Subsistence and Foodways: Domestication (Other Keyword)
76-100 (126 Records)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. As the only domesticated animal native to the North American continent, analysis of turkey husbandry in the prehistoric American Southwest is important to understand human-avian interaction, foddering techniques, and trade. Direct analysis of turkey remains provides information about their myriad functions. The Houck community of sites is located at 6,035...
Karen Adams and Early Agricultural Period Research: A Synthetic Approach Using Niche Construction Theory (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Enduring Relationships: People, Plants, and the Contributions of Karen R. Adams" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the last 30 years Early Agricultural period research has documented a series of substantial early farming settlements in four river valleys: the Santa Cruz in the Tucson Basin, the Río Boquilla at La Playa in northern Sonora, the Río Casas Grandes in northern Chihuahua, and the Upper Gila River in...
La Playa in the Broader Early Agricultural Period (2024)
This is an abstract from the "13,000 Years of Adaptation in the Sonoran Desert at La Playa, Sonora" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This presentation will situate La Playa site within a broader narrative of the development of the Early Agricultural period (EAP). We review evidence for the obvious parallels of technological development that occurred at La Playa and other EAP sites in both Northwest Mexico and the US Southwest. These changes are then...
Late Archaic Maize in the Trans-Pecos of West Texas: Implications and Future Research (2021)
This is an abstract from the "The Big Bend Complex: Landscapes of History" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The recovery of Late Archaic maize from the Trans-Pecos, peripheral to the American Southwest, adds to an expanding list of primary crop acquisition by foragers that occupied the arid region. The region, however, lacks clear demographic and settlement patterns diagnostic of this period from adjacent regions. Lacking key similarities, local...
Making Plant Foods in the Early Neolithic: Microbotanical Evidence from Shangshan Pottery (2018)
The Lower Yangtze Valley of China is renowned for the origin of rice agriculture. Previous research based on archaeobotanical analysis and genetic data indicates that the evolution from wild rice to domestic rice was a continuous process that occurred between 11,000 - 6,000 BP. The Shangshan culture (11,400 BP – 86,00) has revealed the earliest evidence of rice cultivation in the region and abundant pottery vessels. These vessels are diverse in form but their functions still remain unclear. By...
Mapping Heat: Pinpointing Early Human Interactions with Chili Pepper in Mexico (2024)
This is an abstract from the "The Archaeobotany of Early Peopling: Plant Experimentation and Cultural Inheritance" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Our project investigates the origins and domestication pathways of the Mesoamerican chili pepper (Capsicum annuum var. annuum L.). Undertaken by an interdisciplinary team and relying on a tripartite methodological framework, this study employs morphometric analyses of extant and archaeological Capsicum...
Morphological and Chemical Signatures of Chenopodium: Application of Optical and Electron Microscopy to Seeds from Experimental and Archaeological Contexts (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Humans are considered natural seed dispersing agents through the social acts of seed saving and seed sowing. The intentional and unintentional results of these human-plant relationships can lead to the development of genotypic and phenotypic traits that are beneficial to both the plant and to their human influencers. Anthropogenic seed dispersal of wild...
Neolithic Pigs and People along China's Fertile Arc: Regional Expression and Domestication (2018)
The foothills of mountain chains along river catchments, or "Hilly Flanks", have repeatedly been shown to be key to understanding the origins of agriculture throughout Eurasia. During the Neolithic, sites in the northern part of China’s Fertile Arc (see Ren et al. 2016)—showing the the earliest evidence of the cultivation of Chinese Millets—are situated along China's own "Hilly Flanks". In contrast, southern sites along the Arc cultivating rice, are located in a diverse array of landforms...
A New Locus for Avocado Domestication in Mesoamerica: Evidence for 8,000 Years of Human Selection and Tree Management at El Gigante, Honduras (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Beyond Maize and Cacao: Reflections on Visual and Textual Representation and Archaeological Evidence of Other Plants in Precolumbian Mesoamerica" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Recent research demonstrates that ancient Mesoamericans engaged in forest management long before they domesticated maize. Our research from El Gigante provides additional evidence for the antiquity of tree management practices in several...
Paquimé in Perspective: A Meta-Analysis of Turkey Remains from the US Southwest and Northern Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Current Research on Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) Domestication, Husbandry and Management in North America and Beyond" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Excavations at the site of Paquimé in Northern Mexico, uncovered the interred remains of hundreds of common turkeys. Given both the size and unusual nature of this assemblage, studies of the Paquimé turkeys seem well suited to furthering our understanding of...
The Past (and Future?) of Our Crop Plants in Changing Global Environments (2018)
The development of agricultural societies, one of the most transformative events in human and ecological history, began independently in a number of world regions including the American tropics during a period of profound environmental change at the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. Plant domestication is at its core an evolutionary process involving both natural and human selection for traits favorable for harvesting and consumption. Scientists from a number of disciplines have long sought to...
Pathways to Plant Domestication: Categories of Cultivation Practice and Convergent Evolution (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Questioning the Fundamentals of Plant and Animal Domestication" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Taking inspiration from Zeder’s notion of pathways to animal domestication (commensal, prey, directed), this presentation will outline equivalent pathways of plant domestication types, and suggest a range of species that can be grouped by these pathways. These pathways are united by issues of habit (annual, perennial),...
A Pawsitively Interesting Prehistory of Dogs: New Stable Isotope and Morphometric Analyses from Croatia (2018)
Though dogs are recognized as important points of comparison for archaeologists seeking to reconstruct prehistoric human diet and lifestyles (e.g., canine surrogacy approach), less attention has focused on understanding the cultural and ecological significance of dogs themselves in these same contexts. We report new morphometric and stable isotope results from prehistoric (Neolithic-Iron Age) sites from Croatia that represent different cultural and environmental contexts that potentially...
People-Plant Relationships in Long-Generation Arboreal Fruit Cultivation (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Multispecies Frameworks in Archaeological Interpretation: Human-Nonhuman Interactions in the Past, Part II" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The study of human-plant relationships in archaeology is rich and varied, including gathering, cultivation of wild species, domestication, intensive agriculture, and nonfood uses of plants. People-plant relationships in agricultural entanglements, however, have primarily focused on...
Peppers and People in Mesoamerica: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Tracing the Origin and Domestication of Chiles (Capsicum annuum var. annuum L.) (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Fryxell Symposium in Honor of Dolores Piperno" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Dolores Piperno’s career has been defined by pioneering work in multidisciplinary and collaborative plant research. Following in her footsteps, this interdisciplinary team comprised of archaeologists/archaeobotanists, an ethnobotanist, and a biogeographer assembled to investigate the origins and domestication of Capsicum annuum var. annuum...
Persistence in Turkey Husbandry Practices in the Southwest and Four Corners Region: The isotopic and ethnohistorical evidence (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Current Research on Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) Domestication, Husbandry and Management in North America and Beyond" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. aDNA analysis reveals an independent domestication event of Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) occurred in the Southwestern United States between 200 BC—AD 500. While this event was distinct from the domestication of turkey within the Mesoamerican world approximately 2000 years...
Phytolith Analysis of Experimental Fires: Insights into the Prehistory of Fire (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Cooking Hypothesis suggests the morphological changes in the Homo lineage, including larger brains, were due to incorporating controlled combustion to cook food. Most archaeological evidence for fire comes from cave sites, which are less likely to be exposed to post-depositional processes (e.g. wind and water) that can destroy combustion evidence. Yet the...
Pig Management in Neolithic North China: Foddering and Social Change in the Western Liao River Valley (2019)
This is an abstract from the "From Tangible Things to Intangible Ideas: The Context of Pan-Eurasian Exchange of Crops and Objects" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Recent models for pig domestication in China have suggested that initial domestication was contingent upon millet cultivation, which allowed for foddering through agricultural surplus. For this study, a combination of bulk collagen carbon and nitrogen isotopic analysis and compound...
Pigs by Sea: The Establishment of Pig Husbandry on Wallacean Islands during the Late Holocene (2018)
Domestic pigs play a crucial role in the socioeconomic systems of Island Southeast Asian cultures today. However, the timing of their introduction into the region during the late Holocene and details of their use by prehistoric inhabitants is not entirely clear. The introduction of domestic pigs by maritime Neolithic horticulturalists to the Wallacean island region of eastern Indonesia and Timor-Leste, which has never been connected to a major landmass, appears to have been an advantageous...
Prehistoric Dogs in the Uruguay Lowlands (2018)
This paper presents archaeological information about domestic dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) recovered in prehistoric sites in the southeastern lowlands of Uruguay. The presence of dog in the archaeological record is associated to horticultural activities of hunter-gatherers adapted to the very dynamic conditions of this flood ecosystem during the Holocene. Dog findings in mounds have a recurrent and unique association with burials. This context allows a starting discussion on the economic,...
Preliminary Insights into the Biocultural Trajectory of Maize in Southwestern Amazonia (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Subsistence Crops and Animals as a Proxy for Human Cultural Practice" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Mounting archaeobotanical and archaeogenetic data show that the southwestern Amazon region had an important role to play in the history of South American maize dispersal, acting as a “secondary improvement center” for primitive lineages that arrived in the region during the Middle Holocene (>6500 BP). How these...
A Proteomic Approach to Determine Sex in Zooarchaeology (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Sex determination from animal skeletal remains can be challenging as it relies on sex specific bones or osteometrics. Determining sex is beneficial in understanding animal husbandry practices, as well as human-animal interactions. Building on previous work with humans, here we present a proteomic approach for determining sex from tooth enamel in nonhuman...
The Pueblo Farming Project: Research, Education, and Native American Collaboration (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Research, Education, and American Indian Partnerships at the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Maize farming represents a fundamental aspect of Pueblo people’s identity. This paper focuses on an experimental farming program conducted as part of the Pueblo Farming Project (PFP). The PFP represents one of Crow Canyon’s longest-running projects and one of the center’s most important...
Radiocarbon Dating and Carbon/Nitrogen Stable Isotope Analysis of Human Skeletons from the Lambayeque Valley, North Peru (Formative to Inca) (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. We analyzed 73 human bone/tooth samples from the following archaeological sites of the Lambayeque Valley, North Peru: Huaca Rajada, Huaca Zarpán, Huaca Santa Rosa, Huaca El Pueblo, Huaca El Chorro, Huaca El Triunfo, Huaca Saltur and Huaca Ventarrón. The associated material culture indicates that this sample encompasses a deep and continuous time transect going...
Raising Dogs for Meat and Sacrifice: A Comparative Study of Classic Period Sites in Oaxaca, Mexico (2018)
The domestic dog (Canis familiaris) became a staple in the meat diet of Zapotec peoples during the Formative period (1500 BC – AD 200) in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico, and continued to be increasingly important in subsistence and ritual into the Classic and Postclassic periods. Recent zooarchaeological research has identified low-intensity household management/production of animals and animal by-products at sites throughout the valley, with each settlement marked by its own unique signature of...