Pre-Colombian Jamaica: Caribbean Archeology and Ethnohistory

Excavated Sites and Fauna / 113
Vertebrate Fauna
Notwithstanding this, and paradoxically enough, we do have quite a lot of
information concerning the fauna from some of these sites, including those
for which no full excavation report exists. Thus, a comprehensive report on
the fauna from White Marl was produced by Elizabeth Wing, who also compared
the results with those from Bengal (A8), Rio Nuevo (Y4), and Bellevue–
Mannings Hill (K13) (AJ 1977, 1:2–7; Silverberg et al. 1972). In addition,
we have reports from Cinnamon Hill (J10) (AJ 1976, 1:9–18), Upton (A43)
(Fandrich 1991; Scudder 1994), and Rodney’s House (Scudder 1991, 1992).
Wing’s table for the first four sites (AJ 1977, 1:7) (with slight amendments to
correct misprints) is at Table 23 in the “List of Principal Excavated Sites in Jamaica,”
Appendix A herein (see also Appendix 10). K. F. Johnson’s table for
Cinnamon Hill (AJ 1976.1:18) is at Table 24, in Appendix A herein (see also
Appendix 27). Information about the fauna from Upton and Rodney’s House
is included in the excavation reports on those sites, since Fandrich and Scudder
did not originally tabulate their results in the same way as Wing and Johnson.
Nonetheless, their reports can provide the basis for so doing (see Table 25 in
the “List of Principal Excavated Sites,” Appendix A). The result is that we are
able to compare all seven sites (layers 2 and 3 from Bellevue being amalgamated
into one) in terms of minimum number of individuals (MNI) represented
and in terms of the broad ecological groups recognized by Wing. Scudder presented
detailed figures for crabs and lobsters at Rodney’s House. Unfortunately,
no quantified information of this kind is available for the other sites, although
crabs were certainly present (Silverberg et al. 1972:Table 2, note*), so they have
had to be excluded from the comparison. The broad habitat groups recognized
by Wing are (1) land (with which freshwater has been amalgamated, since it
is hardly represented at all), (2) beaches, (3) inshore or estuarine, (4) banks
and reefs, (5) offshore or pelagic. Using the MNI percentages for each of these
groups at the seven sites, a convincing general picture of the vertebrate exploitation
patterns for both the north coast and the south coast can be obtained. This
is shown in the form of pie diagrams at Figures 28 and 29. A clear distinction
emerges among those sites that were predominantly exploiting marine resources
(Cinnamon Hill, Bengal, Rio Nuevo, Rodney’s House) and those where land
resources were more important (Bellevue, Upton, White Marl). This reflects
the distance of each site from the sea, but there are also differences between the
north and south coasts that relate to the shoreline configurations, as demonstrated
by Scudder’s map (1991:Figure 2) (Appendix 43).