Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3DZ, UK.
Department of Archaeology, University of York, Kings Manor and Principals House, Exhibition Square, York, YO1 7EP, UK.
Ecology. 2021 Jun;102(6):e03349. doi: 10.1002/ecy.3349. Epub 2021 May 18.
Human isotopic ecology at its core aims to study humans as a part of their environments, as animals within an ecosystem. We are complex animals with complicated foodways and mobility patterns that are hard to address without large multifaceted data sets. As biomolecular data from archaeological remains proliferates scientists are now at the stage where we are able to collate large bodies of data and undertake complex meta-analyses and address the complexities of human ecology and past socioenvironmental dynamics. Here we present a data set of 862 entries of new primary isotopic data (37 faunal bone, 235 human enamel carbonate with a subset of 18 for Sr, 347 human bone, 243 human bulk dentine) within a larger data set compiled from available legacy data. It contains a total of 8,910 isotopic entries from ancient humans and animals relating to diet and mobility from the late Roman period into the Middle Ages (c. 400-1200 AD). It includes carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and strontium isotope ratios from human bone, human dentine, faunal bone, and human bioapatite from thousands of individuals, and hundreds of sites found across 26 modern countries in western Europe. Studies have previously focused on only one of these aspects, compiling data sets for one tissue, or common isotopic pairing, or focusing on a particular site or region at a smaller scale for multi-isotope multitissue studies. This is the largest and first multitissue, multi-isotope, multiproxy data set of its kind from premodern populations. In publishing this data set, we hope to inspire more synthetic and meta-analytical work on human isotopic ecology. Insights from these data should lead to greater understanding of diet, agriculture, climate change, human-animal interactions, mobility/migration, and much more in the past. It is hoped that these insights into past socioenvironmental dynamics will help inform current discourse on human-environmental interactions. There are no copyright or proprietary restrictions on the data; these data papers should be cited when these data are used in publications. Additionally, we would like to hear from other researchers who use these data sets in teaching or for their own research.
人类同位素生态学的核心目标是将人类作为其环境的一部分，以及作为生态系统中的动物来进行研究。我们是复杂的动物，其食物来源和迁移模式非常复杂，如果没有大规模的多方面数据集，这些都很难解决。随着考古遗存中的生物分子数据不断增加，科学家们现在已经能够整理大量数据，并进行复杂的元分析，以解决人类生态学和过去社会环境动态的复杂性问题。在这里，我们提出了一个数据集，其中包含 862 个新的主要同位素数据条目（37 个动物骨骼，235 个人类牙釉质碳酸盐，其中有 18 个样本用于 Sr，347 个人骨，243 个人骨牙本质），这些数据是从现有遗留数据中汇编的更大数据集的一部分。它总共包含了 8910 个来自古代人类和动物的同位素数据条目，这些数据与从罗马后期到中世纪（约公元 400-1200 年）的饮食和迁移有关。它包括来自数千个人的人类骨骼、人类牙本质、动物骨骼和人类生物磷灰石的碳、氮、氧和锶同位素比值，以及来自西欧 26 个现代国家的数百个地点的数据。以前的研究主要集中在这些方面的一个方面，即编译一种组织的数据，或常见的同位素配对，或集中在一个较小规模的特定地点或地区进行多同位素多组织研究。这是来自前现代人群的最大和第一个多组织、多同位素、多探针数据集。通过发布这个数据集，我们希望激发更多关于人类同位素生态学的综合和元分析工作。从这些数据中得出的见解应该会导致对过去饮食、农业、气候变化、人类与动物的相互作用、迁移/移民等方面的更好理解。希望这些对过去社会环境动态的了解将有助于为当前关于人类与环境相互作用的讨论提供信息。这些数据没有版权或专有限制；在出版物中使用这些数据时，应引用这些数据论文。此外，我们希望听到其他使用这些数据集进行教学或自己研究的研究人员的意见。
