Introduction

Herding and hunting, along with farming, represented the economic basis of subsistence of communities in the past. The strategies of animal husbandry and hunting were diverse and different between communities, whilst they also changed over time. The differences and variations were sometimes caused by local or regional environmental conditions, but were also the result of social, cultural, political, and even religious factors. One of the goals of archaeological research is the discovery and reconstruction of the impact of these factors on the strategies of animal husbandry and hunting in the past. Animal remains represent the most frequent and most numerous traces of animal-based economic activities. Therefore, zooarchaeological research is central to understanding and reconstructing patterns of past animal exploitation. Geographic position of the Balkan Peninsula is such that it has always represented an important region for transferring and exchanging knowledge, ideas, people, material cultures and other civilization traits between southwest Asia and central Europe. The archaeological heritage of this region thus provides an excellent opportunity for studying the development of economic strategies practiced by a number of communities that inhabited the Peninsula through prehistory and history. During the Early Neolithic, the groups of people that arrived from southwest Asia brought first domesticated animals and plants to the Balkans, and it is from here that animal husbandry spread to other parts of Europe. Following the introduction of domesticates, a long period ensued during which animal herding techniques underwent adaptations, diversification, specialisation, and transformations – from the Late Neolithic through the Bronze and Iron Ages, up to the Roman and Medieval periods. Changes in animal husbandry practices were accompanied by shifts in the significance and role that wild animals played in the past communities, as well as the development of hunting strategies. This publication brings new results of research on animal herding and hunting in the central and western Balkans during prehistoric and historic periods. The investigations presented here cover a wide range of topics related to animal exploitation strategies; they range from broad syntheses to specific case studies and, moreover, include interdisciplinary studies that use zooarchaeological and historical data, iconographic representations and modern laboratory analysis. Twenty-two authors contributed to this publication by presenting their research within 13 papers. We think that it is significant and encouraging that the majority of contributors are early-career scholars, who started their professional journeys with the study of faunal remains from sites in the central and western Balkans. We believe that this trend promises further development of zooarchaeology as an academic discipline in the region. The first steps towards the preparation of this volume were taken when a dedicated session was organised at the 42nd Annual Meeting of the Serbian Archeological Society, under the auspices of the Bioarchaeological Section of the Society, in the town of Negotin in Serbia, between 30 May and 1 June 2019. We would like to take this opportunity to thank our dear colleague Dr Nataša Miladinović-Radmilović, the head of the Bioarchaeological Section, for her support in the organisation of the session. We would also like to express our gratitude to the members of the editorial board who provided us with endless support and whose reviews enhanced the scientific value of this publication