Elizabeth Veatch

ELIZABETH GRACE VEATCH, then a graduate student at Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, received funding in April 2018 to aid research on ‘Interpreting Hominin Subsistence Strategies from Small Mammal Remains at Liang Bua, Flores, Indonesia,’ supervised by Dr. Jessica Thompson. This project was designed to understand the role of small mammals as a dietary resource for modern ( Homo sapiens ) and non-modern humans ( Homo floresiensis ) on Flores. Veatch aimed to identify the main sources of predation that caused the accumulation of hundreds of thousands of murine skeletal elements at Liang Bua and compare human accumulation patterns between Homo floresiensis and Homo sapiens occupational units. Data were collected on thousands of skeletal elements, including bone surface modifications, burning patterns, skeletal completeness, species identification and murine body size. Results show that both Homo floresiensis and Homo sapiens incorporated murines into their diets: Homo floresiensis consumed murines of medium (~300 g) and giant (~3 kg) body size from more-open environments while Homo sapiens consumed murines of all body sizes (~50 to 3,000 g) from multiple habitats. Overall, this project found that Homo floresiensis engaged with their surrounding environment in fundamentally different ways’sourcing only locally available and abundant resources’compared to the more generalist approach observed in modern humans.