Goat’s tooth shows that ancient Greek food economy was more complicated than researchers thought

The agricultural economy was the backbone of wealth in ancient Greece. Food brought people together, whether in smaller groups at a wine-drinking symposium, or the entire community in a sacrificial feast of epic proportions. In The Odyssey, the ancient Greek epic poem, Odysseus’s son joins one of these early feasts – a community barbecue of 100 cattle.

Researchers have long recognised the economic, political and social importance of food in ancient Greece. But one key question has never been fully settled: how were animals actually raised within this system?

For nearly a century, academics have been locked in a debate over the organisation of ancient Greek animal husbandry. At one extreme is the idea of large, semi-nomadic herds moving seasonally across the landscape in search of pasture. At the other is a more intimate picture: smaller herds integrated into everyday farm life, feeding on local fields and crop by-products. In other words, were animals part of a mobile pastoral system, or woven tightly into mixed crop-and-livestock farms?

Along with an interdisciplinary team of archaeologists and scientists, I have analysed one of the largest assemblages of animal remains...

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