Multiple Microfossil Extraction in Environmental Archaeology

Book Chapter

Summary *

?Microfossils? are defined as those biogenic particles invisible to the naked eye and deposited in any type of soil or sediment context (Coil et al. 2003, 991). These regularly includes ancient silica phytoliths, diatoms, faunal spherulites, starch granules; calcium oxalates, cellulose rings, cryophytes and micro-charcoal, but any other micro particle that is an organism itself or part of one may be also included. It recognizes it?s origins on phytoliths studies (since Pearsal 19778, Piperno 1988 and many others), but includes other microfossils in the same importance level since the development of a low chemical extraction procedure allowed to conserve most of them. Laboratory procedures for obtaining as many types of microfossils as possible in one single extraction have been explored (Coil et al. 2001, Korstanje 2003, 2004) and conformed what we today is called ?multiple microfossil analysis? (Korstanje 2009). Information provided by the agent in SIGEVA