Raised bed agriculture in northwest Europe triggered by climatic change around 850 BC: a hypothesis

A sudden decline of solar activity around 850 calendar years BC caused a shift to a cool and wet climate in northwest Europe. Food production suddenly became problematic because of shorter, wetter growing seasons and increased night frost. This climate change triggered innovation and the development of a new agricultural system in continental northwestern Europe: arable farming on raised beds (Celtic field banks) laid out in a more or less checked pattern. This kind of agriculture mitigated the effects of the climate shift by providing better drainage and lessening damage by night frost and thus lengthening the growing season. Once the advantages of this kind of cultivation, soil enrichment and optimum root growth besides the hydrological effects, became obvious it will have been practised on a large scale and introduced when people thought it useful, independent of the local hydrological situation.     

Ecological constraints on the first prehistoric farmers in Europe

The Neolithic Revolution, which witnessed the transformation of hunter–gatherer groups into farming communities, is traditionally viewed as the event that allowed human groups to create systems of production that, in the long run, led to present-day societies. Despite the large corpus of research focused on the mechanisms and outcomes of the Neolithic transition, relatively little effort has been devoted to evaluating whether particular production-oriented adaptations could be integrated into a broad range of ecological conditions, and if specific cultural traditions differed ecologically. In order to investigate whether the differences between the adaptations and geographic distributions of three major Early Neolithic archaeological cultures are related to the exploitation of different suites of environmental conditions, we apply genetic algorithm and maximum entropy ecological niche modeling techniques to reconstruct and compare the ecological niches within which three principal Neolithic cultures (Impressed Ware, Cardial Ware, and Linearbandkeramik) spread across Europe between ca. 8000 and 7000 cal yr BP. Results show that these cultures occupied mutually exclusive suites of environmental conditions and, thus, were adapted to distinct and essentially non-overlapping ecological niches. We argue that the historical processes behind the Neolithization of Europe were influenced by environmental factors predisposing occupation of regions most suited to specific cultural adaptations.     

Phylogeographic analysis of barley DNA as evidence for the spread of Neolithic agriculture through Europe

Results of analyses of the photoperiod response gene (PPD-H1) and simple sequence repeats (SSRs) in modern landraces of cultivated barley were used as evidence for the mechanism of agricultural spread in Neolithic Europe. In particular, we explored the usefulness of considering adaptive genes as indicators of past selective pressures acting on crops, during their spread through Europe. In some areas, such as the Alpine region, Britain and Scandinavia, we have evidence to suggest that the adaptation of crops to certain climatic conditions may have contributed to the timing of agricultural spread. At the northern fringes of Europe, and in higher altitude locations in central Europe, the introduction of more suitably adapted cereals may have facilitated successful agriculture to trigger agricultural expansion. This research opens up the possibility of investigating other genetic adaptations to climate, which would permit a fuller evaluation of the relative contributions of climate/crop and forager/farmer interactions in the process of agricultural spread.     

Modelling the effect of Mesolithic populations on the slowdown of the Neolithic transition

The expansion of the Neolithic transition in Europe took place gradually from the Near East across the whole continent. At Northern Europe, observations show a slowdown in the speed of the Neolithic front in comparison to other regions of the continent. It has been suggested that the presence of high population densities of hunter-gatherers at the North could have been the main cause for this slowdown. This proposal has recently been described by a mathematical model that takes into account: (i) the resistance opposed by the Mesolithic populations to the advance of Neolithic populations in their territory, and (ii) a limitation on the population growth dynamics due to the competition for space and resources. But these two effects are not equally responsible for the slowdown of the spread. Indeed, here we show that the limitation on the population growth dynamics seems to have been the main cause of the delay of the expansion of farming in Northern Europe.     

The Origins of the Neolithic Along the Atlantic Coast of Continental Europe: A Survey

The main aim of this work is to compare the processes of transition to the Neolithic along the Atlantic coasts of continental Europe. Archaeological data on the late Mesolithic and the early Neolithic in the best known regions (central and southern Portugal, Cantabrian Spain, Atlantic France, the shores of the North Sea, and southern Scandinavia) are discussed. The transition to the Neolithic in Atlantic Europe can be viewed as a relatively late phenomenon, with several interesting particularities. Among those, we point out the fundamentally indigenous character of the processes; the existence of a long availability phase, in which hunter-gatherer groups maintained contact with neighboring agriculturalists and probably were familiar with farming and animal husbandry without applying them in a systematic way; and the later development of megalithic monumental funerary architecture. Finally, the main hypotheses so far proposed to explain the change are contrasted with the available evidence: those that argue that the change derives from economic disequilibrium, and those that opt for the development of social inequality as the fundamental cause.     

The mesolithic of Western Europe

Recent investigations of prefarming adaptations during the Mesolithic period in early Holocene Europe have led to significant revision of traditional views. A number of innovations and changes occur, particularly toward the end of the Mesolithic, that permit this time to be described as both dynamic and extraordinary. Permanent settlement and the use of domesticated animals, exchange, and, perhaps, cultivated plants and monumental tombs characterize a number of later Mesolithic adaptations. The transition to the Neolithic is now regarded as the result of in situ developments in most areas of Western Europe, as Mesolithic groups slowly adopted pottery, cultigens, and other characteristics of farming villagers. In this paper, questions regarding chronology, nomenclature, and the definition of terms are addressed initially. Changes in European environments at the close of the Pleistocene and during the early postglacial are considered in terms of major impacts on human adaptation. The central focus of this study is a survey of the Mesolithic in Ireland, Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Portugal, Spain, and Italy. Recent research projects in these areas are discussed in terms of new approaches and results. An overview of developments in these countries is also presented, emphasizing the transitions from the Paleolithic and into the Neolithic. Concluding remarks address future directions in Mesolithic research.     

THE FORMATION OF SOCIAL RANK IN THE EARLY NEOLITHIC OF NORTHERN EUROPE

Klavs Randsborg has made important contributions to the archaeology of the Bronze Age and later prehistoric periods, but in the 1970s he also touched upon issues such as the formation of rank in Neolithic societies. In his article ‘Social Dimensions of Early Neolithic Denmark’, he suggested that a hierarchical society arose at the transition from the Early to Middle Neolithic, c. 3300–3200 BC. Since then, excavations and research have resulted in numerous publications about the Neolithic, but only rarely have these examined social development. In this article, the authors continue the debate, sharing the same starting point as Klavs Randsborg, but here approaching the question of emerging social inequality on the background of recent research into the early agricultural societies in Northern Europe, seen in a broader European context. The primary focus is upon burial monuments as manifestations of status and power, and parallels are drawn with similar construction activities amongst present‐day farming communities in such remote areas as the islands of Southeast Asia. The social organisation and ritual customs of these modern farming communities are considered relevant when interpreting the archaeological evidence for early agricultural societies in Northern Europe.     

The transition to farming in Eastern and Northern Europe

This paper presents a general survey of the transition to farming in Eastern and Northern Europe, approached within the framework of the availability model and treated from the perspective of local (Mesolithic) hunting and gathering communities. We argue that in Eastern and Northern Europe, the transition to farming was a slow process, which occurred through the adoption of exogenous cultigens and domesticates by the local hunter-gatherer populations, who may have been already engaged in some form of husbandry of the local resources. Contact and exchange with the Neolithic and later Bronze Age of Central Europe had a profound and prolonged influence on the process of the adoption of farming in Eastern and Northern Europe. During the slow process of transition, mixed hunting-farming societies emerged, which could be regarded as having a characteristic social and economic organization of their own (i.e., neither Mesolithic nor Neolithic). In conclusion, we argue for continuity in population and in social and economic traditions from the hunter-gatherer past until recent antiquity and, in some areas, into the historical period.     

Integrating Local and Regional in Pre-Contact Hawaiian Agriculture at Kahuku,Hawai‘i Island

ABSTRACT

The agricultural systems of the Hawaiian archipelago were some of the most intensive in the Pacific and this scale of intensity is well illustrated by the large agricultural landscapes of leeward Hawai‘i Island. Previous research in the area has centred on understanding the relationship between agriculture, political process, and large-scale environmental conditions. Much of this research has been oriented at the regional level, privileging discussion of elite management and oversight, with only limited investigation exploring farmer-centric adaptation at local scales. In this paper, we assess the integration of local and regional processes in Hawaiian agriculture using recent paired archaeological and ecological data from the Ka‘ū Field System as a case study. We demonstrate the presence of both general patterns previously identified in the archipelago and particular adaptations to the local environment of Kahuku ahupua‘a. In particular, we highlight targeted infrastructural developments that allowed for cultivation of what would otherwise be a difficult cultivation medium within the confines of a larger, likely regionally organised, field system constrained by general soil biogeochemical thresholds. We argue that such investigations provide an increased understanding on how these large-scale agricultural landscapes were formed by integration at multiple social and spatial scales.     

Same island, different diet: Cultural evolution of food practice on Öland, Sweden, from the Mesolithic to the Roman Period

The Mesolithic–Neolithic transition in north-west Europe has been described as rapid and uniform, entailing a swift shift from the use of marine and other wild resources to domesticated terrestrial resources. Here, we approach the when, what and how of this transition on a regional level, using empirical data from Öland, an island in the Baltic Sea off the Swedish east coast, and also monitor changes that occurred after the shift. Radiocarbon dating and stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analyses of bones and teeth from 123 human individuals, along with faunal isotope data from 27 species, applying to nine sites on Öland and covering a time span from the Mesolithic to the Roman Period, demonstrate a great diversity in food practices, mainly governed by culture and independent of climatic changes. There was a marked dietary shift during the second half of the third millennium from a mixed marine diet to the use of exclusively terrestrial resources, interpreted as marking the large-scale introduction of farming. Contrary to previous claims, this took place at the end of the Neolithic and not at the onset. Our data also show that culturally induced dietary transitions occurred continuously throughout prehistory. The availability of high-resolution data on various levels, from intra-individual to inter-population, makes stable isotope analysis a powerful tool for studying the evolution of food practices.     

Changes in crop cultivation during the last five centuries before the Roman conquest: archaeobotanical investigation in the Clermont-Ferrand basin,Massif Central,France

For several decades, a growing number of protohistoric sites in Auvergne (Massif Central, France)—mostly excavated through preventive archaeology—have been subject to the collection of archaeobotanical analysis. This study presents the archaeobotanical results from ten La Tène sites dating from the last five centuries before the Roman conquest. In addition to providing an inventory of taxa, this paper concerns crops and crop cultivation methods. These results are interpreted in a wider context, dealing with crop husbandry, arable farming, storage and consumption practices. The sites are located in the Limagne plain within a 50-km radius around the city of Clermont-Ferrand. A total of 23,579 carpological remains were identified from 163 sediment samples totalizing a volume of 1096 l. Comparable to other sites in Gaul, the spectrum of cereals and pulses is restricted. Spelt (Triticum spelta), einkorn (Triticum monococcum) and foxtail millet (Setaria italica) are disappearing or becoming rare. A better control of agricultural techniques and increased yields is supposed during the ca. five centuries of the La Tène period. Mixed cultivation is hereby replaced by the sowing of monocrops. At the beginning of this period, farming systems are dominated by a polyculture of cereals and pulses. They become more specialized during the last two centuries before the Roman conquest; diversity of cereals and pulses is decreased.     

农业历史地理环境变迁与农业地域拓展

农业地理环境是农业生产诸自然条件中影响最大的因素之一。历史过程之中,以地理环境条件为基础,伴随农业生产技术的纵深迈进,农业经济的开发与中心转移呈现出明显的层次性与地域性特征:率先是黄河中下游地区的旱作农区,次为长江流域稻作农区,进而是高寒农区的开发。     

Enemies to Allies: The Role of Policy‐Design Adaptation in Facilitating a Farmer–Environmentalist Alliance

In the period 1985 to 1996, agricultural conservation policy in the United States underwent a fundamental transition from a focus on policy design elements that emphasized short‐term economic returns for farmers and long‐term productivity to a focus on design elements that emphasized systemic environmental concerns. Although farmers' concerns with the environment were doubtlessly real, this adaptation of design elements allowed the agriculture policy community to gain the support of the environmental community for programs that offered new ways to channel short‐term economic support to farmers. The adaptation of design elements was triggered by the severe economic threat farmers began to experience in the late 1970s. This article investigates the language adaptations that facilitated the changes in agricultural conservation policy by analyzing the five policy‐design elements developed by Ingram and Schneider.     

Land-Use Conflict and the Rate of the Transition to Agricultural Economy: A Comparative Study of Southern Scandinavia and Central-Western Korea

Although the forager–farmer interaction model successfully explains the gradual transmission of farming technology to foraging groups, it fails to explain rapid, abrupt transition to agricultural economies. This paper suggests that interaction between farmers and foragers often includes conflict and competition over land and that this conflict between different land-use strategies may lead to a rapid, discontinuous transition of subsistence economy. Comparing southern Scandinavian and central-western Korean cases, this paper suggests that the rapid transition to an agricultural economy in central-western Korea was a consequence of the appearance of territoriality of farmers in mobile, land-sharing context, resulting in a decrease in number of resource patches available to foragers.     

Local gender contract and adaptive capacity in smallholder irrigation farming: a case study from the Kenyan drylands

This article presents the local gender contract of a smallholder irrigation farming community in Sibou, Kenya. Women's role in subsistence farming in Africa has mostly been analyzed through the lens of gender division of labor. In addition to this, we used the concept of ‘local gender contract’ to analyze cultural and material preconditions shaping gender-specific tasks in agricultural production, and consequently, men's and women's different strategies for adapting to climate variability. We show that the introduction of cash crops, as a trigger for negotiating women's and men's roles in the agricultural production, results in a process of gender contract renegotiation, and that families engaged in cash cropping are in the process of shifting from a ‘local resource contract’ to a ‘household income contract.’ Based on our analysis, we argue that a transformation of the local gender contract will have a direct impact on the community's adaptive capacity climate variability. It is, therefore, important to take the negotiation of local gender contracts into account in assessments of farming communities' adaptive capacity.     

全国第一个家庭林场与农村经济体制改革

党的十一届三中全会以后,福建省仙游县的农民李金耀创办了全国第一个上规模的家庭林场,尝试开发性农业经营。此举引起社会各界的关注,引发了一场全国性的大争论。通过争论,使人们解放了思想,对社会主义理论的基本内涵有了新的认识,突破了长期以来在社会主义经济建设中的教条主义,促进了人们思想观念的转变。中共中央、国务院根据李金耀和广大农民的伟大创举,调整了农村经济政策,变革了农业经营方式,加速了农村改革进程,使农村改革从种植业开始逐步向林业、水产业、畜牧业等多方面发展,促进了家庭承包经营向农业产业化发展,加速了中国农业的市场化进程。     

江苏盱眙东阳军庄汉墓群出土人骨的稳定同位素分析

黄淮地区是传统粟稻混作区,西汉时麦作推广进入关键时期,但小麦在这一过程中对黄淮地区原有粟稻混作格局的影响并不明确。对江苏省盱眙县东阳军庄汉墓群出土人骨的稳定同位素分析结果显示,9例人骨骨胶原δ13C值的范围为-20.0‰~-18.4‰,均值-19.4±0.6‰(n=9),表明西汉时期盱眙先民主要以稻、麦等C3类植物为食,已经不再将粟作为主要粮食,结合该地区西汉以前的农业格局,可推测西汉时期苏北淮河流域已经开始由传统的稻粟混作模式向稻麦混作模式转变。将本文数据与我国同时期其他遗址的稳定同位素数据比较后发现,在原有稻粟混作区内,粟在先民饮食结构中的地位呈自西向东下降的趋势,反映了小麦种植在不同区域的不平衡发展,关中地区小麦的推广普及明显晚于东部近海地区。     

Detection of diffusion and contact zones of early farming in Europe from the space-time distribution of 14C dates

The spread of early farming in Europe is revisited using a sample of 3072 audited 14C calBC dates from 940 georeferenced early Neolithic sites. The surface expansion of early Neolithic has been reconstituted using the kriging technique of spatial interpolation. Centres of renewed expansion, of contact zones, and the main routes of expansion have been highlighted by means of a vector map, representing the gradient. The expansion of the agricultural system on the map, was not uniform and regular across Europe as a whole, but proceeded in leaps. With the scale of detection of the 500-year isochrones, several leaps are identifiable: at 8000 calBC crossing the Taurus barrier, 6700–6100 calBC crossing the southern Adriatic barrier, 6100–5600 calBC crossing the Central European agro-ecological barrier and 5000–4000 calBC expanding on the other, marginal zones. Using a vector map, 10 points of renewed expansion and nine contact zones, were detected. The whole does not correspond to a process of homogeneous diffusion, approximately steady, but a process marked by phases of geographical expansion and stasis.     

After the Deep Freeze: Confronting “Magdalenian” Realities in Cantabrian Spain And Beyond

The Magdalenian culture-stratigraphic unit in Western Europe, despite being a construct of nineteenth-century prehistoric archeologists, does have reality as a continuous network of human inter-relationships, whose ecologically transcendent range expanded through the course of the Late Last Glacial, in many ways reminiscent of Braudel’s histoire de la longue durée—in this case lasting some 9,000 calendar years. At the scale of the moyenne durée, the Magdalenian underwent several reorganizations [represented by its Initial, Lower, Middle, Upper, Final, and Epi-Magdalenian (i.e., Azilian, Federmesser) stages]—with distinctly regional manifestations and inter-regional connections—that in part can be understood in light of environmental/resource changes and variations at the scales of millennia and natural regions. At the scale of the courte durée, we are dealing with the adaptations of local and regional hunter-gatherer bands and the peculiarities and vicissitudes of their circumstances measured by forager group territories and centuries. Numerous, diverse concrete archaeological manifestations of territories and inter-group contacts support the growing consensus about the social reality of the Magdalenian phenomenon and the changes and variations that characterized it within a range that ultimately stretched from Portugal to Poland during the last millennia of the Pleistocene. Here, the focus is on Cantabrian Spain as one of the core or source areas of the Magdalenian cultural tradition that arose out of the Solutrean experience some 20,000 calendar years ago (about a millennium later than in France) and that was intimately linked to the process of human recolonization of upland and northerly regions of western and ultimately central Europe during the course of Greenland Stadial 2 and early Greenland Interstadial 1. Finally, archaeological and paleobiological indicators clearly point to major breaks in human adaptations and ways of understanding the human place in the universe a few centuries after the onset of Holocene conditions in Vasco-Cantabria, i.e., the development of Mesolithic cultures about 11,000 calendar years ago.     

Latitudinal variation in a photoperiod response gene in European barley: insight into the dynamics of agricultural spread from ‘historic’ specimens

Between ca. 6000 BC and ca. 500 BC, barley cultivation spread across the continent of Europe from the extreme south to the extreme north. Carbon-dating would suggest that this spread, and indeed the spread of crop cultivation generally, varied in its pace, with ‘delays’ at certain points along its route. Such delays in the spread of agriculture have been explained as resulting from the slow assimilation of agricultural practices by existing indigenous human populations or as the time taken for the crops to adapt to novel climatic conditions, such as altered temperature regimes and day-lengths. A mutant form of the photoperiod response gene, Ppd-H1, causes barley to be non-responsive to long days, while the wild-type responsive form allows plants to flower in response to long days. We sequenced this gene in 65 ‘historic’ barley accessions, from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in order to explore the potential role of environmental adaptation in the spread of agriculture. We chose to use ‘historic’ material, to complement the richer patterns in extant genetic lines, by spreading the data range in both time and space. Our ‘historic’ barley data shows a latitudinal divide in the Ppd-H1 gene similar to that found in extant lines, but with clearer geographical resolution, and extending northwards into the Arctic Circle. We discuss the implications of our results in relation to the dynamics of agricultural spread across Europe.