272 Grey
sometimes used as a marker of a change towards a colder, damper climate in
northern European contexts.37 At our current state of knowledge we should be
careful not to place too great an interpretational weight upon this sample, but
the evidence is nonetheless suggestive. Meanwhile, high proportions of oak
and in particular chestnut, suggest a certain amount of human intervention
in and maintenance of woodland resources in the period—and I return to this
proposition below.38
A range of animals, exploited variously for their meat, their muscle, and their
milk is attested, too. Again, robust archaeozoological samples are currently few
and far between, but we are served by a small number of suggestive contexts.39
At Podere San Mario, for example, the evidence hints at a small flock of sheep
and/or goats as well as pigs and cattle. At the somewhat larger site of Monte
Barro in the modern-day province of Lecco in northern Italy, young pig, sheep,
and goat appear to have been butchered for meat, while poultry and cattle are
also present along with a small sample of horse.40 It is difficult to move from
these isolated samples to a systematic appreciation of the relative presence or
role of these various animals in agrarian regimes, and we should not expect
homogeneity either geographically or socio-economically. A rough apprecia-
tion of their relative value in the eyes of the law may be gleaned from a chapter
in the Edictum Theoderici establishing penalties for rustling of livestock, which
appears to present a set of rough equivalences: one stallion to two mares, two
cows, ten female goats, or five pigs.41
This catalogue is clearly influenced by the estimation of the horse as a sym-
bol of wealth and status, but it does reflect the relative value of cattle, which
are undeniably the most versatile of the animals characteristically found in an
agricultural context. Bovines can be used to plough fields, exploited for milk
and meat, while their hide, horn, and bone can be employed in making tools,
household items, ornaments, and clothing. We catch hints of the potential
economic value of plough animals from a chapter contained in the Edictum
Theoderici that determines a penalty of one solidus per day for the exploitation
37 McCormick, “Climate Science”, pp. 83–5; Cheyette, “Climate Anomaly”, p. 163.
38 Rottoli/Negri, “I resti vegetale carbonizzati”, pp. 201–3. Chestnut is also found in signifi-
cant proportions at Monte Barro: Castiglioni/Cottini/Rottoli, “I resti archeobotanici”,
p. 224. Note also the discussion of Squatriti in this volume.
39 See, for recent surveys of archaeozoological materials in Italy, Baker/Clark,
“Archaeozoological Evidence”; Valenti/Salvadori, “Animal Bones”.
40 See the table in Baker, “Subsistence, Husbandry and Status”, pp. 252–3.
41 Edictum Theoderici 57. See also Edictum Theoderici 56; 58.