117 Bridgehead to the Badia: New Biometrical and Isotopic Perspectives on Early Neolithic Caprine Exploitation Systems at ‘Ain Ghazal Cheryl A. Makarewicz New analyses of sheep and goat biometrical data from ‘Ain Ghazal attest to a complex and multi-trajectory evolution of early Neolithic caprine management systems that spanned the over two-thousand-year occupation of the settlement. his process was characterized by initial husbandry of caprines brought under human control elsewhere, a strategy which was possibly accompanied by concurrent local practices involving incipient management of local wild goats. Subsequent developments involved intensification of harvesting strategies that emphasized the optimal kill-off of young males, and the adoption of new populations of domesticated sheep and goats while maintaining resident domestic caprine herds. Stable isotopic analyses of bone collagens extracted from goat remains also indicate that goats were likely grazed on pastures located near ‘Ain Ghazal, suggesting that animal management strategies involving disarticulation of caprine herds from the main settlement and regular exploitation of the badia by herders inhabiting the settlement were not in use during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic. he settlement of ‘Ain Ghazal has provided one of the longest Neolithic occupation sequences in the Near East spanning more than two thousand years from the Middle Pre-Pottery Neolithic B through the Yarmoukian Pottery Neolithic (8,100–5,800 cal BC) (Rollefson 1997). Extensive excavations at ‘Ain Ghazal have uncovered an enormous quantity of both architectural and settlement information, as well as striking evidence regarding the ritual and symbolic worlds of early Neolithic societies exemplified by skull caches, plaster statues, shrines, and temples (Rollefson 1983; 1993; 1998). Taken together, these elements have provided considerable insights into the construction and development of Neolithic societies (e.g. Rollefson 2004; 2010). he tremendous temporal depth of occupation at ‘Ain Ghazal also makes the site an important archive of faunal remains that provide a rare opportunity to study the evolution of early animal husbandry strategies over the long- term. Numerous zooarchaeological investigations of the ‘Ain Ghazal faunal assemblage have revealed a dynamic picture of continuously evolving animal exploitation strategies at the site, which included intensive hunting, experimentation with animal husbandry, and complex caprine harvesting strategies (Arbuckle and Atici 2013; Köhler-Rollesfon 1989; Makarewicz 2013; Martin and Edwards 2013; von den Driesch and Wodtke 1997; Wasse 2000; 2002). Indeed, ‘Ain Ghazal has been variously identified as a site of local domestication of the goat (von den Driesch and Wodtke 1997), a place where attempts to manage aurochsen failed (von den Driesch and Wodtke 1997), and a community that successively adopted animals, in particular sheep and goat, domesticated elsewhere (Wasse 2002). ‘Ain Ghazal may have also served as a locale where new lifeways characterized by exclusive herding of domesticated caprines emerged, perhaps during the later Pre-Pottery Neolithic. he development of a ‘tethered’ pastoralism, characterized by seasonal disarticulation of sheep and goat herds from the main settlement (Köhler-Rollefson 1992), could have promoted the formation of a distinct pastoralist segment of society dependent on renewable animal products and contributed to the emergence of pastoral nomadism in the region (Rollefson and Köhler-Rollefson 1993; Quintero et al. 2004). Here, the character of caprine exploitation strategies in use at ‘Ain Ghazal are re-examined through an analyses of biometrical data previously collected by several different analysts and through isotopic analyses of Pre-Pottery Neolithic caprine skeletal remains. In this paper, statistical analyses of the metrical data detail the character of the harvesting strategies in use at ‘Ain Ghazal by isolating more concretely variation in sex-specific kill-off practices and by clarifying the nature of the caprine populations present in order to examine the transfer and uptake of domesticated animal technologies by community members. Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analysis of goat bone collagen will provide insights into caprine management strategies involved with manipulating the animal diet.