New climatological data on the IInd millennium BC: the avifaunal remains from the Mursia settlement on the island of Pantelleria (central Mediterranean, Italy)

Bird remains from archaeological sites can provide us useful data concerning climate in the past. The excavations of the Bronze age settlement of Mursia on the island of Pantelleria have brought to light several large huts with different shapes and a complex stratigraphy with at least three different phases. The settlement was built on a large area and dated to the IInd millennium BC. Several exotic products coming from the eastern Mediterranean testify that the island of Pantelleria was part of a complex commercial net.

A large faunal assemblage with thousands of bird remains was recovered from inside the huts and from the open spaces between them. A careful study of these remains allowed us to make some climatological hypothesis based on the different ecological adaptations of the identified species. The result of our work is that it seems that a small cold oscillation affected the central Mediterranean during the generally warm Bronze age.