New Dietary Evidence on Medieval Rural Communities of the Basque Country (Spain) and Its Surroundings from Carbon and Nitrogen Stable Isotope Analyses: Social Insights,Diachronic Changes and Geographic Comparison

This paper presents the results of palaeodietary reconstruction based on stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis on bone collagen of five medieval rural populations from the Basque Country (northern Spain) spanning from 5^th to 15^th centuries ad . One hundred forty‐seven human and 47 domestic faunal samples were successfully analysed with the objective of defining agrarian productive strategies and food consumption patterns. The results grouped the five sites in two clusters: on one side Zaballa and Treviño, whose inhabitants followed diets exclusively based on C₃ plants with significant intake of animal protein, and on the other, the populations from Aistra and Zornoztegi, who combined C₃ and C₄ plants and consumed lower amounts of animal protein. The isotopic values from Dulantzi were intermediate to these two groups. No differences were detected when individual status markers, such as grave goods, were available. Conversely, some restrictions on the access to certain food resources based on sex were uncovered. A relevant change in δ¹³C values was identified around 10^th century, a consequence of a shift in the consumption patterns of C₃ and C₄ plants. Finally, these Basque sites were compared with those of the medieval Iberian case studies available in the literature. This comparison made evident the distinctive nature of the diet of the Basque medieval rural contexts. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Expertise Marginalized: Quality Inspection and the Grain Market in Republican China

With the help of professionally trained agricultural scientists, the Guomindang’s Nationalist government drafted a large-scale program for agricultural reconstruction in the late 1920s and early 1930s. At the heart of the program was a scientific rice-breeding experiment with the potential to produce great numbers of new high-yield rice varieties. However, this scientific achievement could not assure success of the new rice varieties in the market because the marketability of rice was determined not by the scientific productivity improvement but by a series of processes required before the rice reached consumers. For this, local and practical contexts had to be considered. By juxtaposing two different forms of “rice expertise,” this paper illuminates the incompatibility between the state’s productivist understanding of agricultural improvement and the quality issue in the grain market.     

长江下游新石器时代水稻田与稻作农业的起源

长江下游地区一系列史前水田遗迹的发现,说明长江下游不仅是稻作农业起源中心,也是栽培稻的起源中心。     

“清江四案”“白银案”之前后

锦屏本地苗族木商向政府状告外省木商使用冲铅银两假币的诉讼案件。收集到的两件状词,一是道光七年（1827）由李荣魁带头起诉到贵州布政使司批转黎平府的公文,又由黎平府作出处理公告;另件是光绪十三年（1887）姜名卿等向黎平府递交的状纸。两起案件相隔60年,因为假银泛滥、受害深重后才产生诉讼,政府行文禁止后,仍禁而不止,所以少数民族的木商、林农和从事木材运输的农民工,受假银之害至少在80年以上。但从外省木商之滥用假币,折射出清水江木业之兴旺。     

三种植物成分防霉活性及其对纸张、颜料影响的实验研究

针对文物保存中的霉菌病害问题,测试了三种植物成分柠檬醛、肉桂醛和香茅醛在室温条件下的自然挥发对文物中几种常见的橘青霉、黑曲霉、球毛壳三种霉菌的防霉活性,研究了三种成分对实验宣纸的色差、强度影响和对三种丙烯的颜色的色料影响。结果表明,三种成分均具有良好的气相防霉效果,但对文物材质的影响有所差异。     

Decentring 1788: Beyond Biotic Nativeness

The usefulness of the concept of biotic nativeness has been challenged in both the social and natural sciences, for different reasons. This paper explores the particular construction of nativeness in Australia in relation to plants, showing that the definition builds on and inscribes more deeply the boundary between humans and the rest of nature seen in the wider literature. In this context two further boundaries are etched: between some humans and others, and before and after European colonisation. Such a use of nativeness as an axiom of environmental management is argued to be problematic, foreclosing a number of future options just when we need to increase our capacity to deal with contingency and unpredictability. But if Australia has experienced distinctive historical processes of entrenching these boundaries, it also has a distinctive heritage of destabilisation in a range of geographic work. The paper discusses how we might build on this heritage to imagine more open futures in which the problematic boundaries were removed. Some of these futures resonate with vernacular recombinations of plants from diverse origins.     

Feeding the Crusades: Archaeobotany,Animal Husbandry and Livestock Alimentation on the Baltic Frontier

ABSTRACT

The integrated results of micromorphology, plant macrofossil, pollen, phytolith, and non-pollen palynomorph analyses represent an important study of two thirteenth-century Teutonic Order castles at Karksi (Livonia), and Elbl?g (Prussia). The research examines deposits that formed during the period of active crusading. At Karksi, the investigation of a midden and of the organic-rich sediment beneath allows the diachronic use of this area to be understood. Freshwater aquatic indicators are consistent with the occurrence of shallow stagnant water, as also suggested by a waterlaid pond sediment identified in thin-section. Coprophilous spore taxa suggest the use of the pond as a watering hole. Plant macrofossils from the midden represent a range of habitats, mostly from wet/damp areas, as well as pastures and meadows, and also woodlands. Fragments of millet are embedded within herbivore dung in thin-section showing the use of this grain as fodder. At Elbl?g, parasite ova may derive from animal feces as they also occur in the dung observed in thin-section, and a range of coprophilous fungal spore taxa were extracted. The results reveal information about the range of livestock that the Teutonic Knights kept, whereabouts within the castles the animals were stabled, and what fodder was used.     

INVADED BY WEEDS: CONTESTED LANDSCAPE STORIES

Landscapes tell stories of the lives and dwelling of those who inhabit them. They are not given, but in constant motion. In North Norwegian coastal societies cultural landscapes are rapidly transforming. One of the most visible and debated agents of landscape transformations are weeds such as cow parsley and dock. As well as threatening the biodiversity of coastal landscapes, the “invading weeds” seem to challenge the embodied landscapes of their dwellers. Focusing on the rapid spread of cow parsley, this article investigates complex and contested aspects of landscape changes. Inspired by Ingold's phenomenological perspective as well as performative theories, we search for ways of approaching hybridized relations within dwelt places. The transformative agency of cow parsley is used as a lens to approach societal dynamics and challenges. Through a study of the coastal community of Herøy in Northern Norway, we have explored people's engagement with the changing cultural landscape. The cow parsley covered landscape is perceived as a deteriorated landscape and as such seems to affect a form of alienation. We demonstrate a disruption between the emerging landscape produced by new ways of dwelling, and the landscape people wish to dwell in. What happens when the landscape tells stories which their dwellers do not want to be part of?     

LABOUR MOBILITY AND PLANT PERFORMANCE: ON THE (DIS)SIMILARITY BETWEEN LABOUR‐ AND CAPITAL‐INTENSIVE SECTORS FOR KNOWLEDGE DIFFUSION AND PRODUCTIVITY

In this article we analyse differences between capital‐ and labour‐intensive sectors with regard to the impact of workforce composition and labour mobility on plant performance. By the use of geo‐referenced longitudinal employer–employee data on a micro level, we analyse labour flows between plants within and between labour market regions. The analysis is carried out using weighted least squares (WLS) regression analysis combined with additional variance analysis (ANOVA). The results show that there are differences between the sectors with regard to both in‐house workforce composition and type of skill inflow. A high degree of related knowledge in the in‐house workforce has a strong positive effect on plant performance in the labour‐intensive sectors. The analysis of labour inflow indicates that knowledge in the capital‐intensive sectors is localized – only intra‐regional labour flows give rise to increased plant productivity. In the labour‐intensive sectors, the geographic and cognitive dimensions complement one another; similar knowledge needs to be non‐local in order to be beneficial to plant performance, and unrelated knowledge mainly contributes to plant productivity growth when it is local.     

Sampling seeds

Problems of sampling carbonized plant material are discussed. Firstly, the problem of actually selecting a sample in the laboratory is considered, and some experiments which investigate various procedures are described. Secondly, the statistical aspects of determining optimal sample sizes are considered. Formulae are given for calculating optimal sample sizes and confidence intervals. Upper bounds, which are independent of the total population size, are provided for the sample size required to achieve any desired accuracy.