ABSTRACT
Efremov (1940) defined taphonomy as the laws of burial. As such, taphonomy refers to the depositional history of a particular set of remains, explaining the natural and, in some cases, artificial (Pokines 2015c) processes that have acted upon the remains until the time of their discovery and removal from that depositional environment. Taphonomic research is drawn from multiple academic disciplines, including ethology, botany, paleontology, archaeology, and physical anthropology. Taphonomy can illuminate the natural processes that have affected a crime scene or other forensic archaeological sites. Research on taphonomic processes in large part began as a method to interpret osseous data about past environments and ecological relationships in an effort to determine the causative agents of bone destruction and alterations that might bias these interpretations (Behrensmeyer
Introduction 57 Carnivore damage to skeletal remains 60 Rodent damage to skeletal remains 67 Other sources of gnawing 70 Summary 70 Review questions 72 Glossary 72 References 73 Further reading 77
1991; Weigelt 1989). Taphonomic research is also rooted in differentiation between bone modification caused by hominins (i.e., humans and our close fossil relatives) and that caused by other animals (Binford 1981; Brain 1981; Byard et al. 2002; Kerbis Peterhans 1990; Payne 1983). Current taphonomic research covers a variety of topics, including subaerial weathering (i.e., the effects of exposure to sunlight, precipitation, and so on), damage from plant root growth, gnawing by scavengers, modifications made by fluvial transport or thermal damage, and the effects of acidic soil on buried skeletal remains. See Chapters 15, 17, and 18 of this text for a detailed discussion of other taphonomic processes.
