Re-analysis of archaeobotanical remains from pre- and early agricultural sites provides no evidence for a narrowing of the wild plant food spectrum during the origins of agriculture in southwest Asia

Bibliographic Data

ID12200340
AuthorsMichael Wallace (0000-0003-3351-9223, University of Sheffield, corresponding author), Glynis Jones (University of Sheffield), Michael Charles (0000-0002-9630-7589, University of Oxford), Emily Forster (0000-0002-0934-1931, University of Oxford), E C Stillman (0000-0002-5971-0985, University of Sheffield), Vincent Bonhomme (0000-0002-2742-6349, Institut des Sciences de l'Evolution de Montpellier), A Livarda (0000-0002-4503-1287, University of Nottingham), Colin P Osborne (0000-0002-7423-3718, University of Sheffield), Mark Rees (0000-0001-8513-9906, University of Sheffield), Georg Frenck (Universität Innsbruck), Catherine Preece (0000-0001-6584-3541, Centre for Research on Ecology and Forestry Applications)
Year2018
Volume28
Issue4
Pages449-463
Publication date2018-11-17
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueVegetation History and Archaeobotany (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0939-6314 • E-ISSN: 1617-6278
PublisherSpringer Science+Business Media (PUBLISHER • DE)
DOI10.1007/s00334-018-0702-y
PMID31231152
OpenAlexW2901913207
LanguageEN
Citations received22
References cited53

Archaeobotanical evidence from southwest Asia is often interpreted as showing that the spectrum of wild plant foods narrowed during the origins of agriculture, but it has long been acknowledged that the recognition of wild plants as foods is problematic. Here, we systematically combine compositional and contextual evidence to recognise the wild plants for which there is strong evidence of their deliberate collection as food at pre-agricultural and early agricultural sites across southwest Asia. Through sample-by-sample analysis of archaeobotanical remains, a robust link is established between the archaeological evidence and its interpretation in terms of food use, which permits a re-evaluation of the evidence for the exploitation of a broad spectrum of wild plant foods at pre-agricultural sites, and the extent to which this changed during the development of early agriculture. Our results show that relatively few of the wild taxa found at pre- and early agricultural sites can be confidently recognised as contributing to the human diet, and we found no evidence for a narrowing of the plant food spectrum during the adoption of agriculture. This has implications for how we understand the processes leading to the domestication of crops, and points towards a mutualistic relationship between people and plants as a driving force during the development of agriculture

Agriculture · Agroforestry · Archaeology · Biogeosciences · Biology · Botany · Cultivated plant taxonomy · Domestication · Geography · Paleoethnobotany · Taxon · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies · Paleopathology and ancient diseases · Ecology · Geology

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