Isotopic evidence for long-distance connections of the AD thirteenth century Promontory caves occupants

• Main Authors: Metcalfe, Jessica, Ives, John, Shirazi, Sabrina, Gilmore, Kevin, Hallson, Jennifer, Brock, Fiona, Clark, Bonnie, Shapiro, Beth
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: unknown
• Published: Zenodo 2021
• Subjects: Subarctic; Bison bison bison
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.7291/D18Q23

The Promontory caves (Utah) and Franktown Cave (Colorado) contain high-fidelity records of short-term occupations by groups with material culture connections to the Subarctic/Northern Plains. This research uses Promontory and Franktown bison dung, hair, hide, and bone collagen to establish local baseline carbon isotopic variability and identify leather from a distant source. The ankle wrap of one Promontory Cave 1 moccasin had a δ 13 C value that indicates a substantial C 4 component to the animal's diet, unlike the C 3 diets inferred from 171 other Promontory and northern Utah bison samples. We draw on a unique combination of multi-tissue isotopic analysis, carbon isoscapes, ancient DNA (species and sex identification), tissue turnover rates, archaeological contexts, and bison ecology to show that the high δ 13 C value was not likely a result of local plant consumption, bison mobility, or trade. Rather, the bison hide was likely acquired via long-distance travel to/from an area of abundant C 4 grasses far to the south or east. Expansive landscape knowledge gained through long-distance associations would have allowed Promontory caves inhabitants to make well-informed decisions about directions and routes of movement for a territorial shift, which seems to have occurred in the late thirteenth century. We have uploaded alignments (.bam files) of these shotgun data to bison (Bison bison; NCBI GCA_000754665), cattle (Bos taurus; NCBI Btau_4.6.1), bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis; NCBI CP011912.1), and two-toed sloth (Choloepus hoffmanni; NCBI5KN174222.1) genomes. We have not supplied raw shotgun data because there is a chance that ancient human DNA could be examined from these Moccasin samples and we do not have permission to study this DNA.