CaribOx brought Archaeologist Grace Turner and Rick Schulting, Professor of Scientific and Prehistoric Archaeology University of Oxford, together this summer to analyse the dietary habits of early inhabitants of The Bahamas.
This fascinating research focuses on San Salvador (Guanahaní), The Bahamas, providing fresh insight into human–environment interactions before European contact.
By examining radiocarbon dates and chemical signatures in human remains, researchers found that between AD 900 and 1400, people relied less on marine foods over time. The most likely reason: local marine resources were being overused.
This shift toward land-based food sources offers strong evidence that even small-scale societies had the power to reshape their ecosystems and had big environmental impacts long before industrialisation.