An important question in the analysis of bone artefacts is the determination of the applied raw material. In many cases artefacts retaining anatomical features can be identified by morphological archaeozoological analysis – a field too wide to be dealt here with in detail. However, heavily worked objects often do not retain morphological criteria allowing species identification. The latter can sometimes be determined by histological criteria.
In recent time biomolecular and physical methods become more and more important as identification tools. Biomolecular identification methods comprise e. g. ZooMS (Zooarchaeology by Mass spectroscopy) and aDNA analysis. Physical methods are for instance spectroscopical and optical methods.
The two pages below contain information about raw material identification methods.