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The domestication of plants and animals marks one of the most significant transitions in human, and indeed global, history. Traditionally, study of the domestication process was the exclusive domain of archaeologists and agricultural scientists; today it is an increasingly multidisciplinary enterprise that has come to involve the skills of evolutionary biologists and geneticists. Although the application of new information sources and methodologies has dramatically transformed our ability to study and understand domestication, it has also generated increasingly large and complex datasets, the interpretation of which is not straightforward. In particular, challenges of equifinality, evolutionary variance, and emergence of unexpected or counter-intuitive patterns all face researchers attempting to infer past processes directly from patterns in data. We argue that explicit modeling approaches, drawing upon emerging methodologies in statistics and population genetics, provide a powerful means of addressing these limitations. Modeling also offers an approach to analyzing datasets that avoids conclusions steered by implicit biases, and makes possible the formal integration of different data types. Here we outline some of the modeling approaches most relevant to current problems in domestication research, and demonstrate the ways in which simulation modeling is beginning to reshape our understanding of the domestication process.

Recent increases in archaeobotanical evidence offer insights into the processes of plant domestication and agricultural origins, which evolved in parallel in several world regions. Many different crop species underwent convergent evolution and acquired domestication syndrome traits. For a growing number of seed crop species, these traits can be quantified by proxy from archaeological evidence, providing measures of the rates of change during domestication. Among domestication traits, nonshattering cereal ears evolved more quickly in general than seed size. Nevertheless, most domestication traits show similarly slow rates of phenotypic change over several centuries to millennia, and these rates were similar across different regions of origin. Crops reproduced vegetatively, including tubers and many fruit trees, are less easily documented in terms of morphological domestication, but multiple lines of evidence outline some patterns in the development of vegecultural systems across the New World and Old World tropics. Pathways to plant domestication can also be compared in terms of the cultural and economic factors occurring at the start of the process. Whereas agricultural societies have tended to converge on higher population densities and sedentism, in some instances cultivation began among sedentary hunter–gatherers whereas more often it was initiated by mobile societies of hunter–gatherers or herder–gatherers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a growing body of evidence that reliance on rice cultivation emerged gradually in the Lower and Middle Yangtze river basin during the mid-Holocene amongst societies that had a heavy emphasis on the seasonal collecting and storage of acorns (Cyclobalanopsis, Lithocarpus and/or Quercus) and aquatic nuts (Trapa, Euryale). Recent archaeobotanical research, like that at Tianluoshan, provides evidence for the emergence of cultivation and the decrease in importance of gathered plant foods, and this paper situates these changes in relation to environmental, including climatically driven, changes especially in the Hangzhou Bay (Lower Yangtze) region. A growing number of pollen and other palaecological studies have become available in recent years, and here they will be reviewed to test the hypothesis that regional declines in nut-bearing trees (especially oaks, but also possibly Castanea/Castanopsis chestnuts) was one of the factors that favoured the increasing reliance on rice, which in turn drove the evolution, expansion and intensification of cultivation and the evolution of morphologically domesticated rice. Another factor, however, that also needs to be considered is the evidence for the emergence of social hierarchy and specialised craft production which may have concurrently pushed for an increasingly socially controlled and reliable staple food source in the form of rice. In this regard, it is important to note that intensification of rice use required increasing degrees of labour mobilisation, and landscape transformation, which could provide returns on labour investment to a degree that was not possible with oak groves. Current evidence indicates that both climate-driven environmental changes and social motivations correlate with the shift to domesticated rice and rice agriculture over the latter part of the Neolithic (6000-3000 BC). The earlier beginnings of rice cultivation, the first steps along this pathway, remain obscure although some earlier Holocene climatic events appear correlated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Animal domestication was a major step forward in human prehistory, contributing to the emergence of more complex societies. At the time of the Neolithic transition, zebu cattle (Bos indicus) were probably the most abundant and important domestic livestock species in Southern Asia. Although archaeological evidence points toward the domestication of zebu cattle within the Indian subcontinent, the exact geographic origins and phylogenetic history of zebu cattle remains uncertain. Here, we report evidence from 844 zebu mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences surveyed from 19 Asiatic countries comprising 8 regional groups, which identify 2 distinct mitochondrial haplogroups, termed I1 and I2. The marked increase in nucleotide diversity (P < 0.001) for both the I1 and I2 haplogroups within the northern part of the Indian subcontinent is consistent with an origin for all domestic zebu in this area. For haplogroup I1, genetic diversity was highest within the Indus Valley among the three hypothesized domestication centers (Indus Valley, Ganges, and South India). These data support the Indus Valley as the most likely center of origin for the I1 haplogroup and a primary center of zebu domestication. However, for the I2 haplogroup, a complex pattern of diversity is detected, preventing the unambiguous pinpointing of the exact place of origin for this zebu maternal lineage. Our findings are discussed with respect to the archaeological record for zebu domestication within the Indian subcontinent. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Pulses are a significant component of traditional subsistence in South Asia. Reliable identification criteria for identifying these from archaeological seed remains are reviewed. The botanical evidence relating to the wild progenitors and their distribution, especially of Indian natives (Macrotyloma uniflorum, Vigna radiata, Vigna mungo) is summarised, including new evidence from primary botanical research. The problem of seed size increase in pulses is reviewed through a focused study on Vigna spp., in which it is shown that seed enlargement is delayed by 1–2,000 years after initial cultivation. The taphonomy of archaeological pulses is considered in the context of crop-processing of pulses, in which an important distinction can be drawn between free-threshing and pod-threshing types. The total archaeobotanical record for pulses in South Asia (India and Pakistan) is summarised and key regional differences are highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The application of crop processing models to macro-botanical assemblages has traditionally been used to interpret past husbandry practices and organisation of labour involved in crop-processing. Phytoliths offer an alternative method of analysis because they are durable in most environments, regardless of whether plant parts are charred, and the identification of plant types and plant parts allows them to be used in much the same way as macro-botanical remains. Indeed macro-remains and phytoliths are complementary datasets for examining the input of plant parts, such as crop-processing waste, into archaeological deposits. We outline crop-processing models in relation to macro-remains and then develop the framework for their application to archaeological phytolith assemblages. Rice and millet processing models are explored in relation to patterns expected in both macro-remains and phytoliths. The utility of these models is demonstrated with archaeological evidence from the site of Mahagara, an early farming site in North-Central India. The results indicate a way to employ phytoliths in archaeology which complements the fragmentary evidence available from plant macroremains. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

For the first time we integrate quantitative data on lithic sickles and archaeobotanical evidence for domestication and the evolution of plant economies from sites dated to the terminal Pleistocene and Early Holocene (ca. 12000–5000 cal. BCE) from throughout the Fertile Crescent region of Southwest Asia. We find a strong correlation in some regions, throughout the Levant, for increasing investment in sickles that tracks the evidence for increasing reliance on cereal crops, while evidence for morphological domestication in wheats ( Triticum monococcum and Triticum dicoccum ) and barley ( Hordeum vulgare ) was delayed in comparison to sickle use. These data indicate that while the co-increase of sickle blades and cereal crops support the protracted development of agricultural practice, sickles did not drive the initial stages of the domestication process but rather were a cultural adaptation to increasing reliance on cereals that were still undergoing selection for morphological change. For other regions, such as the Eastern Fertile Crescent and Cyprus such correlations are weaker or non-existent suggesting diverse cultural trajectories to cereal domestication. We conclude that sickles were an exaptation transferred to cereal harvesting and important in signalling a new cultural identity of “farmers”. Furthermore, the protracted process of technological and agricultural evolution calls into question hypotheses that the transition to agriculture was caused by any particular climatic event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rice can be cultivated in a range of arable systems, including upland rainfed, lowland rainfed or irrigated, flooded or décrue, and deep water cultivation. These agricultural regimes represent ecosystems controlled to large degree by agricultural practices, and can be shown to produce different weed flora assemblages. In order to reconstruct early rice cultivation systems it is necessary to better establish how ancient rice farming practices may be seen using archaeobotanical data. This paper focuses on using modern analogue phytolith assemblages of associated crop weeds found within cultivation regimes, as well as in wild rice stands (unplanted stands of Oryza nivara or Oryza rufipogon ), as a means of interpreting archaeobotanical assemblages. Rice weeds and sediment samples have been recorded and collected from a range of arable systems and wild stands in India. The husks, leaves and culms of associated weeds were processed for phytolith reference samples, and sediment samples were processed for phytoliths in order to establish patterns identifiable to specific systems. The preliminary results of the phytolith analysis of samples from these modern fields demonstrate that phytolith assemblage statistics show correlation with variation in rice cultivation systems on the basis of differences in environmental conditions and regimes, with wetness being one major factor. Analysis of phytoliths from archaeological samples from contrasting systems in Neolithic China and India demonstrate how this method can be applied to separate archaeological regions and periods based on inferred differences in past agricultural practices, identifying wet cultivation systems in China, dry millet-dominated agriculture of north China and rainfed/dry rice in Neolithic India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agriculture has been crucial in sustaining human populations in South Asia across dramatically variable environments for millennia. Until recently, however, the origins of this mode of subsistence in India have been discussed in terms of population migration and crop introduction, with limited focus on how agricultural packages were formulated and utilised in local contexts. Here, we report the first measurements of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope values in well-preserved charred crop remains from sites spanning the Neolithic/Chalcolithic to the Early Historic in two very different environmental zones: tropical East India and the semi-arid Deccan. The results show that this approach offers direct insight into prehistoric crop management under contrasting environmental constraints. Our preliminary results plausibly suggest that early farmers in India experimented with and made strategic use of water and manure resources in accordance with specific crop requirements and under varying environmental constraints. We suggest that the development of modern crop isotope baselines across India, and the application of this methodology to archaeological assemblages, has the potential to yield detailed insight into agroecology in India's past. • First archaeobotanical stable isotope data from Neolithic/Chalcolithic peninsular India. • Direct insight into crop management by early farmers. • Early farmers strategically used water resources to tackle environmental constraints. • Early farmers exploited dung and dung-ash as manure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]