Reassessing the evidence for the cultivation of wild crops during the Younger Dryas at Tell Abu Hureyra, Syria

Environmental Archaeology

Volumn 15, Issue 2, 2010, Pages 124-138

  Colledge, Sue ^a   Conolly, James ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON   (United Kingdom)

^b DNA Building ^*  (Canada)

Author keywords

CULTIVATION; LATE EPIPALAEOLITHIC; LOW RANKED PLANT FOODS; SW ASIA; TELL ABU HUREYRA; YOUNGER DRYAS

Indexed keywords

EID: 78650905211     PISSN: 14614103     EISSN: 17496314     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1179/146141010X12640787648504     Document Type: Review

References (64)

1. Alley, R. B. 2000. The Younger Dryas cold interval as viewed from central Greenland. Quaternary Science Reviews 19, 213-26.
2. Alley, R. B., Meese, D. A., Shuman, A., Gow, A. J., Taylor, K. C., Grootes, P. M., White, J. W. C., Ram, M., Waddington, E. D., Mayewski, P. A. and Zielinski, G. A. 2003. Abrupt increase in Greenland snow accumulation at the end of the Younger Dryas event. Nature 362, 527-29.
3. Bar-Matthews, M., Ayalon, A. and Kaufman, A. 1997. Late Quaternary Paleoclimate in the Eastern Mediterranean Region from stable isotope analysis of speleotherms at Soreq Cave, Israel. Quaternary Research 47, 155-68.
4. Bar-Matthews, M., Ayalon, A., Kaufman, A. and Wasserburg, G. J. 1999. The Eastern Mediterranean paleoclimate as a reflection of regional events: Soreq cave, Israel. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 166, 85-95.
5. Bar-Matthews, M., and Ayalon, A. 2003. Climatic conditions in the Eastern Mediterranean during the Last Glacial (60-10 ky bp) and their relations to the Upper Palaeolithic in the Levant: oxygen and carbonisotope systematics of cave deposits, pp. 13-18 in Goring-Morris, N. and Belfer-Cohen, A. (eds.), More Than Meets the Eye: Studies on Upper Palaeolithic Diversity in the Near East. Oxford: Oxbow Books.
6. Baruch, U. and Bottema, S. 1991. Palynological evidence for climatic changes in the Levant ca. 17,000-9,000 B.P., pp. 11-20 in Bar-Yosef, O. and Valla, V. (eds.), The Natufian Culture in the Levant. Ann Arbor, Michigan: International Monographs in Prehistory.
7. Bar-Yosef, O. and Belfer-Cohen, A. 2002. Facing environmental crisis: Societal and cultural changes at the transition from the Younger Dryas to the Holocene in the Levant, pp. 55-66 in Cappers, R. T. J. and Bottema, S. (eds.), The Dawn of Farming in the Near East (Studies in Early Near Eastern Production, Subsistence and Environment 6). Berlin: Ex Oriente.
8. Bettinger, R. L. 2006. Agriculture, archaeology, and human behavioral ecology, pp. 304-22 in Kennett, D. J. and Winterhalder, B. (eds.), Behavioral Ecology and the Transition to Agriculture. Berkeley: University of California Press.
9. Binford, L. R 1968. Post-Pleistocene adaptations, pp. 313-41 in Binford, S. R. and Binford, L. R. (eds.), New Perspectives in Archaeology. Chicago: Aldine.
10. Boardman, S. and Jones, G. 1990. Experiments on the effects of charring on cereal plant components. Journal of Archaeological Science 17, 1-11.
11. Bottema, S. 1995. The Younger Dryas in the Eastern Mediterranean. Quaternary Science Reviews 14(9), 883-91.
12. Bradbaart, F., Boon, J. J., Veld, H., David, P. and van Bergan, P. F. 2004. Laboratory simulations of the transformation of peas as a result of heat treatment: Changes in the physical and chemical properties. Journal of Archaeological Science 31, 821-33.
13. Bradbaart, F. and van Bergen, P. F. 2005. Digital imaging analysis of size and shape of wheat and pea upon heating under anoxic conditions as a function of the temperature. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 14, 67-75.
14. Buck, C. E., Christen J. A. and James G. N. 1999. BCal: An on-line Bayesian radiocarbon calibration tool. Internet Archaeology 7 [http://intarch.ac.uk/journal/issue7/buck-index.html].
15. Byrd, B. F. 2005. Reassessing the emergence of village life in the Near East. Journal of Archaeological Research 13(3), 231-90.
16. Cohen, M. N. 1977. The Food Crisis in Prehistory: Overpopulation and the Origins of Agriculture. New Haven, London: Yale University Press.
17. Colledge, S. M. 1998. Identifying pre-domestication cultivation using multivariate analysis, pp. 121-31 in Damania, A. B., Valkoun, J., Willcox, G. and Qualset, C. O. (eds.), The Origins of Agriculture and Crop Domestication. Aleppo, Syria: ICARDA.
18. Colledge, S. 2001. Plant Exploitation on Epipalaeolithic and Early Neolithic Sites in the Levant (British Archaeological Reports International Series 986). Oxford: Archaeopress.
19. Colledge, S., Conolly, J. and Shennan, S. 2004. Archaeobotanical evidence for the spread of farming in the Eastern Mediterranean. Current Anthropology 45 (supplement), S35-S58.
20. Fairbairn, A., Asouti, E., Near, J. and Martinoli, D. 2002. Macrobotanical evidence for plant use at Neolithic Çatalhöyük, southcentral Anatolia, Turkey. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 11, 41-54.
21. Fuller, D. Q. 2007. Contrasting patterns in crop domestication and domestication rates: Recent archaeobotanical insights from the Old World. Annals of Botany 100, 903-24.
22. Goodfriend, G. A. and Magaritz, M. 1988. Palaeosols and late Pleistocene rainfall fluctuations in the Negev Desert. Nature 332, 144-46.
23. Hillman, G. 1978. On the origins of domestic rye - Secale cereale: The finds from aceramic Can Hasan III in Turkey. Anatolian Studies XXVIII, 157-74.
24. Hillman, G. C. 1989. Late Palaeolithic plant foods from Wadi Kubbaniye in Upper Egypt: Dietary diversity, infant weaning, and seasonality in a riverine environment, pp. 207-39 in Harris, D. R. and Hillman, G. C. (eds.), Foraging and Farming. London: Unwin Hyman.
25. Hillman, G. C. 1996. Late Pleistocene changes in wild plant-foods available to hunter-gatherers of the northern Fertile Crescent: Possible preludes to cereal cultivation, pp. 159-203 in Harris, D. R. (ed.), The Origins and Spread of Agriculture and Pastoralism in Eurasia. London: UCL Press.
26. Hillman, G. C., Colledge, S. M. and Harris, D. R. 1989. Plant-food economy during the Epipalaeolithic period at Tell Abu Hureyra, Syria: Dietary diversity, seasonality, and modes of exploitation, pp. 240-68 in Harris, D. R. and Hillman, G. C. (eds.), Foraging and Farming. London: Unwin Hyman.
27. Hillman, G. C. and Davies, M. S. 1990. Measured domestication rates in wild wheats and barley under primitive cultivation, and their archaeological implications. Journal of World Prehistory 4, 157-222.
28. Hillman, G., Hedges, R., Moore, A., Colledge, S. and Pettitt, P. 2001. New evidence of Lateglacial cereal cultivation at Abu Hureyra on the Euphrates. The Holocene 11(4), 383-93.
29. Kislev, M. E. 1997. Early agriculture and paleoecology of Netiv Hagdud, pp. 209-36 in Bar-Yosef, O. and Gopher, A. (eds.), An Early Neolithic Village in the Jordan Valley (American School of Prehistoric Research Bulletin 43). Cambridge, USA: Harvard University, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology.
30. Maher, L. A., Banning, T. and Chazan, M. In press. Oasis or mirage? Assessing the role of abrupt climate change in the prehistory of the Southern Levant. Cambridge Journal of Archaeology.
31. McCorriston, J. and Hole, F. 1991. The ecology of seasonal stress and the origins of agriculture in the Near East. American Anthropologist 93(1), 46-69.
32. Moore, A. M. T. 1975. The excavation of Tell Abu Hureyra in Syria: A preliminary report. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 41, 50-77.
33. Moore, A. M. T. and Hillman, G. C. 1992. The Pleistocene to Holocene transition and human economy in southwest Asia: The impact of the Younger Dryas. Society for American Archaeology 57(3), 482-94.
34. Moore, A. M. T., Hillman, G. C. and Legge, A. J. 2000. Village on the Euphrates: from Foraging to Farming at Abu Hureyra. New York: Oxford University Press.
35. Moore, A. M. T., Hillman, G. C. and Legge, A. J. 2010. Village on the Euphrates. Available online 〈http://www.rit.edu/academicaffairs/ abuhureyra〉.
36. de Moulins, D. 1997. Agricultural Changes at Euphrates and Steppe Sites in the Mid-8th to the 6th Millennium B.C. (British Archaeological Reports International Series 683). Oxford: Archaeopress.
37. Nesbitt, M. 2002. When and where did domesticated cereals first occur in southwest Asia?, pp. 113-32 in Cappers, R. T. J. and Bottema, S. (eds.), The Dawn of Farming in the Near East (Studies in Early Near Eastern Production, Subsistence and Environment 6). Berlin: Ex Oriente.
38. Nesbitt, M. and Samuel, D. 1996. From staple crop to extinction? The archaeology and history of the hulled wheats, pp. 41-100 in Padulosi, S., Hammer, K. and Heller, J. (eds.), Hulled Wheats. Promoting the Conservation and Use of Underutilized and Neglected Crops (Proceedings of the First International Workshop on Hulled Wheats, 21-22 July 1995, Castelvecchio Pascoli, Tuscany, Italy). Rome: International Plant Genetic Resources Institute.
39. Reimer, P. J., Baillie, M. G. L., Bard, E., Bayliss, A., Beck, J. W., Blackwell, P. G., Bronk Ramsey, C., Buck, C. E., Burr, G. S., Edwards, R. L., Friedrich, M., Grootes, P. M., Guilderson, T. P., Hajdas, I., Heaton, T. J., Hogg, A. G., Hughen, K. A., Kaiser, K. F., Kromer, B., McCormac, F. G., Manning, S. W., Reimer, R. W., Richards, D. A., Southon, J. R., Talamo, S., Turney, C. S. M., van der Plicht, J., Weyhenmeyer, C. E. 2009. IntCal09 and Marine09 radiocarbon age calibration curves, 0-50,000 years cal BP. Radiocarbon 51(4), 1111-50.
40. Robinson, S. A., Black, S., Sellwood, B. W. and Valdes, P. J. 2006. A review of palaeoclimates and palaeoenvironments in the Levant and Eastern Mediterranean from 25,000 to 5000 years BP: Setting the environmental background fort he evolution of human civilisation. Quaternary Science Reviews 25, 1517-41.
41. Roitel, V. and Willcox, G. 2000. Appendix 6: Analysis of charcoal form Abu Hureyra 1, pp. 544-47 in Moore, A. M. T., Hillman, G. C. and Legge, A. J. (eds.), Village on the Euphrates: From Foraging to Farming at Abu Hureyra. New York: Oxford University Press.
42. Schiffer, M. B. 1987. Formation Processes of the Archaeological Record. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
43. Shennan, S. and Conolly, J. 2007. The origin and spread of Neolithic plant economies in the Near East and Europe. Available online 〈http://ads.ahds.ac.uk/catalogue/archive/neoplants-ahrb-2005〉.
44. Stevens, D. W. and Krebs, J. R. 1986. Foraging Theory. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
45. Valkoun, J., Giles Waines, J. and Konopka, J. 1998. Current geographical distribution and habitat of wild wheats and barley, pp. 293-99 in Damania, A. B., Valkoun, J., Willcox, G. and Qualset, C. O. (eds.), The Origins of Agriculture and Crop Domestication. Aleppo, Syria: ICARDA.
46. van der Plicht, J., van Geel, B., Bohncke, S. J. P., Bos, J. A. A., Blaauw, M., Speranza, A. O. M., Muscheler, R. and Björck, S. 2004. The Preboreal climate reversal and a subsequent solar-forced climate shift. Journal of Quaternary Science 19(3), 263-69.
47. van Zeist, W. and Bakker-Heeres, J. A. H. 1984 (1986). Archaeobotanical studies in the Levant 3. Late-Palaeolithic Mureybit. Palaeohistoria 26, 171-99.
48. Weaver, A. J., Saenko, O. A, Clark, P. U., and Mitrovica, J. X. 2003. Meltwater pulse 1A from Antarctica as a trigger of the Bolling-Allerod Warm Interval. Science 299, 1709-13.
49. Weiss, E., Wetterstrom, W., Nadel, D. and Bar-Yosef, O. 2004. The broad spectrum revisited: Evidence from plant remains. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 101(26), 9551-55.
50. Weiss, E., Kislev, M. E., Simchoni, O., Nadel, D. and Tschauner, H. 2008. Plant-food preparation area on an Upper Palaeolithic brush hut floor at Ohalo II, Israel. Journal of Archaeological Science 35, 2400-14.
51. Willcox, G. 2004. Measuring grain size and identifying Near Eastern cereal domestication: Evidence from the Euphrates valley. Journal of Archaeological Science 31(2), 145-50.
52. Willcox, G. 2007. The adoption of farming and the beginnings of the Neolithic in the Euphrates valley: Cereal exploitation between the 12th and 8th millennia cal BC, pp. 21-36 in Colledge, S. and Conolly, J. (eds.), The Origins and Spread of Domestic Crops in Southwest Asia and Europe. Walnut Creek, California, Left Coast Press.
53. Willcox, G. 2008. New archaeobotanical data from Mureybet and the neolithisation of the middle Euphrates, pp. 103-14 in Ibáñez Estévez, J. J. (ed.), Le Site Néolithique de Tell Mureybet (Syrie du Nord) :en Hommage à Jacques Cauvin (British Archaeological Reports International Series 1843). Oxford: Archaeopress.
54. Willcox, G. and Fornite, S. 1999. Impressions of wild cereal chaff in pisé from the 10th millennium uncal B.P. at Jerf al Ahmar and Mureybit: Northern Syria. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 8, 21-24.
55. Willcox, G., Fornite, S. and Herveux, L. H. 2008. Early Holocene cultivation before domestication in northern Syria. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 17, 313-25.
56. Willcox, G., Buxo, R. and Herveux, L. 2009. Late Pleistocene and early Holocen climate and the beginnings of cultivation in northern Syria. The Holocene 19(1), 151-58.
57. Wilson, D. G. 1984. The carbonization of weeds seeds and their representation in macrofossil assemblages, pp. 201-06 in van Zeist, W. and Caxparie, W. A. (eds.), Plants and Ancient Man: Studies in Palaeoethnobotany. Rotterdam: Balkema.
58. Wood, W. R. and Lee Johnson, D. 1978. A survey of disturbance processes in archaeological formation. Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory 1, 315-81.
59. Wright, K. 1991. The origins and development of ground stone assemblages in Late Pleistocene southwest Asia. Paléorient 17(1), 19-45.
60. Wright, K. 1993. Early Holocene ground stone assemblages in the Levant. Levant XXV, 93-111.
61. Wollstonecroft, M. M., Ellis, P. R., Hillman, G. C. and Fuller, D. Q. 2008. Advances in plant food processing in the Near Eastern Epipalaeolithic and implications for improved edibility and nutrient bioaccessibility: An experimental assessment of Bolboschoenus maritimus (L.) Palla (see club rush). Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 17 (supplement 1), 19-27.
62. Zohary, D. 1996. The mode of domestication of the founder crops of Southwest Asian agriculture, pp. 142-58 in Harris, D. R. (ed.), The Origins and Spread of Agriculture and Pastoralism in Eurasia. London: UCL Press.
63. Zohary, D. and Hopf, M. 2000. Domestication of Plants in the Old World. 3rd edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
64. Zohary, M. 1973. Geobotanical Foundations of the Middle East (Volumes I and II). Amsterdam: Gustav Fischer Verlag.