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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Environ. Archaeol.
Sec. Archaeological Isotope Analysis
Volume 4 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fearc.2025.1499291
This article is part of the Research Topic Towards a Deeper Understanding of Ancient Terrestrial Migrations: Migratory Ecology and Links to Hominin and Human Behavior View all 3 articles
A strontium ( 87 Sr/ 86 Sr) isoscape of Southern Ethiopia: implications for hominin land-use and faunal mobility patterns
Provisionally accepted
Seminew Asrat 1,2*
Francesco Lucchini 1
Mary Anne Tafuri 1 Caterina Aureli 1
Marina Gallinaro 1
Andrea Zerboni 3
Marianna Marianna 1 Enza Elena Spinapolice 1- 1 Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
- 2 Ethiopian Heritage Authority, Addis Ababa, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
- 3 University of Milan, Milan, Lombardy, Italy
Tracing human and animal mobility behaviour, land use, and exploitation strategies through strontium (Sr) isotope analysis is critical for archaeological and palaeoecological research. The development of an 87 Sr/ 86 Sr bioavailable baseline map, often termed isoscapeThe application of 87 Sr/ 86 Sr bioavailable baseline map, also known as an isoscape, is a prerequisite for interpreting the Sr isotope composition of animal and human remains from an archaeological context. Despite the wealth of archaeological records dispersed across southern Ethiopia, we know little about bioavilable 87 Sr/ 86 SrSr, which calls for a Sr isoscape to address key archaeological questions. Here, we present the first 87 Sr/ 86 Sr isoscape of southern Ethiopia produced using a geostatistical Ordinary Kriging approach through the analysis of water, plants, and soil leachate, combined with previously published datasets. We took used the Middle Stone Age (MSA) site of Gotera as a case study and conducted 87 Sr/ 86 SrSr isotope analysis of faunal tooeeth enamel. The resultsResults show that our novel baseline isoscape displayed heterogeneous 87 Sr/ 86 Sr isotope ratios (0.704--0.711), consistent with geological units, with an accurate model performance evaluated through cross-validation. The faunal tooth enamel analysis reveals that the Gotera faunas are of predominantly local origin, suggesting limited mobility patterns and exploitation of local resources across the Gotera depression. This study on bioavailable isoscape and faunal 87 Sr/ 86 Sr isotopes study highlights the potential of Sr isotope research in to characterise characterizing past mobility patterns, spatial ecologies, and resource utiliszation strategies in Ethiopia.
Keywords: Isoscape, Strontium, Mobility pattern, Hominin land use, MSA, southern Ethiopia
Received: 20 Sep 2024; Accepted: 11 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Asrat, Lucchini, Tafuri, Aureli, Gallinaro, Zerboni, Marianna and Spinapolice. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Seminew Asrat, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy
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