Date: March 19, 2018
Source: Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
Police detectives analyze
isotopes in human hair to find out where a murder victim was born and grew up.
Ashley Sharpe, an archaeologist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute
in Panama, and colleagues combined clues from carbon, nitrogen, oxygen and
strontium isotope analysis discovering the earliest evidence that the Maya
raised and traded dogs and other animals, probably for ceremonial use.
Their results are published in
the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week
of March 19.
"In Asia, Africa and Europe,
animal management went hand-in-hand with the development of cities," said
Sharpe. "But in the Americas people may have raised animals for ceremonial
purposes. The growth of cities doesn't seem to be directly tied to animal
husbandry."
Sharpe found that animal trade
and management began in the Preclassic Period some 2,500 years ago and
intensified during the Classic Period, making it likely that organized ceremonies
involving animal and human sacrifice and raising animals for food played
important roles in the development of Maya civilization.
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