Endangered species may have been part of ancient funeral feasts in Morocco cave

Miami Herald

24-04-2025

On the northern peninsula of Morocco, just across the sea from Spain, one of the world's heaviest flying birds faces extinction.
The population of great bustards, Otis tarda, is now down to less than 80 individuals, with some experts estimating the species will go extinct on the African continent by 2036.
This wasn't always the case, however, and a new analysis from deep inside an ancient cave shows the birds may once have been plentiful — and used in ritualistic feasts.
The Grotte des Pigeons is a large, open air cave that has hosted human occupation for at least 85,000 years, ending about 14,600 years ago, according to a study published March 18 in the peer-reviewed journal Ibis.
For centuries, the cave was used as a burial ground, now known as 'Africa's oldest identified cemetery,' according to the study.
Researchers have been studying the site for years because of the 'exceptional detail' of the preserved remains, but as they sifted through the bones, they realized not all of them belong to humans.
From 2005 to 2022, researchers uncovered 150 bird remains belonging to at least 14 species, including some belonging to great bustards, according to the study.
Some of the bustard remains show evidence of being butchered and cooked, with cut marks similar to those made on modern-day turkeys after Thanksgiving, researchers said in an April 16 news release from the Natural History Museum in London.
Bustards are incredibly large birds, with some males of the species reaching nearly 45 pounds, so hunting and preparing them for consumption would not have been an easy task, researchers said.
'A specialist of open grasslands and farmland, the great bustard requires equally massive areas of relatively undisturbed land to live and breed on,' according to the release.
These areas are not physically close to the cave, meaning the birds were intentionally brought into that space, researchers said.
'This is a communal behavior that involves special foods that people have to go out of their way for that is then consumed in some kind of special context,' study author Joanne Cooper said in the release. 'The habitat for the great bustard isn't really the kind of the mountainous area around the cave in which the remains are found. They would have had to trek down to the plains to catch the bustards, carry them back up to the cave, prepare them, cook them and eat them. The special context is that they're associated with these burials.'
The bird remains, dated to about 15,000 years ago, were not only eaten (evidenced by teeth marks on bones) but also left as offerings with the dead, according to the study.
Meat-rich parts of the bird were found near the feet and legs of a human male, intentionally left while other parts of the bird were consumed by the living, according to the study.
'We see a strong cultural association with the great bustard because the people are not only depositing them in burials, but there's also evidence that they were eating them as well,' Cooper said. 'We believe that was part of the funeral rites. It seems to be a feasting set up, which is a very specific type of ritual eating.'
Great bustards are listed as endangered worldwide by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and are found outside Morocco in Spain, a few small populations in central Europe, western Asia, and in northern China and Mongolia.
The population in Morocco is the only group of great bustards in Africa, and researchers said because of their genetic difference to the Spain population, there was previous debate about how long great bustards have lived on the continent.
'This new finding confirms that the birds have a long history on the African continent, and were much more abundant and widespread than they are today,' according to the release.
The Grotte des Pigeons cave is located outside the town of Tafoughalt, in northeastern Morocco.
The research team includes Cooper, Nigel Collar, Abdeljalil Bouzouggar, Nick Barton and Louise Humphrey.