| This research addresses the emergence and evolution of fodder provisioning in the southern Levant during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic. As a human modification of animal dietary intake, foddering likely increased the reliability, predictability, and accessibility of animal resources at a crucial transition in prehistory from hunter-gatherer-cultivator lifeways to agro-pastoralist ones. The goals of this dissertation research were to gain a detailed understanding of the role of fodder provisioning in emergent goat husbandry practices in the southern Levant and to understand how animal husbandry practices such as foddering and weaning evolved in response to the broader social and economic developments that occurred ca. 8500 to 6500 cal BC during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB).;This research focused on carbon (delta13C), nitrogen (delta15N), organic oxygen (delta18O), and hydrogen (deltaD) stable isotopic analyses of goat and gazelle bone collagens from five sites in the southern Levant, including Abu Ghosh, Kefar Hahoresh, 'Ain Ghazal, Basta, and Ba'ja. This research has resulted in an understanding of the variety of animal husbandry practices employed by pastoralists during the PPNB. Fodder provisioning practices employed by herders during the PPNB varied tremendously over both time and geographic space. Initial foddering practices during the Middle PPNB were non-systematically applied to goats regardless of animal sex or age. Later, during the Late PPNB, fodder provisioning practices developed to include a series of complex, selective provisioning strategies that were enacted upon particular categories of animals. Additional husbandry practices, such as weaning, watering, and perhaps seasonal scheduling of animal slaughter or directed herd mobility, also emerged during this period. On a broad level, this research shows that goat husbandry practices played an important role in increasing social and economic complexity in the region. |
