Résumé
The morphological identification of animal bone remains from the Late Quaternary record has long been a subject of discussion. A comprehensive methodological toolkit has been developed, mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, to address various specific issues. However, the osteology of tropical faunas remains poorly documented, leading to a paradox: the regions with the greatest taxonomic diversity suffer from a chronic lack of reference materials, making reliable documentation of their subfossil record particularly difficult. Southeast Asia is no exception, as only a few studies have focused on the region, especially concerning postcranial elements. To address this gap, we conducted morphological and morphometric studies aimed at providing visual and metric identification criteria applicable to all bovid and cervid species from continental Southeast Asia. Observation and comparison of postcranial bones from several hundred specimens allowed us to test the potential for species identification using consistent visual criteria and/or raw measurements. We also carried out morphometric analyses of the phalanges—elements that are often complete even in otherwise heavily fragmented archaeological assemblages. We hope our results will contribute to the development of zooarchaeological approaches in Southeast Asia, where access to comparative collections is frequently limited or altogether unavailable.