These marks suggest butchering activities and the production of leather and textiles.
Here, the only evidence for animalproduct use are those of primary butchering marks on various mammalian animal bones (primarily deer), likely for meat production.
Thus, it appears that both butchering and consumption occurred on all terraces.
Handaxes were no doubt also very effective functional tools especially for butchering carcasses and some may have only played this role.
There is no corroborating bone evidence of butchering or skinning, so the likelihood is that this is evidence of hide working rather than food production.
It is possible, however, as always, that the bone remains from butchering were discarded at a locale distant from the structures.
Consequently, the archaeologically observed 'events' of knapping and butchering must be rendered comprehensible by treating them as the acts of biological organisms reacting to long-term ecological change.
However, our sample of butchering and skinning evidence on bone is small, and future research should focus on the question of specialized butchering and/or skinning.
