00:00.00 ALEX Hello everyone welcome to another episode of archae animals. The podcast all about zoaraeology I'm your host Alex Fitzpatrick and with me as always and today is a very special episode. 00:10.46 S_ Granarius Simmon of Halanga. 00:16.30 ALEX 1 because it's the final installment of our miniseries that we've been doing for the last couple months called where in the world where we finally break out of our british shells and enter other parts of the world to take a look at the zoo archeology there. But it's also um, due to me not being able to count. Yeah, today's our None episode. Um, we should have done something special I was going to do something special and I I mean I I think of I've talked about it on this show. But I'm just I'm really bad at math and counting and numbers. 00:53.30 S_ Granarius I think it just like goes over our head as well cause I think our None anniversary as well. They completely like went over our heads and only after it when lives that wait so we've been doing this a year and we went with fish. 00:55.58 ALEX So. 00:59.94 ALEX Near. 01:09.29 ALEX Well, that was just I cruel irony I think but yeah I mean so next episode next episode we will have our belated happy none episode celebration which we have a very special thing planned. But. Yeah, so let's pretend this is like 49.5 and we'll get on to it because today's also unique. Not only because it's the none episode not only because it's the last installment of this miniseries but we've been breaking each of these episodes. Into continents for ease and today we'll be looking at the final one which is Antarctica little yeah, there's a lot of brain stretching in this episode in terms of content I think we we did a good. 01:49.98 S_ Granarius Might be a little short this one. 02:02.55 ALEX Job. 02:04.49 S_ Granarius Um, you mean of course um Antarctica itself ah is our most southern continent and literally sitting at the south pole of the planet. Um, however, because otherwise it was gonna be a ah real real short episode. 02:18.53 ALEX But. 02:22.77 S_ Granarius We'll be broadening our site a a little bit ah over to the antarctic region surrounding the continent as well. Um, so we'll include offshore islands just the South Shetlands South Orkneys The South Sandwich islands among others. 02:37.65 ALEX Yeah, a lot of. 02:39.41 S_ Granarius And just a moment I was I got really confused for a moment when I None like read through the notes that's like so the shetlands orkney will like wait. What? ah all the south shetlands and the south orkneys arc cap real real creative guys stuff. 02:54.22 ALEX Yeah there's a lot of lot of South X Y Z Islands we'll have in this episode. We'll be sure to make sure we you know specify. But yeah I could understand why it might be a little confusing now. What makes this even trickier is that Antarctica's never had a quote unquote permanent human population I mean even today the human population that does exist on Antarctica is mainly research staffs. They're not really there permanently so you know what we would consider archeology would be. Fairly contemporary, especially compared to the other episodes we've done that said there's still archeology that's being uncovered in exploring the kind of early years of human contact with the continent. So for example, the oldest human remains found so far were from an indigenous woman. Likely from Southern Chile who's been interpreted as a potential sealer who had actually died in the eighteen hundreds and there was like an entire ceiling camp found near her body so there is archeology per se It's just definitely very contemporary in the grand scheme of things. But it is really important to understand because it's kind of telling us the story of you know this continent that's been so out of reach for ages and how we've slowly got human contact with it. 04:17.60 S_ Granarius Now Guess how we've shaped it over time if you will um. 04:21.39 ALEX For better or worse I guess and I think we'll get more to that. There's if you like geopolitics folks then you'll love this episode. 04:31.70 S_ Granarius Just wondering as well. Like there might be like I don't know like how much work has been done under archeological conditions in Antarctica because that that probably is sort of even like it would not surprise me if there'll be even older remains in that. 04:48.69 ALEX I Think there probably is there is a surprising amount of archeology when I first like started researching it. You know I really thought we were going to have to stretch it. But there's been ah, a fair amount of archeology done Again. It's. Very contemporary in the Grand scheme of things because I think the oldest stuff is about the eighteen hundreds but who knows really I mean you know possibilities ran less in terms of their potentially being even older. You know, remains somewhere. But. 05:18.74 S_ Granarius Next because even if it's in the form of ah of shipwrecks of populations trying to reach the continent then just going now. Well never mind. Um. 05:26.20 ALEX Yeah, yeah, so we will start as we've been doing all these episodes with our kind of wild species that you know they're just there usually don't mean anything more than they're there or they've been hunted. And let's be real a lot of this episode. We'll be talking about hunted species and we will start with the antarctic None seal. 05:56.15 S_ Granarius Aktacealus Gazela which again confusing nothing to do with gazelles. 05:59.49 ALEX Yeah there's go to be some really interesting names as well in here. So it's a ah pinipe species or seal species that is technically located in the subanttarctic regions that are you know, just north of the actual antarctic continent. Unsurprisingly given its name the fur fur seal has been mostly threatened by sealers hunting them for their furs and interestingly it's these sealers that actually provide much of the early archeological record in the Antarctica region excavations of none century ceiling camps at say the the south. Shetland Islands for example have actually revealed the kind of methods in which sealers would utilize their surroundings to create temporary shelters either in natural currencies like caves or through scavenging materials like whalebones and sealskins to create huts along with rocks. And you know ah seal skins I think will be another kind of recurring theme in this obviously sealing kind of brought people to the continent but seal skins themselves were utilized as a raw material for clothing such as footwear. Although sealers also brought a fair amount of their own personal materials and items with them and a lot of that is still found in the archeological record there. But it's really interesting to kind of see that importance of seals in the antarctic ah record not just as the artifact itself. But like. Such a huge influence on how the archaeological record was created to begin with the fact that you know the seals attracted humans humans come here and that starts that kind of record being created and archaeology of seaers has actually been used as a framework. By some archaeologists kind of look at the way capitalism has eventually spread to Antarctica via you know the need for selfurs leading towards that Geo and geopolitical situation that I was kind of talking about earlier where many countries are kind of. Trying to exploit the continent for various reasons and ain't that just the way. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 08:06.77 S_ Granarius But um, going away from the um poor first seals. Um our next one we have the the equally poor blue Whale Balopteram Musullu So Hashtag muslim boy. 08:22.31 ALEX Um. 08:25.72 S_ Granarius Um, for a blue whales particularly muscular I mean they must be like all that swimming. 08:33.68 ALEX Thever Well like well they're all fat right? That's why I feel kinship with them. 08:36.88 S_ Granarius That that don't fat shame the whales. 08:42.34 ALEX I've said I feel kinship with them. 08:43.70 S_ Granarius Ah, up blue whales are a species of baline whale um, meaning that they throw sort of massive plates of ballline as opposed to teeth. The ballline itself are very similar in appearance and feeling to actual like sort of bristles of hair um like on your hair brushsh or something. Um and they're actually made out of keratin so like the same material that ah makes up our nails ah hair etc and which then gets stiffened through carciation ballina used for what's called filter feeding. Where sort of basically price just more fish and krill gets sucked into the mouth with water which is then pushed out of the mouth through the ballleen thus keeping the actual prey inside. Um Bale which is sometimes mistakenly referred to as whalebone as also being utilized as raw material in tools. Weapons and various forms of ornamentation and decor as some of you may know blue whales are in fact, ah, the largest living creature to have ever existed on the planet. So Hashtag big mostly boys. Ah, and they've been known to be very very difficult to hunt. But. 09:55.64 ALEX Um. 10:02.52 S_ Granarius That's never stopped people has it. Ah no and it definitely did not stop people out from nearly wiping out wiping them out in the and and I can speak words nearly wiping them out in the antarctic region with approximately 330000 blue whales Killed in the None century with us. This is a jolly episode. Ah oh. 10:25.46 ALEX Yep, Capitalism and you know wiping out the species The most fun episode. 10:30.93 S_ Granarius Oh like it says the same like you have like continent people arrive to the continent people around to keep animals and just start again. Um, but ah, in fact, um I mean that no it is it not an upset. Well. 10:38.00 ALEX 2 10:49.55 S_ Granarius The whaling industry ah is what develops much of the archaeological record in the antarctic region after Seaalers. So I Guess it's thanks to whaling that we get sort of this archeology. Although really fact to pick I'd rather have that whales alive and well ba hair such is life. Um. And what we mostly tend to get is um are the material remains that were left behind during these expeditions particularly in the form of ship shipwrecks underwater. 11:14.64 ALEX Yeah, Antarctic was really interesting in that it is kind of just a history of exploitation. You know you have the Sears come in and then the whalers come in and now you know you do have research teams which are foreseeably there for good reasons. But there's all this. Really intricate geopolitical stuff going on as well. So not entirely. Ah Goodwill I guess so it's but it's very interesting and I can imagine that if you're one of those. Nerds that likes politics and political sciencey things. Antarctica is probably interesting case study in terms of international negotiation I know I don't really understand that stuff myself so I will talk more about the yes although I also want to say is that the none. 12:01.73 S_ Granarius Penguins. 12:05.43 ALEX Um, we've talked about whales on this show. 12:07.19 S_ Granarius I think we've covered whales Beforek cause I remember like mentioning sort of artifacts made out of whale bone in my during um sort of um british archaeology miniseries because I think a lot during sort of the um scandinavian so like the best. 12:12.76 ALEX Yeah. 12:22.22 ALEX Yeah, that's I was thinking. 12:25.42 S_ Granarius And period Yeah, you do you to tend to find the yeah items made at a whalebone and such and to be fair even like later on and earlier on I think it just the most common particular time period. 12:34.34 ALEX Yeah, we should do a full wing episode especially because I am very fascinated by whaling my grandfather. My great grandfather on the norwegian part of my family was a whaler from Norway. So. Have a bunch of wiling stuff in our house I think still somewhere but very interesting and um also I always found whaleboned to be the most aesthetically pleasing out of raw materials from animals just a bit morbid but I don't know I think it's nice to look at bad to get. From whales. Anyway, we're talk about penguins which are my favorite animal. Ah on the entire world. So we'll talk about the emperor penguin instead. 13:13.22 S_ Granarius Oh. 13:26.29 S_ Granarius Abtenodi thiss Ph for. 13:26.95 ALEX And I chose the um for penguin because it's the tallest of all penguin species and it's perhaps the ideal image conjured up when None thing's a penguins which I do a lot because again penguins are my favorite animal and they have a very distinct yellow orange kind of ombre effect from their shoulders to their bellies. Very cute, but sadly we need to talk about dead emperor penguins because they actually factor into the archeological excavations of expedition bases located on Ross Island at the site of the terra nova hut at Cape Evans archeologists were actually able to recover. 13:48.37 S_ Granarius Um, so. 14:01.94 ALEX Well-p preserved remains of None emperor penguins and I've seen the photos and it makes me very sad because they they just you know they're very well preserved and it's they're just dead penguins but they were killed and saved as food in light of severe rationing of food during a 1914 and 1917 stay expedition team that was unable to gather further supplies for 3 years and again, that's another theme that will be talked about in this episode in people not knowing how to survive antarctica poor penguins. 14:31.86 S_ Granarius Just like people not and not packing enough. Supplies are people just getting stranded place. 14:36.75 ALEX And I and a lot of the the worst parts kind of carried by the animals sadly and and Penguins are so cute. So it didn't make me really sad to see those pictures. 14:48.52 S_ Granarius So right now I'm I'm picturing like a really bad reality like stranded in Antarctica. 14:54.18 ALEX No I would let I would simply just let the Penguin eat me to saying. 15:02.18 S_ Granarius I mean probably would if he I mean they are fish. Yeah no, they probably would. But. 15:10.18 ALEX What what is a human but a a very big fish that's on land. Yeah anyway I think I don't know I just I. 15:15.53 S_ Granarius But. 15:24.95 ALEX Like I said we'll we'll get into this in probably the next segment particularly but couple themes that we're gonna hit here obviously exploitation and people not being prepared and it makes sense I mean Antarctica was such a such a different kind of environment for a lot of people. When they came here and you know well like I said we'll we'll talk a bit more about the kind of geopolitical issues with the fact that all these countries wanted to claim Antarctica for themselves so there was basically kind of a race to you know claim land on the a continent but it was also. The worst possible place to try and do anything at any speed. 16:05.99 S_ Granarius Yeah, so I guess many of them just yet. Just yeah. 16:10.47 ALEX Yeah, so you know and like I said we'll we'll definitely talk about this in the upcoming segment because believe it or not I was able to make a list of domestic hits in Antarctica. So if you want to take a guess as to. But. Kind of species will be on that list while we take a break and we'll be back with that segment.