Building a taphonomy database

The use of databases is deeply embedded in scientific research. Any table of information you put together is, in fact, a type of database. However, advances in computing power now allow us to accumulate and analyze huge digital datasets in a variety of formats. Before these datasets can be analyzed, though, they must be compiled and digitally transformed. Archaeology and paleobiology now have several large online databases, including Neotoma (paleoecology) and the Canadian Archaeological Radiocarbon Database, among many, many others.

Josh Miller and Russ Graham, who invited myself and a group of other researchers to the University of Cincinnati for a workshop on August 23rd and 24th, thought it was high time that taphonomists thought seriously about the creation of an online database. Over the course of those two days we discussed a variety of issues, including the data that might be included in a database, how those data should be coded, the degree to which they should be standardized, and where one might store a taphonomy database.

Welcome poster for the taphonomy workshop in the
University of Cincinnati library.

We are still in the process of putting our ideas into practice, so I can't reveal much as this point, but I do hope that something emerges from what was a very stimulating workshop. I am very thankful to have been invited and to have learned so much.

Oh, and if you ever fly into Concourse B of the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport, be sure to check out the beautiful replicas of North American Ice Age mammals:

Replica of a Megalonyx jeffersonii skeleton.

Replica of a Mammut americanum skeleton.

This was a pleasant surprise for a zooarchaeologist and taphonomist!