Stable Isotope Paleodiet & Mobility Analysis

Stable isotope paleodiet and mobility analysis is the methodology by which bioarchaeologists turn the isotopic chemistry of bone and tooth into quantitative statements about what people ate and where they lived. It rests on a chain of disciplined procedures rather than a single measurement: screening extracted collagen for diagenetic integrity using carbon-to-nitrogen atomic ratios, anchoring human values to a locally measured faunal baseline, quantifying trophic position from nitrogen-15 spacing, partitioning C3 versus C4 and marine carbon sources using the offset between collagen and apatite, and reconstructing residential mobility from biologically available strontium isotopes in tooth enamel. Bentley's review of strontium in the archaeological skeleton and Evershed's account of the biomarker revolution together frame the geochemical and analytical principles that make these inferences defensible.