In the summer of 2007, Jessica Grimm of Wessex Archaeology approached the Animal Bone Metrical Archive Project (ABMAP) to discuss the possibility of depositing Wessex Archaeology metric animal bone data onto the ABMAP database. This led to the formation of the Wessex Archaeology Metric Archive Project (WAMAP), with data from WAMAP datasets, structured to be compatible, added to the ABMAP database. The data transferred contains a selection of all measurements commonly taken during Wessex Archaeology zooarchaeological analysis; complete WAMAP datasets can be downloaded from the following pages, as well as a list of measurement definitions.
The datasets are derived from Wessex Archaeology developer-funder projects (primarily in the United Kingdom), and as such, will provide information from a wide range of archaeological sites in terms of location, period and type. The database is hosted by the Archaeology Data Service (ADS).
Animal and bird bones are examined by archaeozoologists to help us understand the environment of a site.