Periodic Reporting for period 3 - 4-OCEANS (Human History of Marine Life: Extraction, Knowledge, Drivers & Consumption of Marine Resources, c.100 BCE to c.1860 CE)
Reporting period: 2024-07-01 to 2025-12-31
What is the problem/issue being addressed?
The 4-OCEANS project addresses a fundamental gap in our understanding of past human engagement with the sea by asking three questions:
1. When and where was marine exploitation of major significance to human society?
2. How did socio-economic, cultural, and environmental forces constrain and enable marine exploitation?
3. What were the consequences of marine exploitation for societal development and the oceans?
The answers to these questions are significant to enhancing ocean literacy - i.e. understanding the role of ocean resources for the development of human societies. The answers will reveal diverging societal and cultural trajectories in the past that may also inform future pathways. To answer these questions the project will map, date and measure (quantity, animal size, trophic level and genomic change) marine extractions (gathering, hunting, fishing) across two millennia, the longest and geographically most extended coverage ever conducted. The researchers will survey and characterise evolving historical knowledge of marine animals in diverse cultures, and will identify and untangle the natural and human forces that variously drove and constrained marine exploitation. They will analyse how and where extracted marine resources were transformed into material and immaterial wealth, its potential contribution to historical food security, its demographic, social, cultural, economic and political effects; and the resulting ecological footprint on ocean life.
Why is it important for society?
4-OCEANS is novel and high-risk, high-gain in its aims to identify, quantify, and characterise marine extractions, and examine if, when and how barriers of knowledge to marine resource use were overcome, and with what consequences to societies and environments. 4-OCEANS will address the need for systematic, comparable, high quality data and lend historical specificity to our understanding of marine extractions and the role of marine resources for human society. The project will serve to inform the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development.
What are the overall objectives?
4-OCEANS will establish a platform of open source documentation of marine resource extraction and use to enable the researchers:
- To identify and quantify human exploitation and consumption of marine life in the pre-modern era by a systematic analysis of global archaeological and documentary records.
- To assess the constraints and enablers of marine exploitation by identifying and modelling key socio-economic, cultural, and environmental influences.
- To examine the consequences of human engagement with marine life by tracing the consumption, capitalisation and socio-economic metabolisation of resources for societal development, and fisheries-induced changes in marine life.
The 4-OCEANS project addresses a fundamental gap in our understanding of past human engagement with the sea by asking three questions:
1. When and where was marine exploitation of major significance to human society?
2. How did socio-economic, cultural, and environmental forces constrain and enable marine exploitation?
3. What were the consequences of marine exploitation for societal development and the oceans?
The answers to these questions are significant to enhancing ocean literacy - i.e. understanding the role of ocean resources for the development of human societies. The answers will reveal diverging societal and cultural trajectories in the past that may also inform future pathways. To answer these questions the project will map, date and measure (quantity, animal size, trophic level and genomic change) marine extractions (gathering, hunting, fishing) across two millennia, the longest and geographically most extended coverage ever conducted. The researchers will survey and characterise evolving historical knowledge of marine animals in diverse cultures, and will identify and untangle the natural and human forces that variously drove and constrained marine exploitation. They will analyse how and where extracted marine resources were transformed into material and immaterial wealth, its potential contribution to historical food security, its demographic, social, cultural, economic and political effects; and the resulting ecological footprint on ocean life.
Why is it important for society?
4-OCEANS is novel and high-risk, high-gain in its aims to identify, quantify, and characterise marine extractions, and examine if, when and how barriers of knowledge to marine resource use were overcome, and with what consequences to societies and environments. 4-OCEANS will address the need for systematic, comparable, high quality data and lend historical specificity to our understanding of marine extractions and the role of marine resources for human society. The project will serve to inform the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development.
What are the overall objectives?
4-OCEANS will establish a platform of open source documentation of marine resource extraction and use to enable the researchers:
- To identify and quantify human exploitation and consumption of marine life in the pre-modern era by a systematic analysis of global archaeological and documentary records.
- To assess the constraints and enablers of marine exploitation by identifying and modelling key socio-economic, cultural, and environmental influences.
- To examine the consequences of human engagement with marine life by tracing the consumption, capitalisation and socio-economic metabolisation of resources for societal development, and fisheries-induced changes in marine life.
Launched internally on 1st July 2021, the 4-OCEANS project has a broad, established and dedicated research team. The project is led by 4 PIs - Poul Holm, Francis Ludlow, James Barrett and Cristina Brito - and was publically launched in November 2021. The project PIs successfully formed a joint collaborative agreement with project additional beneficiaries, University of Oslo, Columbia University, NASA, University of San Diego (foreseen) and University of Texas System (unforeseen). Colleen Petrik, additional beneficiary with PI Ludlow, also completed her move from the University of Texas to the University of San Diego, as planned, and was then brought onto the project formally.
In report period 1, the entire project hosts over 40 staff and students, and the four 4-OCEANS teams have published 23 peer-reviewed and 5 editor-reviewed publications in this reporting period - all open access. We have participated in or attended over 50 conferences, workshops, seminars or science festivals. The combined teams have completed more than 50 research trips during this report period. A total of 10 dedicated workshops took place during this timeframe: online, in Dublin, Lisbon and Hull.
The PIs meet on a monthly basis and have completed a number of in person and virtual workshops involving the core teams, international experts and students, to ensure collaboration is developing on a level required to meet the goals of a Synergy project. The project is managed by the 4-OCEANS project manager (Joanne D’Arcy) based at Trinity College Dublin. 4-OCEANS has a new and dedicated endnote library with over 11,000 entries, resulting from an extensive and dedicated systematic literature review conducted by different team members.
From the start of the 4-OCEANS project, the consortium has built an integrated research platform uniting archaeology, history, ecology, and climate science. The four PI-led teams rapidly established laboratories, systematic reviews, and international collaborations. Early achievements included ancient DNA and stable isotope studies revealing past exploitation of cod, herring, and walrus, alongside the creation of large zooarchaeological databases. Historical analyses traced whaling, sealing, and manatee hunting across the Atlantic and beyond, while drivers of extraction were modeled using climate reconstructions, archival trade data, and Earth System Models. By 2025, the project has laid a solid foundation of systematic and learning-driven literature reviews, an Expert Review platform engaging hundreds of scholars, reconstructions of historical North Sea zooplankton abundance and European jet stream patterns, and identified Atlantic Europe’s marine footprint over five hundred years. The Lisbon and London seafood economy case studies mapped global supply chains, while Northern Seas and Eastern North America Syntheses consolidated zooarchaeological records. Across 50+ research trips and extensive mobility of postdocs and students, the project achieved strong synergy. Further notable results to date include identifying marine event horizons, reconstructing drivers of fish catch and demand such as volcanic winters and economic shocks, and tracing ecological consequences like trophic downgrading. Public engagement has been an important component, with exhibitions linking science to heritage, videos, and digital resources widely shared. By the end of this reporting period, 4-OCEANS has laid the foundation for the first global timeline of marine exploitation, revealing when, where, and how oceans shaped societies, and positioning its outputs to inform future sustainability debates.
In report period 2, the still hosts a large volume of staff and students however most will be finished their tasks by the end of the report period. The 4-OCEANS teams have published over 70 publications to date. The team has participated in or attended over 60 conferences, workshops, seminars or science festivals in this period. The combined teams have completed more than 55 research trips during this report period. A total of 8 dedicated workshops took place during this timeframe: Dingle, in Dublin, Lisbon Troia and Trondheim.
Details about the 4-OCEANS project can be accessed via the project website https://www.tcd.ie/tceh/4-oceans/(opens in new window) and local websites at each host institution https://www.ntnu.edu/museum/4-oceans(opens in new window) and https://cham.fcsh.unl.pt/en/projects-detail.php?p=2069(opens in new window). Social media accounts have been created on Bluesky (@erc4oceans.bsky.social) and Instagram (@4oceanserc). In January 2023 we produced the science animation video “The Fish Revolution: how humans thrived and oceans shrank”, which attracted over 2,000 views on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQvNru2ab2M(opens in new window). The video was co-funded by the Marine Institute of Ireland Foras na Mara. PI Brito curated a long term exhibition about the past of whales and whaling, and cetacean conservation in Atouguia da Baleia (together with the local municipality), Portugal (2023). The project repository website is under way and can be accessed here https://4oceanserc.org/(opens in new window).
The digital World Atlas of Historical Marine Extractions is underway with a GIS specialist from UTA (additional beneficiary Dr Charles Travis) who formally joined the project team in July 2023. Dr Travis coordinates and develops the Atlas in conjunction with the PIs. Preliminary discussions have been undertaken with EMOD-Net, VLIZ, and the Irish Marine Institute to gauge the potential for collaboration and a long-term repository of the Atlas.
Key regions of focus:
-Transect 1 (Yellow Sea to Baltic) reveals medieval and early modern intensification (e.g. cod, herring).
-Transect 2 (Chile to Mozambique) highlights under-researched tropical exploitation zones.
-Transect 3 (Arctic to Tierra del Fuego) documents large-scale whaling, sealing and walrus hunting, particularly during the 17th–19th centuries.
The project has appointed an international panel of experts who contribute their expertise to the project pro bono.
The project is running on schedule and has experienced no major issues or delays.
In report period 1, the entire project hosts over 40 staff and students, and the four 4-OCEANS teams have published 23 peer-reviewed and 5 editor-reviewed publications in this reporting period - all open access. We have participated in or attended over 50 conferences, workshops, seminars or science festivals. The combined teams have completed more than 50 research trips during this report period. A total of 10 dedicated workshops took place during this timeframe: online, in Dublin, Lisbon and Hull.
The PIs meet on a monthly basis and have completed a number of in person and virtual workshops involving the core teams, international experts and students, to ensure collaboration is developing on a level required to meet the goals of a Synergy project. The project is managed by the 4-OCEANS project manager (Joanne D’Arcy) based at Trinity College Dublin. 4-OCEANS has a new and dedicated endnote library with over 11,000 entries, resulting from an extensive and dedicated systematic literature review conducted by different team members.
From the start of the 4-OCEANS project, the consortium has built an integrated research platform uniting archaeology, history, ecology, and climate science. The four PI-led teams rapidly established laboratories, systematic reviews, and international collaborations. Early achievements included ancient DNA and stable isotope studies revealing past exploitation of cod, herring, and walrus, alongside the creation of large zooarchaeological databases. Historical analyses traced whaling, sealing, and manatee hunting across the Atlantic and beyond, while drivers of extraction were modeled using climate reconstructions, archival trade data, and Earth System Models. By 2025, the project has laid a solid foundation of systematic and learning-driven literature reviews, an Expert Review platform engaging hundreds of scholars, reconstructions of historical North Sea zooplankton abundance and European jet stream patterns, and identified Atlantic Europe’s marine footprint over five hundred years. The Lisbon and London seafood economy case studies mapped global supply chains, while Northern Seas and Eastern North America Syntheses consolidated zooarchaeological records. Across 50+ research trips and extensive mobility of postdocs and students, the project achieved strong synergy. Further notable results to date include identifying marine event horizons, reconstructing drivers of fish catch and demand such as volcanic winters and economic shocks, and tracing ecological consequences like trophic downgrading. Public engagement has been an important component, with exhibitions linking science to heritage, videos, and digital resources widely shared. By the end of this reporting period, 4-OCEANS has laid the foundation for the first global timeline of marine exploitation, revealing when, where, and how oceans shaped societies, and positioning its outputs to inform future sustainability debates.
In report period 2, the still hosts a large volume of staff and students however most will be finished their tasks by the end of the report period. The 4-OCEANS teams have published over 70 publications to date. The team has participated in or attended over 60 conferences, workshops, seminars or science festivals in this period. The combined teams have completed more than 55 research trips during this report period. A total of 8 dedicated workshops took place during this timeframe: Dingle, in Dublin, Lisbon Troia and Trondheim.
Details about the 4-OCEANS project can be accessed via the project website https://www.tcd.ie/tceh/4-oceans/(opens in new window) and local websites at each host institution https://www.ntnu.edu/museum/4-oceans(opens in new window) and https://cham.fcsh.unl.pt/en/projects-detail.php?p=2069(opens in new window). Social media accounts have been created on Bluesky (@erc4oceans.bsky.social) and Instagram (@4oceanserc). In January 2023 we produced the science animation video “The Fish Revolution: how humans thrived and oceans shrank”, which attracted over 2,000 views on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQvNru2ab2M(opens in new window). The video was co-funded by the Marine Institute of Ireland Foras na Mara. PI Brito curated a long term exhibition about the past of whales and whaling, and cetacean conservation in Atouguia da Baleia (together with the local municipality), Portugal (2023). The project repository website is under way and can be accessed here https://4oceanserc.org/(opens in new window).
The digital World Atlas of Historical Marine Extractions is underway with a GIS specialist from UTA (additional beneficiary Dr Charles Travis) who formally joined the project team in July 2023. Dr Travis coordinates and develops the Atlas in conjunction with the PIs. Preliminary discussions have been undertaken with EMOD-Net, VLIZ, and the Irish Marine Institute to gauge the potential for collaboration and a long-term repository of the Atlas.
Key regions of focus:
-Transect 1 (Yellow Sea to Baltic) reveals medieval and early modern intensification (e.g. cod, herring).
-Transect 2 (Chile to Mozambique) highlights under-researched tropical exploitation zones.
-Transect 3 (Arctic to Tierra del Fuego) documents large-scale whaling, sealing and walrus hunting, particularly during the 17th–19th centuries.
The project has appointed an international panel of experts who contribute their expertise to the project pro bono.
The project is running on schedule and has experienced no major issues or delays.
4-OCEANS is on track to publish 3 monographs, addressing the three research questions, co-authored by the PIs and around 40 peer-reviewed papers in major open-access journals.
The project has the online World Atlas of Historical Marine Exploitation in development stage. It will be continuously populated with data and perspectives through the project lifetime and beyond. All data generated by the project will be curated before the end of the project for permanent accessibility at the OBIS trusted digital repository (www.iobis.org).
All outputs to date have open-access policies.
4-OCEANS is marking a definitive methodological step change in the integration of humanities and natural science, through the trans-disciplinary background of the PIs and synergistic interaction of their expertise. It is creating a new team of scholars in marine environmental history and will open new avenues for future scientific approaches to oceans’ past.
The 4 PIs published a review of the state of art of marine environmental history (Holm et al. 2022 in Open Research Europe) and identified the research agenda for inter and trans disciplinary progress.
The ultimate result - the first ever globalised evaluation of the role of marine resources for societies through two millennia is underway. This robust historical data will unlock avenues for future social, economic, cultural, biological, ecological, and conservation research and policy. It will enhance global ocean literacy by increased understanding of the role of ocean life in human history. Long- term data and understanding of changes in human behaviour is critical to informing the UN SDG and Decade for the Oceans, where the historical dimension is definitely missing. 4-OCEANS will introduce much needed chronological depth to urgent societal and environmental issues across the globe, through the understanding of past commonalities and divergences in the use and perceptions of the oceans.
The project has the online World Atlas of Historical Marine Exploitation in development stage. It will be continuously populated with data and perspectives through the project lifetime and beyond. All data generated by the project will be curated before the end of the project for permanent accessibility at the OBIS trusted digital repository (www.iobis.org).
All outputs to date have open-access policies.
4-OCEANS is marking a definitive methodological step change in the integration of humanities and natural science, through the trans-disciplinary background of the PIs and synergistic interaction of their expertise. It is creating a new team of scholars in marine environmental history and will open new avenues for future scientific approaches to oceans’ past.
The 4 PIs published a review of the state of art of marine environmental history (Holm et al. 2022 in Open Research Europe) and identified the research agenda for inter and trans disciplinary progress.
The ultimate result - the first ever globalised evaluation of the role of marine resources for societies through two millennia is underway. This robust historical data will unlock avenues for future social, economic, cultural, biological, ecological, and conservation research and policy. It will enhance global ocean literacy by increased understanding of the role of ocean life in human history. Long- term data and understanding of changes in human behaviour is critical to informing the UN SDG and Decade for the Oceans, where the historical dimension is definitely missing. 4-OCEANS will introduce much needed chronological depth to urgent societal and environmental issues across the globe, through the understanding of past commonalities and divergences in the use and perceptions of the oceans.