The Study of Fish Remains from the Late Roman Era from Argamum, Tulcea County

. The studied fish remains come from the excavations carried out by the


Introduction
The fortification of Argamum is located at Cape Dolojman, on a rocky promontory on the shores of Lake Razelm, Jurilovca commune, Tulcea County (Figure 1).In ancient times the settlement had direct access to the Black Sea, because the current lagoon was a former golf.The urban settlement was founded by Greek colonists from Miletus, the toponym associated with it being Orgame, which in Roman times is Latinised into Argamum2 .The studied fish remains come from the excavations carried out by the Ștefan Honcu archaeologist between 2017 and 2020 within the Argamum archaeological site.The remains are dated to the Late Roman Era as follows: second half of the V century, first half of the VI century, second half of the VI century and late VI century -early VII century3 .The archaeozoological material represents food waste.The only osteological remains registered with butchering marks was a fragment of a caudal vertebra from Silurus glanis (catfish) (Figure 2).In the second half of the VI century level was discovered an edifice (noted E1), from which were identified 7 remains coming from carp (Cyprinus carpio), one fragment of a posttemporal of catfish and 11 remains from Teleostei fish.

Methods
The study methodology consisted mainly of anatomical and taxonomic identifications based on archaeozoological atlases 4 , quantification of the data (NISP -number of identified specimens and MNI -minimum number of individuals), taphonomical evaluation, osteometry, size and weight estimation 5 , estimation of energy yield 6 and statistical analysis.

Results and discussion
The studied material consists of 72 fish remains coming from carp -28 fragments, catfish -19 remains and the rest of 25 fragments couldn`t be identified up to species level (Figure 4).Regarding the minimum number of individuals (MNI), the carp sums up a minimum of 14 individuals and the catfish adds up to 11 individuals.Starting in chronological order with the second half of the V century level, the fish remains counts to 9, 4 remains from carp, a fragment of cleithrum from catfish and 4 fragments from unidentifiable fish.As MNI, for carp was estimated to have a minimum of three individuals and one individual for catfish.From the first half of the VI century were discovered 17 osteological remains coming from carp -7 remains, catfish -8 remains and two unidentified fragments.For both, carp, and catfish, were identified two minimum individuals each.In the second half of the VI century were discovered the most fish remains -41 osteological fragments.The unidentifiable remains are prevalent in this assemblage -19 remains, being followed by the carp remains -15 and catfish remains -7 fragments.Carp presents a minimum number of 5 individuals and catfish presents only 3 estimated individuals.Lastly, in the late VI -early VII century were excavated only 5 fragments, 2 remains coming from carp and 3 remains from catfish.Catfish are more numerous as MNI too, being estimated 3 individuals, while for carp were estimated 2 individuals (Table 1).For some of the osteological remains the size and weight were calculated based on osteometry.Thus, for the second half of the V century were measured a hyomandibular, an opercular and a vertebra of carp and estimated sizes of 866.28 mm, 475.48 mm, 802.25 mm and weights of 9599 g, 1624,59 g, respectively 7648.88 g.For catfish was measured a cleithrum with M2 = 17.7 mm, being estimated a size of 1114.2 mm and a weight of 9329.83 g.
The estimated size of carp varies from 271.33 mm to 713.7 mm in the first half of the VI century and the weight varies from 310.24 g to 5416.74 g.For catfish, the size varies from 1216.2 mm to 2271.3 mm and the weight varies from 12122.7 g to 78557.6 g.In the second half of the VI century were measured 8 fragments of carp and 4 fragments of catfish.Thus, the size of carp varies from 592.79 mm to 904.31 and the weight from 3126 g to 10900 g.For catfish, the calculated sizes are: 1132.5 mm, 1645.49mm, 2335.42 mm and 2367.19 mm and the estimated weights are: 16561 g, 29951 g, 85381.23 g and 88903.83g.
In the last studied level, the size and weight of carp were estimated to be 669.5 mm and 841.6 mm, respectively 4480 g and 8813.53 g based on two caudal vertebrae with M1 of 12 mm and 15.4 mm.Based on two precaudal vertebrae and a dentary bone, the size of catfish was calculated to 912.3 mm, 1095 mm and 630.75 mm.The weight was estimated to be 5130.12g, 8855.88 g, and 1701.38 g respectively (Table 2).A size distribution was made for both carp and catfish to better see in which size classes most of the individuals are situated.Thus, most of the individuals of carp are situated between 60-80 cm and 80-100 cm (Figure 5).For catfish, most of the individuals have sizes between 220 -240 cm (three individuals) and between 100-120 cm and 180-200 cm (two individuals for each class) (Figure 6).The majority of large size individuals (adults) could indicate that most probably fishing took place during the spawning season, which occurs mainly between March and June 7 .

Silurus glanis
Based on the estimated amount of meat for each species, the energy yield (kcal) was calculated.Thus, catfish, due to its larger size and higher caloric yield (244 kcal/100 g) provided in all samples the largest part of the estimated calories (54% -second half of the V century; 97% -first half of the VI century; 91% -second half of the VI century; 73% -late VI century -early VII century).Compared to catfish, carp is a less fatty fish, with a caloric yield of 104 kcal/100 g.Energy yields for carp and catfish were taken from Mincu, 1985.In the second half of the V century, carp offered 1.962.743kcal and catfish 2.276.478kcal.Moving to the first half of the VI century total fish resources provided 52.362.898kcal, of which 50.992.964kcal came from catfish.In the second half of the VI century, catfish provided 53.874.575kcal, and carp only 5.630.083kcal.And in the late VI century -early VII century, carp offered 1.382.536kcal, while catfish provided 3.827.720kcal (Table 3).For a better understanding of the energy yield values we followed the theoretical model of Bălășescu et al. 8 and we tried to estimate the number of inhabitants that could have been fed exclusively with these fish resources.We took the same mean value of the needed calorie intake of approximately 3000 kcal/day/individual depending on age, gender, weight, elders, adults, or children.Therefore, the fish resources from the second half of the V century could sustain 1413 inhabitants for a day, 47 for 30 days, 8 for 6 months and 4 for a year.In the VI century, the fish resources were richer, in the first half being fed 17454 inhabitants for a day, and up to 48 inhabitants for a year.In the second half, the amount of estimated calories could have sustained 19835 people for a day and 54 people for a year.In the late VI century -early VII century fish resources are similar to the V century and could`ve fed 1737 inhabitants for a day, 58 for 30 days, 10 for 6 months and 5 for a year (Table 4).According to the approximately half a century dating for each archaeological level, we tried to estimate how many people could sustain these fish resources, and only the resources coming from the VI century were rich enough to sustain two inhabitants (one for the first half and one for the second half of the century).

Conclusions
The studied archaeozoological remains, which represent food waste, come from the Argamum archaeological site from the 2017-2020 archaeological campaigns by Ștefan Honcu.The present study focuses only on the fish resources from the Late Roman Era from the Argamum fortress.In the aforementioned archaeological campaigns were discovered 72 fish fragments coming only from two species (common carp and catfish) and being dated to the second half of the V century -9 remains, first and second half of the VI century -17 remains, respectively 41 remains and to late VI century -early VII century -5 remains.The carp is prevalent as NISP and MNI in almost all the studied assemblages.
Most of the measured fish fragments came from large-size specimens, between 40 -100 cm for carp and between 100 -240 cm for catfish.By size distribution, it seems that most of the captured fish were adults, and it is possible that fishing took place during the spawning 8 BĂLĂȘESCU et.al. 2005.season, between March and June.The energy yield was estimated based on the reconstituted weights.Thus, catfish, due to its larger size and higher caloric yield was the main energy source in all the studied assemblages.Also, a theoretical model was made to better understand how many individuals could sustain these fish resources.The assemblages from the VI century were the richest, being able to feed 17454 inhabitants for a day, 582 for 30 days, 48 for a year and one inhabitant for 50 years in the first half of the century and 19835 inhabitants for a day, 661 for 30 days, 54 for a year and one for 50 years in the second half.

Figure 4 .
Figure 4. Proportions of fish remains from the Argamum archaeological site.

Figure 5 .
Figure 5. Carp size distribution in the Argamum archaeological site.

Figure 6 .
Figure 6.Catfish size distribution in the Argamum archaeological site.

Table 1 .
Quantification of fish remains from the studied archaeological levels from Argamum site.

Table 2 .
Carp and catfish estimated sizes and weights.

Table 3 .
Energy yield estimated for the reconstituted fish weight.

Table 4 .
The number of inhabitants sustained exclusively by the studied fish remains for each archaeological level.