The trajectory of early rice intensification and cultural change in the Lower Yangtze Valley revealed by an ecological analysis of archaeological phytoliths.

Summary

Using data from modern and archaeological phytolith assemblages we follow the trajectory of wild rice cultivated on wetland margins at 5000 BC through early domestication and the first artificial arable systems in dug out fields at c. 4000 BC to fully developed irrigated paddy fields in the Lower Yangtze Valley. Using multivariate analysis with phytolith assemblages from ecological communities of rice weed flora across a range of arable systems we create modern analogues of ancient systems which are used to interpret our archaeobotanical samples. In addition we interpret our data from ancient rice fields and archaeological sites using a physiologically-based wet versus dry model of grass morphotype silicification. These data reveal how rice cultivation changed alongside cultural development in the Lower Yangtze Valley, moving from wet to dry and back to wet systems. This sequence of changes in cultivation ecology inferred from phytoliths fits with available plant macro-remains and can be understood as agricultural intensification alongside growing social complexity.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• ‘Siempre a la Vanguardia’: A Tribute to Dolores Piperno Contributions to the Origins and Spread of Agriculture   •
• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage