Chicken Bones

Why did the chicken cross the Atlantic? To get to the other side of the world, of course!

Chickens (Gallus gallus) were familiar livestock to the Jamestown colonists. They were easy to raise, reproduced quickly, and were an affordable food source, even for England’s poorest citizens. Chickens also helped to control waste and pests, eating bugs, mice, and discarded plant material. It was common for chickens to roam freely on rural farms and plantations and even through city streets, consuming whatever they might find. John Smith’s writings reference these behaviors were true at Jamestown, stating, “…neere 500 chickens brought up themselves, without having any meate given them.”

Archaeologically, chicken bones have been found in several early Fort Period contexts, including many that date to the Starving Time. Several of the excavated chicken bones were butchered or burned, evidence of their use as food. Nearly every type of bone present in chicken skeletons have been uncovered from Jamestown’s excavations, highlighting that the animals were alive at Jamestown and were one of the first types of livestock brought to the Virginia colony from England. A notable bone type uncovered from Jamestown are cock spurs, which are only present on roosters. At this time, cock fighting was still a popular sport in England, and it’s likely that it was brought to the colony as well.

Just like today, people in Tudor England ate both the meat and eggs of chickens. Breasts, wings, and thighs were eaten, along with gizzards, livers, and hearts. Even the head of chickens were occasionally eaten, as is the case with the Middle Age recipe of cockentrice. This Frankenstein-esque meal involved attaching the upper body of a pig to the rump of a chicken, and then attaching the remaining chicken head and neck to the lower half of the pig. The cockentrice then would be basted, stuffed, and roasted.