Charting the Emergence of Cereal and Pulse Domestication in South-west Asia

Abstract

During the last decade, considerable advances have been made in our knowledge of the origins of cereal and pulse domestication in south-west Asia. Archaeobotanical assemblages have become available from hitherto poorly known regions and time periods, and new methodologies and interpretative approaches have allowed the reevaluation of older collections. Our understanding of the environmental and cultural context of the domestication process is also far better understood. The progenitors of the majority of the south-west Asian cereal and pulse domesticates were native to the park and steppe woodland habitats of the Fertile Crescent. This environment was very restricted at the pleniglacial, but there is nevertheless evidence for the use of cereals and pulses from this period. From ca. 13,000 bc, this food-rich habitat began to expand and it is likely that this accelerated during the Bølling and Allerød interstadials. Localised food-storing, semi-sedentary communities developed from ca. 10,500 bc. The Younger Dryas stadialled to a retraction of these resources and it is during the early ninth millennium bc that we see the first evidence for cereal cultivation. By 7,000 bc, 'domestic-type' cereals are found throughout the Fertile Crescent and by 6,000 bc 'domestic-type' pulses are found in many areas.