Bone chemistry and palaeodiet: Bioarchaeological research at Roonka Flat, lower Murray River, South Australia 1983 - 1999

The predominance of stone and bone in prehistoric archaeological deposits has resulted in the development of a range of methods to extract information from these important cultural resources. Since the development of radiocarbon dating in the late 1940s, a variety of analytical techniques derived from chemistry have been applied to archaeological research problems. Many of these methods have been employed in the analysis of archaeological skeletal remains, both human and faunal. In addition to providing information about chronology, chemical analyses of bones and teeth offer independent scientific methods to address past diet, climate and ecology that supplement conventional approaches (Price 1989; Schoeninger and Moore 1992; MacFadden and Bryant 1994; Pate 1994, 1997a; Bocherens et al. 1999)