Gone Batty: A Newly Adapted Morphological Methodology for Bat Cranial Remains Within an Archaeological Setting

ABSTRACT In comparison to other species within faunal assemblages, bats (Order: Chiroptera) have been overlooked, especially in Papua New Guinea, resulting in limited traditional archaeozoological methods. The analysis of bats within an archaeological setting in Papua New Guinea will allow for a greater understanding of bat cranial morphology and the impacts that may be occurring throughout time, including anthropogenic or climatic impacts, changes in identified species' morphological compositions, and even identification of extinct species. This is especially important in regions with extensive human–bat interactions across a vast timeframe, such as anthropologically associated bat‐dominated faunal assemblages in Papua New Guinea. The study will adapt and apply a traditional archaeozoological methodology to evaluate use on archaeological bat cranial remains present within the case study site of Kiowa, spanning the late Pleistocene to mid‐Holocene. Furthermore, implementation of the methodology on a case study site determined whether a morphological change, in association with anthropogenic activities, was identifiable and impacting the cranial remains present across the time periods. The results highlight that the adapted traditional methodology is applicable and able to be implemented on bat cranial remains, producing measurement results for the cranial categories. The results produced through the case study suggest no distinct change in morphological size influenced by anthropogenic activities between the late Pleistocene and mid‐Holocene, although sample size and associated issues may have impacted the results. Interestingly, the utilization of this methodology highlighted taphonomic impacts on the cranial elements that were not initially suspected. The results presented in this paper indicate that the newly adapted traditional methodology can be used in archaeozoological assemblages, expanding the limited archaeozoological approach to bats in Papua New Guinea.