2) Deer, antelope, and goats had the lower extremities removed by hacking and snapping away the distal tibia of the hind legs, and sectioning-out the
humerus/radius/ulna articulation of the forelegs. Cow limbs were generally not treated the same way, as carpals and phalanges were the normal
discard. Conversely, pig long bones and lower extremities were a rarity in the collection, suggesting they were, indeed, food items.

3) Fore-and hind-limbs were disarticulated from the carcass by hacking, sawing, cutting, and breaking through the scapula above the glenoid, and into
the pelvis through the acetabulum.

4) The neck was removed by sawing, then closely trimmed of remaining meat by sawing and cutting.

5) Instead of splitting the vertebrae longitudinally, the butchers first removed the backstrap meat (paralleling the vertebrae on each side of the
backbone) with knives. Once exposed, the large dorsal spines of the thoracic vertebrae were hacked or sawed-off to facilitate straighter cutting. At this
point, one of two methods was employed: hacking through the transverse processes, the vertebral column was freed from the ribs and removed; or the
carcass was cut into more than quarter sections, sawing directly through the vertebrae. The number of saw-cut and hacked ribs might indicate that the
rib sack was removed prior to the final division of the carcass and subdivided into smaller sections.

Missing elements from Phase I and II excavations suggest the major elements were further divided elsewhere, if at all. Skulls and mandibles are
notably absent from both collections, as are long bone fragments of cows. Phase I generally produced few unidentified fragments per unit whereas
Phase II produced considerable more by comparison. This may be an indirect indicator of further butchering activity past the initial stage of carcass
reduction, as crushed and splintered bone is produced by closer cutting and trimming. The more numerous occurrences of large mammal and cow
long bone fragments--such as saw-cut femoral articulations in AII Level 2--in the Phase II units suggests some functional difference in the agents
responsible for depositing the bone. The distribution of certain skeletal elements in certain units, such as five scapulae and four pelves in Unit D and
four skull and mandible elements in EII, certainly suggests some grouping of elements for efficiency of butchering or division of butchering labor.
The scarcity of burned bones (a total of 17 for both phases) argues that no major cooking effort was being undertaken in any of the units.

Based solely on skeletal age, immature animals were butchered less often than mature animals. While it is doubtful the Alamo inhabitants could afford
the luxury of slaughtering young domestic animals for tender meat, none of the animals examined had matured to any great extent. A single fetal
animal and a very young goat were identified in Phase II collections, and immature chickens appeared in several units, however. Skeletal age is
somewhat deceiving, though, as a cow may not mature skeletally until 5-7 years but may easily reproduce before then.

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