Zooarchaeology at UVic

The Department of Anthropology at UVic has a fantastic comparative osteology collection of over 2,921 mammals, birds, and fish from throughout the North Pacific and beyond. The ‘bone lab’ which turns 50 years old in 2024 is designed to enable confident identifications of fragmentary skeletal specimens from archaeological sites. The collection is regularly used by students, consultants, and professionals for zooarchaeological research and has an outsized impact on research. The collection has been curated and managed for decades by the extremely knowledgeable Becky Wigen whose career at UVic is rightfully celebrated here. Dr. Stephanie Calce is the new(er) lab instructor whose responsibility includes booking space in the lab and managing the preparation lab and feeding the beetles. UVic Graduate student Kathryn McKenzie has added an incredible amount of digital detail to to make the collection more accessible and discoverable – check out the collection on the Global Biodiversity Information Facility page which has coordinates for 2486 specimens and metadata for 2921 specimens

The zooarchaeology lab with prepared modern specimens on trays against the wall and in the island (left) and the new Environmental Archaeology lab with a sink for processing samples and sorting space. Photos: Iain McKechnie

Thanks to a grant from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation, we’ve been able to purchase a Metreon 3D scanner and have begun to create models of archaeological as well as comparative specimens. Pictured here is former NSERC USRA student Katie Dierks working being trained on using the scanner by UVic Phd Student Marla MacKinnon. There are also many 3D scans available on the UVic library sketchfab page.

The ins and outs of this collection is featured in this film produced by visual anthropology student Holly Cecil entitled : The Bare Bones https://vimeo.com/162629896