and economic stability, suggesting that the earlier size increase was more likely achieved via a genetic change than predominantly via improved feeding regimes.