Understanding early animal domestication is complicated by disagreement over what, in cultural terms, differentiates domestic (closely managed? privately owned?) from wild and by the difficulty of distinguishing these categories zooarchaeologically. We describe recent feral populations of goats, sheep, cattle and pigs in Greece, comprising descendants of animals escaped or released from controlled domestic herds but remaining in private ownership. Many such animals are systematically exploited for meat by trapping or driving, while provision of fodder or water, especially as bait for traps but also to shape their movements, blurs the distinction between wild and domestic. Selective culling (mainly of young males) of goats, sheep and cattle confirms previous concerns regarding zooarchaeological use of mortality data to detect domestic management but also suggests that such data might help to identify private ownership of animals. Applying these observations to mortality data for goats and sheep from early Neolithic southwest Asia, we argue that some animals previously interpreted as early herded domesticates may instead represent trapped and selectively culled wild individuals in private ownership. In conclusion, we consider whether and why private ownership of free-range animals may quite widely have preceded classic domestic control of goats, sheep and perhaps cattle in southwest Asia.

中文翻译：

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西南亚“农场动物”的驯化：来自希腊野生和自由放养亲属的管理的可能见解


对早期动物驯化的理解变得复杂，因为从文化角度来说，家养动物（严格管理的？私人拥有的？）与野生动物的区别存在分歧，而且从动物考古学角度区分这些类别也很困难。我们描述了希腊最近的山羊、绵羊、牛和猪的野生种群，其中包括从受控制的家畜群中逃脱或释放但仍属于私人所有的动物的后代。许多此类动物被系统地通过诱捕或驱赶来获取肉食，而提供饲料或水，尤其是作为陷阱的诱饵，同时也为了塑造它们的运动，模糊了野生动物和家养动物之间的区别。对山羊、绵羊和牛的选择性扑杀（主要是年轻雄性）证实了先前对动物考古学利用死亡率数据来检测家庭管理的担忧，但也表明这些数据可能有助于确定动物的私人所有权。将这些观察结果应用于新石器时代早期西南亚山羊和绵羊的死亡率数据，我们认为，一些以前被解释为早期群居驯化动物的动物可能代表了私人拥有的被困和选择性扑杀的野生个体。总之，我们考虑在西南亚，自由放养动物的私人所有权是否以及为何可能广泛先于对山羊、绵羊甚至牛的传统家庭控制。