Predomestication cereal processing and storage

The latest Antiquity includes a detailed treatment by Willcox and Strodeur of Large-scale cereal processing before domestication during the tenth millennium cal BC in northern Syria at Jerf el Ahmar. The archaeobotany of Jerf has featured large in discussion in recent years on Near Eastern domestication, with apparent evidence for an early arable weed flora (see Willcox 2012 for latest), some grain size increase (reported in Willcox 2004, discussed further in Fuller 2007), but with wild-type shattering rachides, mostly of barley and rye. Jerf has been one of the major datasets contributing to a "slowing down" of domestication, from how fast we thought it was before, and of a "de-centring of the fertile crescent." So it is important to understand just how the archaeobotanical evidence fits with the archaeology on this site, and there are some important details to digest. In this paper the present some more details on the spatial patterning of finds, especially rye and barley in relation to crop-processing (mainly later stage dehusking and preparation for grinding), and argue for possible storage in the 'public' multi-room round building in the the site. There is also discussion of rodent dropping, mainly mice (Mus), which argues for on-site cereal stores, the key context for the evolution of commensal rodents.

Journal Issue on Food Processing

The latest issue of Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences (Volume 3(1)), is a themed issue on food processing studies in archaeobotany and ethnobotany. It has a range of case studies I can recommends, geographically from Argentina to Germany to Greece to Japan, and in age from the Palaeolithic to the European Iron Age and the South American Inka. This is definitely an important for archaeobotanical thinking and research, and it provides a framework that cuts across the usual divide between hunter-gatherers and farmers. The guest editors, Aylen Caparelli, Soutana Valamoti, and Michele Wollstonecroft deserved congratulations.

IN THIS ISSUE:

 >>>Editorial: After the harvest: investigating the role of food processing in past human societies<<<  Aylen Capparelli, Soultana Maria Valamoti & Michèle M. Wollstonecroft. [link]
 >>>Staple or famine food?: ethnographic and archaeological approaches to nut processing in East Asian prehistory<<<  Leo Aoi Hosoya [link]
 >>>Ground cereal food preparations from Greece: the prehistory and modern survival of traditional Mediterranean ‘fast foods’<<<  Soultana Maria Valamoti [Link]
 >>>Early Iron Age and Late Mediaeval malt finds from Germany—attempts at reconstruction of early Celtic brewing and the taste of Celtic beer<<<  Hans-Peter Stika [link]

 >>>Traditional post-harvest processing to make quinoa grains (Chenopodium quinoa var. quinoa) apt for consumption in Northern Lipez (Potosí, Bolivia): ethnoarchaeological and archaeobotanical analyses<<< Laura M. López, Aylen Capparelli & Axel Emil Nielsen [link]

 >>>Recognition of post-harvest processing of algarrobo (Prosopis spp.) as food from two sites of Northwestern Argentina: an ethnobotanical and experimental approach for desiccated macroremains<<<   Aylen Capparelli & Verónica Lema  [link]
 >>>Elucidating post-harvest practices involved in the processing of algarrobo (Prosopis spp.) for food at El Shincal Inka site (Northwest Argentina): an experimental approach based on charred remains<<< Aylen Capparelli [Link]
 >>>The possible influence of post-harvest objectives on Cucurbita maxima subspecies maxima and subspecies andreana evolution under cultivation at the Argentinean Northwest: an archaeological example<<< Verónica S. Lema [link]
 >>>Investigating the role of food processing in human evolution: a niche construction approach<<<  Michèle M. Wollstonecroft  [link]