Neanderthal Butchery Practices of Bison at Chagyrskaya Cave (Altai)

This paper presents the results of a comprehensive analysis of anthropogenic modifications on the bone remains of Bison priscus from Chagyrskaya Cave (Altai, Russia), allowing to reconstruct the butchery strategies of Neanderthals. Bison was the main prey of Neanderthal group from Chagyrskaya Cave in the Late Pleistocene (60-50 ka). The study revealed a multi-stage process of carcass processing, including skinning, separating bones from each other, extracting tendons, meat removal and extracting bone marrow from all tubular bones, rarely from the first phalanges. After butchering the bison, its bone remains were used by Neanderthals to retouch stone tools, with preference given to fragments of long tubular bones, less often flat, mixed bones and first phalanges. The abundance of cuts-marks on the “meaty” long tubular bones indicates intensive meat removal from the carcasses. Most of the muscle cut-marks on the different bones are predominantly inclined to the left, which may indicate the same hand laterality of butchers. The high percentage of cut-marks also suggests that muscle removal occurred when the meat was raw, since cooked meat is easily separated from the bone and the process leaves few cut-marks. The low incidence of longitudinal cuts observed in this group does not allow us to conclude that the meat was dried. The authors declare no conflict of interests.

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