Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jasrep The risky business of keeping pigs during periods of climatic fluctuation: A case from the Mid-Holocene Near East Adam Allentuck a, ⁎ , Arlene M. Rosen b a The Archaeology Centre, University of Toronto, 19 Russell Street, Toronto, Ontario M5S 2S2, Canada b Department of Anthropology, University of Texas at Austin, SAC4.102, 2201 Speedway Stop C3200, Austin, TX 78712, USA ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Pigs Zooarchaeology Geoarchaeology Southern Levant Climate change ABSTRACT The climate record of the Mid-Holocene southern Levant indicates a period of rapid climate change and erratic rainfall. An unpredictable rainfall regime would have posed a considerable risk to societies dependent upon crops and livestock that require a plentiful and consistent supply of water. In this paper, we first examine an assemblage of pig remains from Hartuv, a small settlement occupied during the Early Bronze Age, and then interpret these data alongside palaeohydrological evidence. We reconcile seemingly contradictory data—high relative taxonomic abundance of pigs and climatic conditions characterized by a general aridification trend and rainfall instability—by considering zooarchaeological assemblages from nearby sites in the context of their hydrological settings. On the basis of geoarchaeological evidence from Hartuv, we conclude that the effects of variable rainfall were mitigated by a locally marshy environment and an anthropogenic landscape feature, which may have been used to store water. 1. Introduction Palaeoclimatic records of the Near East show that the late fourth millennium BC was characterized by high degree of short-term varia- bility in rainfall (Bar-Matthews and Ayalon, 2004; Clarke et al., 2016). The effects of unpredictable precipitation on prehistoric agriculture are well known, but their effects on prehistoric livestock husbandry are not as well established. While sheep, goat and cattle are fairly tolerant of moderate vacillations between humid and arid conditions, pigs require a plentiful and dependable source of water in order to thrive (Burrin, 2001). It is for this reason that a high relative frequency of pig remains in a faunal assemblage is commonly taken as a corollary of humid en- vironmental conditions. In this paper, we seek an understanding of the impact of rapid cli- mate change on local livestock management. The faunal assemblage from Hartuv, a Late Early Bronze I (middle to late 4th millennium BC) village site in central Israel, provides a sample of pig remains that is unusually abundant relative to most other assemblages from temperate regions of the southern Levant (Fig. 1). We explain how pigs thrived in this hydrologically unpredictable setting by examining three lines of related evidence: (1) inter-assemblage taxonomic differences in light of their ecological settings; (2) rapid climate change in the Middle Holo- cene; and (3) local hydrology and anthropogenic landscape features. While climate change is conventionally examined at global and continental scales, the zooarchaeological and geoarchaeological evi- dence from Hartuv provides an opportunity to understand how a local community overcame climatic uncertainty to maintain the Near Eastern tradition of keeping pigs. 2. Hartuv Hartuv was excavated by A. Mazar and P. de Miroschedji over the course of three brief seasons in 1985, 1986 and 1988. Hartuv is located on the west bank of Nahal Soreq at the point in the river where the narrow gorge widens as it opens into the Shephelah. The site covers an area of about three hectares, but its ancient delineation is not clear. Strata II and III are attributed to an early phase of Late EB I by its pottery assemblage (Mazar and de Miroschedji, 1996). In the regional chronology, this pottery assemblage is most closely associated with Tel Erani C (Braun, 1996: 242, Table VII.A/2) and Horvat Ptora (Milevski and Baumgarten, 2008). Its location at the intersection of several nat- ural roads provided easy access from the coastal plain to the west and hill country to the east, and from the northern and southern Shephelah. Hartuv is predominantly defined by a large, centrally located building complex presumed to have served communal needs of the village. Of the entire 600 m 2 area of the hillock on which this structure was built, 350 m 2 were excavated (Area A). An additional 65 m 2 were uncovered from an area of domestic architectural installations (Area B) on a https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2019.03.009 Received 29 July 2018; Received in revised form 8 March 2019; Accepted 10 March 2019 ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: a.allentuck@alum.utoronto.ca (A. Allentuck), amrosen@austin.utexas.edu (A.M. Rosen). Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 24 (2019) 939–945 Available online 25 March 2019 2352-409X/ © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T