Naomi F Miller
Biographic Data
| ID | 94469 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Naomi F Miller |
| GIVEN NAMES | Naomi F |
| FAMILY NAME | Miller |
| SIGNATURE | MILLER N F |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Pennsylvania |
| ORCID | 0009-0006-4603-8903 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 47 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 484 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 47 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1984 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 13 |
Ethics in archaeobotany
This article presents the first systematic assessment of ethical concerns specific to archaeobotanical research, focusing on principles and values. Conducted by an international group of archaeobotanists, the study used an anonymous online survey to document experiences and perceptions within the archaeobotanical community with the aim of raising awareness, identifying prevalent good practices and noting points for improvement. The questionnaire …
Historical Homes as Botanical Repositories
Chapter 11. Finding fields
Ancient agricultural landscapes are increasingly recognized as a vital subject of archaeological inquiry, the study of which requires methods and approaches of the social and natural sciences as well as the humanities. This chapter identifies three recurring themes addressed variously in the contributions to this volume that demonstrate the broad relevance of agricultural landscapes to an understanding of ancient society: globalization and hierar…
Assessing the Impact of Holocene Climate Change on Bioavailable Strontium Within the Nile River Valley
The impact of the climate drying during the Holocene within the Nile River Valley System (NRVS) has been the focus of recent debate in the archaeological community. It is argued that the increased contribution of aeolian material from the neighboring Sahara Desert during the last ~7,000 years has changed the isotope compositions of bioavailable Sr relative to the geological background and thus hinders provenance investigations of human remains wi…
A Sacred Landscape of Sumer
The statuettes commonly referred to as “Ram Caught in a Thicket” (2500 BC ) may well be associated with what is known from later texts (2nd millennium BC ) as the (daily) determining-of-the-fates ritual that occurred at sunrise. Symbolic elements (tree, rosette, leaf, possible mountain), and motifs (quadruped facing a tree) occur in other media—glyptic, musical instruments—and their meaning informs the unique combination of elements found in thes…
Paradise lost
Reflecting on Ethnobiology from 1978 to 2018
Archaeology and Conservation of the Middle Phrygian Gate Complex at Gordion, Turkey
In 2016, a project was undertaken at Gordion, Turkey, to stabilize and conserve the remains of a rubble platform built early in the Middle Phrygian period (ca. 800–700 b.c.e.) under the vast Gate Complex leading to the megarons on the Citadel Mound. In the process, aspects of Middle Phrygian building strategies came to light that enhanced our understanding gained from the original excavation in the 1950s. This article outlines the archaeology of …
Historic landscape and site preservation at Gordion, Turkey
Linking agriculture and exchange to social developments of the Central Asian Iron Age
Millet cultivation across Eurasia
The two East Asian millets, broomcorn ( Panicum miliaceum) and foxtail millet ( Setaria italica), spread across Eurasia and became important crops by the second millennium BC. The earliest indisputable archaeobotanical remains of broomcorn millet outside of East Asia identified thus far date to the end of the third millennium BC in eastern Kazakhstan. By the end of the second millennium BC, broomcorn millet cultivation had spread to the rest of C…
Agro-Pastoral Strategies and Food Production on the Achaemenid Frontier in Central Asia
This article discusses aspects of the agro-pastoral economy of Kyzyltepa, a late Iron Age or Achaemenid period (sixth-fourth century BC) site in the Surkhandarya region of southern Uzbekistan. The analysis integrates archaeobotanical and zooarchaeological analyses with textual references to food production and provisioning in order to examine local agro-pastoral strategies. Preliminary results suggest an economy that included both an intensive ag…
Plants and Humans in the Near East and the Caucasus
Review of Plants and Humans in the Near East and the Caucasus: Ancient and Traditional Uses of Plants as Food and Medicine, a Diachronic Ethnobotanical Review (2 vols). Vol. 1: The Landscapes. The Plants: Ferns and Gymnosperms. Vol. 2: The Plants: Angiosperms. Diego Rivera Núñez, Gonzalo Matilla Séiquer, Concepción Obón, Francisco Alcaraz Ariza. 2011. Ediciones de la Unverisdad de Murcia. Pp. 1056. EUR 23.76 (paperback). ISBN 978-84-15463-07-08 (…
Plants and Humans in the Near East and the Caucasus
Review of Plants and Humans in the Near East and the Caucasus: Ancient and Traditional Uses of Plants as Food and Medicine, a Diachronic Ethnobotanical Review (2 vols). Vol. 1: The Landscapes. The Plants: Ferns and Gymnosperms. Vol. 2: The Plants: Angiosperms. Diego Rivera Núñez, Gonzalo Matilla Séiquer, Concepción Obón, Francisco Alcaraz Ariza. 2011. Ediciones de la Unverisdad de Murcia. Pp. 1056. EUR 23.76 (paperback). ISBN 978-84-15463-07-08 (…
Intensive agriculture and land use at Roman Gordion, central Turkey
A Conservation Management Plan for Gordion and its Environs
A Conservation Management Plan for Gordion and its Environs has been developed by a multidisciplinary team within a partnership between the University of Pennsylvania (both the School of Design and Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology) and Middle East Technical University (Faculty of Architecture) in Ankara. The project has involved a new approach to the protection of cultural material at the site itself, as well as the survey and documentation…
Agropastoralism and archaeobiology
One of the more intractable problems that archaeobiologists struggle with is how to characterise ancient subsistence systems when the plant and animal remains that we study are incommensurate in so many ways. Three examples from the upper Euphrates and Iran illustrate how changes in plant remains are associated with changes in animal exploitation. Two of them consider the agropastoral continuum on sites dating to the pre-pottery Neolithic (eighth…
Symbols of Fertility and Abundance in the Royal Cemetery at Ur, Iraq
Fertility and abundance are important themes of ancient Mesopotamian texts and images. The goddess Inanna and her consort Dumuzi personify these ideas in texts of the second millennium B.C.E. Excavated by Leonard Woolley in the 1920s, the Royal Cemetery at Ur dates to the mid third millennium B.C.E. Among the tombs, that of Queen Puabi yielded many ornaments of gold, carnelian, and lapis. Some of the pendants realistically depict identifiable ani…
Archaeological fuel remains as indicators of ancient west Asian agropastoral and land-use systems
Reconciling Nature and Culture after « Naissance des divinités, Naissance de l’agriculture
Dans Naissance des divinités, Naissance de l’agriculture, Jacques Cauvin suggère que l’agriculture n’aurait pas pu apparaître sans une mutation mentale préalable et soudaine, et que le cas du Proche-Orient est exceptionnel. L’accent mis sur la primauté des idées l’amène à rabaisser l’influence des cueilleurs sur leur environnement et à supposer de façon erronée que l’agriculture représentait un contrôle de la nature, qualitativement novateur. Les…
Notes on Arboricultural and Agricultural Practices in Ancient Iran based on New Pollen Evidence
New pollen evidence from two sites in South-Central Zagros (Lake Maharlou), Southwestern Iran, and Sahand Mountains (Lake Almalou), Northwestern Iran, provide evidence for the emergence of tree cultivation in Southwestern Iran since the 3rd and 2nd millennia BC and upland agricultural activities in Northwestern Iran since 5th to 3rd centuries BC. Juglans cf. regia could have been cultivated firstly at ~ 2500 BC and became more extensively cultiva…
A late Holocene pollen record from Lake Almalou in NW Iran
From Food and Fuel to Farms and Flocks
The site of Gordion, Turkey, provides a case study of the integrated use of archaeobiological data. Associations between botanical and faunal remains suggest a continuum of land-use practices. At one end, high ratios of the seeds of wild plants versus cultivated cereal grains (calculated as count/weight) and high proportions of the bones of sheep, goat, and deer are signatures of a subsistence economy focused on pastoral production. At the other,…
Integrating Plant and Animal Data
Vegetation history of the SE section of the Zagros Mountains during the last five millennia; a pollen record from the Maharlou Lake, Fars Province, Iran
The Use of Dung as Fuel
Modern plant use and garbage disposal practices in an Iranian village were observed in order to provide a framework for the interpretation of plant remains from ancient Malyan, a third millennium B.C. urban center in southern Iran. The ethnoarchaeological model suggested that many carbonized seeds originate in dung cake fuel. By applying this proposition to the archaeobotanical material from Malyan, it was possible to corroborate the evidence pro…
Seed Eaters of the Ancient Near East
Millet cultivation across Eurasia
The two East Asian millets, broomcorn ( Panicum miliaceum) and foxtail millet ( Setaria italica), spread across Eurasia and became important crops by the second millennium BC. The earliest indisputable archaeobotanical remains of broomcorn millet outside of East Asia identified thus far date to the end of the third millennium BC in eastern Kazakhstan. By the end of the second millennium BC, broomcorn millet cultivation had spread to the rest of C…
From Food and Fuel to Farms and Flocks
The site of Gordion, Turkey, provides a case study of the integrated use of archaeobiological data. Associations between botanical and faunal remains suggest a continuum of land-use practices. At one end, high ratios of the seeds of wild plants versus cultivated cereal grains (calculated as count/weight) and high proportions of the bones of sheep, goat, and deer are signatures of a subsistence economy focused on pastoral production. At the other,…
Yeki bud, yeki nabud
Agriculture and herding in the early oasis settlements of the Oxus Civilization
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
Agro-Pastoral Strategies and Food Production on the Achaemenid Frontier in Central Asia
This article discusses aspects of the agro-pastoral economy of Kyzyltepa, a late Iron Age or Achaemenid period (sixth-fourth century BC) site in the Surkhandarya region of southern Uzbekistan. The analysis integrates archaeobotanical and zooarchaeological analyses with textual references to food production and provisioning in order to examine local agro-pastoral strategies. Preliminary results suggest an economy that included both an intensive ag…
Agricultural development in western Central Asia in the Chalcolithic and Bronze Ages
Intensive agriculture and land use at Roman Gordion, central Turkey
Notes on Arboricultural and Agricultural Practices in Ancient Iran based on New Pollen Evidence
New pollen evidence from two sites in South-Central Zagros (Lake Maharlou), Southwestern Iran, and Sahand Mountains (Lake Almalou), Northwestern Iran, provide evidence for the emergence of tree cultivation in Southwestern Iran since the 3rd and 2nd millennia BC and upland agricultural activities in Northwestern Iran since 5th to 3rd centuries BC. Juglans cf. regia could have been cultivated firstly at ~ 2500 BC and became more extensively cultiva…
Vegetation history of the SE section of the Zagros Mountains during the last five millennia; a pollen record from the Maharlou Lake, Fars Province, Iran
A late Holocene pollen record from Lake Almalou in NW Iran
What mean these seeds
Excavation and Survey in the Jabbul Plain, Western Syria
The 1996 and 1997 seasons of the Hopkins-Amsterdam project in the Jabbul plain, western Syria, have generated new results on Bronze Age urbanism at Tell Umm el-Marra and elucidated longer-term settlement patterns in the Jabbul region. Excavation results have documented the foundation of Umm el-Marra as a regional center in the Early Bronze Age, provided new data on a period of decentralization in Middle Bronze I, and supplied evidence of the rege…
Sweeter than wine? The use of the grape in early western Asia
Emotional news for lovers of a dry white wine. The blissful Hippocrene was composed from wild grapes from the sixth millennium BC in the lands of its natural habitat. But, as the author shows, the cultivation, domestication and selective breeding of the grape following in the Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age was aimed primarily at the enjoyment of its sweetness
Integrating Plant and Animal Data
Agropastoralism and archaeobiology
One of the more intractable problems that archaeobiologists struggle with is how to characterise ancient subsistence systems when the plant and animal remains that we study are incommensurate in so many ways. Three examples from the upper Euphrates and Iran illustrate how changes in plant remains are associated with changes in animal exploitation. Two of them consider the agropastoral continuum on sites dating to the pre-pottery Neolithic (eighth…
Uruk Colonies and Anatolian Communities
The first Mesopotamian city-states in the Uruk period (ca. 3800-3100 B. C.) pursued a strategy of commercial expansion into neighboring areas of the Zagros Mountains, Syria, and southeastern Anatolia. Recent research in these areas has located several Uruk outposts, in what is apparently the world's earliest-known colonial system. Although some Uruk "colonies" have been excavated, virtually nothing is known about either the operation of this syst…
Historic landscape and site preservation at Gordion, Turkey
Reconciling Nature and Culture after « Naissance des divinités, Naissance de l’agriculture
Dans Naissance des divinités, Naissance de l’agriculture, Jacques Cauvin suggère que l’agriculture n’aurait pas pu apparaître sans une mutation mentale préalable et soudaine, et que le cas du Proche-Orient est exceptionnel. L’accent mis sur la primauté des idées l’amène à rabaisser l’influence des cueilleurs sur leur environnement et à supposer de façon erronée que l’agriculture représentait un contrôle de la nature, qualitativement novateur. Les…
Symbols of Fertility and Abundance in the Royal Cemetery at Ur, Iraq
Fertility and abundance are important themes of ancient Mesopotamian texts and images. The goddess Inanna and her consort Dumuzi personify these ideas in texts of the second millennium B.C.E. Excavated by Leonard Woolley in the 1920s, the Royal Cemetery at Ur dates to the mid third millennium B.C.E. Among the tombs, that of Queen Puabi yielded many ornaments of gold, carnelian, and lapis. Some of the pendants realistically depict identifiable ani…
The Banesh-Kaftari Interface
Paleoethnobotanical Research in Khuzestan
Miller Naomi F. Paleoethnobotanical Research in Khuzestan. In: Paléorient, 1985, vol. 11, n°2. Actes du séminaire CNRS/NSF de Bellevaux (24-29 juin 1985) : L'évolution des sociétés complexes du sud-ouest de l'Iran. pp. 125-127
The Use of Dung as Fuel
Modern plant use and garbage disposal practices in an Iranian village were observed in order to provide a framework for the interpretation of plant remains from ancient Malyan, a third millennium B.C. urban center in southern Iran. The ethnoarchaeological model suggested that many carbonized seeds originate in dung cake fuel. By applying this proposition to the archaeobotanical material from Malyan, it was possible to corroborate the evidence pro…
Paleoethnobotanical Research in Khuzestan
Miller Naomi F. Paleoethnobotanical Research in Khuzestan. In: Paléorient, 1985, vol. 11, n°2. Actes du séminaire CNRS/NSF de Bellevaux (24-29 juin 1985) : L'évolution des sociétés complexes du sud-ouest de l'Iran. pp. 125-127
Archaeologically Defining the Earlier Garden Landscapes at Morven
The first phase of archaeology at Morven was designed to test the potential for further study of the early garden landscape at a ca. 1758 house in Princeton, New Jersey. The research included intensive botanical analysis using a variety of archaeobotanical framework. A study was also made of the garden's topography using map analysis combined with subsurface testing. Information on garden features related to the design of earlier garden surfaces …
What mean these seeds
Ethnobotany and the Four Fields
Agriculture and herding in the early oasis settlements of the Oxus Civilization
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
The Aspalathus Caper
Aspalathus, a plant mentioned in Pliny the Elder's "Natural History," Dioscorides' "De Materia Medica," Theophrastus' "Enquiry into Plants," and Ecclesiasticus is most probably caper (Capparis sp.). It has an Akkadian linguistic cognate, supālu. Ethnobotanical, archaeobotanical, and linguistic evidence show that this plant has played a role in the ancient, but ongoing cultural tradition in the Near East
The Archaeology of Garden and Field
List of Figures List of Tables Preface 1. To Bound and to Cultivate: An Introduction to the Archaeology of Gardens and Fields -Kathryn L. Gleason 2. Fertilizer in the Identification and Analysis of Cultivated Soil -Naomi F. Miller, Kathryn L. Gleason 3. Archaeological Palynology of Gardens and Fields -Suzanne K. Fish 4. Remote Sensing of Gardens and Fields -Bruce Bevan 5. The Creation of Cultivable Land through Terracing -John M. Treacy, William …
Uruk Colonies and Anatolian Communities
The first Mesopotamian city-states in the Uruk period (ca. 3800-3100 B. C.) pursued a strategy of commercial expansion into neighboring areas of the Zagros Mountains, Syria, and southeastern Anatolia. Recent research in these areas has located several Uruk outposts, in what is apparently the world's earliest-known colonial system. Although some Uruk "colonies" have been excavated, virtually nothing is known about either the operation of this syst…
Seed Eaters of the Ancient Near East
The Macrobotanical evidence for vegetation in the Near East, c. 18 000/16 000 B.C to 4 000 B.C
Pendant la période glaciaire, le réchauffement post- glaciaire et le Dryas Récent, la végétation ne semble pas avoir été affectée de façon sensible par les activités humaines. L'expansion de la forêt au début de l'Holocène s'est produite sans intervention humaine, bien que les agriculteurs néolithiques aient été capables de mettre à profit des conditions climatiques meilleures. L'absence de macro-restes végétaux exclut toute discussion concernant…
Plants and mudbrick
Gordion was the capital of ancient Phrygia and reputed home of King Midas (c. 700 BC). Its monuments include the Midas Tumulus, nearly a hundred smaller burial mounds and the ancient city of Gordion itself. Agricultural development and the natural forces of wind and water erosion threaten the integrity of these mounds. In order to preserve the monuments, the Gordion Project is attempting to create a solid cover of grasses and flowers on the Midas…
Geçmiş Dönemlerin Doğal Çevre Ortamı ve Arazi Kullanım Düzenlerinin Yorumlaması
Gordion'daki yerlesim dolgusundan ve yanmis binalardan elde edilen gecmis zamana ait bitki kalintilari, Son Tunc Cag'indan nispeten yakin zamanlara kadar bolgenin orman ortusunde ardic, mese ve cam agaclarinin hakim oldugunu gostermistir. Boyle olmasina ragmen, ormanlik alan azaldikca ormanin bilesimi de degismistir. Bu donemin baslarinda yakacak olarak beliren ardic agaci, sonlarina dogru buyuk olcude yok olur. Sadece onemli bir yapi malzemesi o…
Agricultural development in western Central Asia in the Chalcolithic and Bronze Ages
Plant Forms in Jewellery from the Royal Cemetery at Ur
Among the spectacular finds Sir Leonard Woolley reported from the Royal Cemetery at Ur, the head-dress and “diadem” found in Puabi's tomb are among the best known. Parts of these items look like plants, and many plants had symbolic value to the ancient Sumerians in addition to their practical importance for food, fodder, fuel and all manner of material culture. Insofar as the Ur ornaments refer to real plants, it is therefore important to know wh…
Excavation and Survey in the Jabbul Plain, Western Syria
The 1996 and 1997 seasons of the Hopkins-Amsterdam project in the Jabbul plain, western Syria, have generated new results on Bronze Age urbanism at Tell Umm el-Marra and elucidated longer-term settlement patterns in the Jabbul region. Excavation results have documented the foundation of Umm el-Marra as a regional center in the Early Bronze Age, provided new data on a period of decentralization in Middle Bronze I, and supplied evidence of the rege…
Down the Garden Path
According to V. Gordon Childe, it was the first great "revolution"-that advent of settled life that marks the Neolithic. Dr. Miller provides a paleobotanical perspective on the process, illustrating how crop choices and animal management schemes were intertwined in creating new cultural structures for people to inhabit
Yeki bud, yeki nabud
The Banesh-Kaftari Interface. The View from Operation H5, Malyan
The Banesh-Kaftari Interface
Earthly Paradises
Vegetation history of the SE section of the Zagros Mountains during the last five millennia; a pollen record from the Maharlou Lake, Fars Province, Iran
Sweeter than wine? The use of the grape in early western Asia
Emotional news for lovers of a dry white wine. The blissful Hippocrene was composed from wild grapes from the sixth millennium BC in the lands of its natural habitat. But, as the author shows, the cultivation, domestication and selective breeding of the grape following in the Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age was aimed primarily at the enjoyment of its sweetness
A late Holocene pollen record from Lake Almalou in NW Iran
From Food and Fuel to Farms and Flocks
The site of Gordion, Turkey, provides a case study of the integrated use of archaeobiological data. Associations between botanical and faunal remains suggest a continuum of land-use practices. At one end, high ratios of the seeds of wild plants versus cultivated cereal grains (calculated as count/weight) and high proportions of the bones of sheep, goat, and deer are signatures of a subsistence economy focused on pastoral production. At the other,…
Archaeology (34 works) · Geography (33 works) · History (25 works) · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (24 works) · Biology (17 works) · Ancient history (16 works) · History (16 works) · Agriculture (13 works) · Ancient Near East History (12 works) · Ecology (11 works)