Interests

Terry O'Connor read Archaeology at London University, specialising in field archaeology and the study of animal remains. On completion of a PhD in which sheep featured strongly, he worked at the Environmental Archaeology Unit, University of York for nine years, principally conducting zooarchaeological research on material from York. He then moved to the University of Bradford for a further nine years, teaching zooarchaeology and environmental archaeology. Terry returned to York in 1999.

Research

Research GroupS

Research Interests

Terry has completed a major research project on livestock, deadstock and animal husbandry in towns across Viking Age Europe, with further work and a major synthesis on urban assemblages from York. This has demonstrated the existence of spatial patterning in the condition and composition of faunal assemblages which relates to ‘neighbourhood’ patterns of selection, consumption and disposal. It has also highlighted the complexity of the taphonomic processes which need to be considered in these contexts. This research has led to the proposal of new methodologies for dealing with large urban assemblages, published in Archaeology of York 19(2), and an ongoing revision of the theory and methodology of zooarchaeological taphonomy.

At the same time, Terry has been pursuing research on the evidence for Late Upper Palaeolithic activity in the Karstic Dales of North Yorkshire. This has involved a detailed analysis and reappraisal of historic collections from cave excavations and the application of high precision C14 dating to human and animal material. The primary focus of this work has been to resolve stratigraphic problems with the deposits from specific caves and more general biostratigraphic issues relating to this distinctive region during a period of high amplitude climate change. This has led to a broader concern with the multi period nature of many deposits of human and animal remains in caves, in particular, the use of caves for burial and other rites in the Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age. This work continues, in collaboration with Dr Tim Taylor (University of Bradford).

Though Terry retains an active interest in the landscape archaeology of upland regions, his research is mostly in the fields of vertebrate zooarchaeology and environmental archaeology, and includes a number of publications in the Archaeology of York series. Other major publications include the books The Archaeology of Animal Bones (Sutton, 2000), Biosphere to Lithosphere (Oxbow, 2005), and, with John Evans, Environmental Archaeology: Principles and Methods (Sutton, 1999; 2nd ed. 2005).

Current Research projects

Future research will develop on three fronts. Further work on bone taphonomy across a full range of contexts will run alongside more detailed treatment of prehistoric human and animal bone from caves in Britain. This will provide the context for a new programme of C14 dating on material from caves across the country (in collaboration with Taylor, Edmonds & Milner). Against this background, next year will see the start of a major book on past human/animal relationships. Premised on a radical critique of approaches to domestication, this study will emphasise the complex webs of historical and ecological relations in which animals and people are always set. Terry is currently co-editing (with Dr Naomi Sykes, University of Nottingham) a book on introductions and extinctions in the British fauna.

Academic and professional distinctionS

Elected Member,International Committee of the International Council for Archaeozoology (ICAZ) 2002–6 (re-elected 2006); Session Co-Ordinator & Chair ‘Taphonomy’, ICAZ International Conference Durham 2002; Session Chair Session Co-Ordinator & Chair ‘Caves and Vertebrates’, ICAZ International Conference Mexico City 2006; Board Member and Trustee, York Archaeological Trust; Member of the AHRB and NERC Peer Review Colleges; Editor of International Journal of Osteoarchaeology; Terry was President of the Archaeology and Anthropology Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science for 2008. He was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 2008.

References

Koon, H.E.C., O'Connor, T.P. and Collins, M.C. in press 2009. "Sorting the butchered from the boiled", Journal of Archaeological Science
O'Connor, T.P. 2009. "Culture and Environment; mind the gap" Land and People. Papers in memory of John G. Evans. Allen, M.J., Sharples, N. and O’Connor, T.P. (eds), Prehistoric Society Research Paper 2. London: The Prehistoric Society; 11-18
O'Connor, T.P. and Bunting, M.J. 2009. "Environmental Change in an Orkney Wetland: plant and molluscan evidence from Quoyloo Meadow", Land and People. Papers in memory of John G. Evans. Allen, M.J., Sharples, N. and O’Connor, T.P. (eds), Prehistoric Society Research Paper 2. London: The Prehistoric Society; 162-8
O’Connor, T.P. 2008. ‘Zooarchaeology in Southern Africa: a view from the North’, in S. Badenhorst, P. Mitchell and J. Driver (eds) Animals and People. Archaeozoological papers in honour of Ina Plug. Oxford, British Archaeological Reports 1849; 8-15
O’Connor, T.P. 2008. ‘On the differential diagnosis of arthropathy in bovids’, in J. Peters (ed.) Documenta Archaeobiologae 6; pp 165-186. 2007.
"Wild or domestic? Biometric variation in the cat Felis silvestris Schreber", International Journal of Osteoarchaeology DOI: 10.1002/oa.913
2007. with Lord, T.C., Siebrandt, D.C., Jacobi, R.M. "People and large carnivores as taphonomic agents in Late Glacial cave assemblages" Journal of Quaternary Science DOI: 10.1002/jqs.1101
2007. "Thinking about beastly bodies", Breaking and shaping beastly bodies. Animals as material culture in the Middle Ages, A. Pluskowski (ed.). Oxford, Oxbow Books, pp. 1-10
2006. "Vertebrate demography by numbers: age, sex and zooarchaeological practice", in Recent Advances in Ageing and Sexing Animal Bones, D. Ruscillo (ed.). Oxford, Oxbow Books, pp. 1-8.
2006: with James Barrett "Animal Bones", Archaeology in Practice. A student guide to archaeological analyses, J. Balme and A. Paterson (eds). Oxford, Blackwell, pp. 260-294.
2005. (ed.) Biosphere to lithosphere. New studies in vertebrate taphonomy. Oxford, Oxbow Books
2005: with O'Connor, S., "Digitising and image-processing radiographs to enhance interpretation in avian palaeopathology", Feathers, grit and symboism. Birds and humans in the ancient Old and New Worlds, G. Grupe and J. Peters (eds). Rahden, Marie Leidorf, pp. 69-82.
2003. Comment on Leach “Human domestication reconsidered”, Current Anthropology 44(3), 361-2
2003. The analysis of urban animal bone assemblages. Archaeology of York 19/2. York, Council for British Archaeology.
2003: with Robinson, S., Nicholson, R.A. and Pollard A.M. “An evaluation of Nitrogen porosimetry as a technique for predicting taphonomic durability in animal bone”, Journal of Archaeological Science 30, 391-403.
2001. “Collecting, sieving, and animal bone quantification”, in Animals and Man in the Past, H. Buitenhuis, W. Prummel (eds). Groningen: ARC Publicatie 41, pp. 7-16.
2001: with Piper, P.J. “Urban small vertebrate taphonomy: a case study from Anglo-Scandinavian York”, International Journal of Osteoarchaeology 11, 336-344.
2001. “On the interpretation of animal bone assemblages from wics”, in Wics. The early mediaeval trading centres of northern Europe, D. Hill and R. Cowie (eds). Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 54-60.
2001. "Economic prehistory or environmental archaeology? On gaining a sense of identity", in Theoretical Issues in Environmental Archaeology, U. Albarella (ed.). Amsterdam, Kluwer Scientific Publications, pp. 17-27.
2001. "Archaeozoology: Western Europe", in Medieval Archaeology, an Encyclopaedia, P. Crabtree (ed.). New York, Garland Publishing, pp. 9-12.
2000. The Archaeology of Animal Bones. Stroud: Sutton Publishing.
2000. "Animal bone quantification", in Handbook of Archaeological Sciences D.R. Brothwell and A.M. Pollard (eds). London, John Wiley, pp. 699-706.
2000: with Jones, A.K.G. "Vertebrate resources", in Handbook of Archaeological Sciences. D.R.Brothwell and A.M. Pollard (eds). London, John Wiley, pp. 411-421.
2000. "Human refuse as a major ecological factor in medieval urban vertebrate communities", in Human Ecodynamics. G. Bailey, R. Charles and N. Winder (eds). Oxford, Oxbow Books, pp. 15-20.
2000: with R.A. Nicholson (eds). People as an Agent of Environmental Change. Oxford, Oxbow Books.

Terry O'Connor