Ancient whale bones have been
found on three Roman fish processing sites close to the Strait of Gibraltar
Wed 11 Jul
2018 00.01 BSTLast modified on Wed 11 Jul 2018 10.16 BST
Ancient bones found around the
Strait of Gibraltar suggest that the Romans might have had a thriving whaling
industry, researchers have claimed.
The bones, dating to the first
few centuries AD or earlier, belong to grey whales and North Atlantic right
whales – coastal migratory species that are no longer found in European waters.
Researchers say this not only
suggests these whales might have been common around the entrance to the
Mediterranean in Roman times, but that Romans might have hunted them.
They add that Romans would not
have had the technology to hunt whale species found in the region today - sperm
or fin whales which live further out at sea - meaning evidence of whaling might
not have been something archaeologists and historians were looking out for.
“It’s the coastal [species] that
makes all the difference,” said Dr Ana Rodrigues, first author of the research
from the Functional and Evolutionary Ecology Centre, CEFE, in France.
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