INTRODUCTION

Animal bones are one of the most ubiquitous archaeological finds, and it is well recognised that their detailed study can shed light on a diverse range of past human activities. These include the identification of subsistence strategies; economic regimes; the use of animals and animal parts in craft and industry; attitudes to animals; and the symbolic role of animals in cosmology, ritual/religion and as food items. The importance of these lines of investigation, together withthe abundance of faunal remains on many sites, has meant that analyses of animal bone are now routinely undertaken as part of the post-excavation process. Despite their centrality, however, zooarchaeological studies of the later post-medieval period in Britain, defined here as dating from the mid-18th century, are remarkable for their absence.

As a zooarchaeologist withresearch interests in the later medieval and post-medieval periods I have often been frustrated by the infrequency withwhich later post-medieval assemblages of animal bones have been subjected to detailed analysis and publication. This chapter thus seeks to explore how this situation has arisen and to highlight to curators, archaeological project managers and historical archaeologists more generally, why later post-medieval animal bone assemblages should be aff orded a higher status than is currently the case. The latter aim will be achieved through the presentation of two case studies: one of which can be described as broadly post-processual in perspective (exploring changing attitudes to animals) and the other more economic and processual in nature (dealing withthe improvement of domestic animals).