Not by bones alone: Exploring household composition and socioeconomic status in an isolated historic mining community

Archaeological excavations in the historic townsite of Grantsville, Nevada, were conducted in a variety of contexts including dugouts, houses, and a blacksmith shop. Investigations at 12 features retrieved a modest yet spatially variable assemblage of food bones, largely represented by domestic taxa (i.e., cow, pig, and sheep). Faunal quantity, variety, and serving size helped discern household composition and the frequency of food preparation. Faunal quality, regardless of quantification technique, tended not to correspond with ceramic socioeconomic indicators recovered across these same features. By reviewing mid- to late 19th-century western foodways to derive implications for archaeological faunal assemblages, and by considering systemic variability in isolated historic communities, the data suggest that in such cases ceramics manifest a more reliable indicator of feature-specific socioeconomic status than do food bones.