Between Archaeology and Text: The Origins of Rice Consumption and Cultivation in the Middle East and the Mediterranean

Abstract

Asiatic Rice <em>Oryza sativa</em> L. (Poaceae) is a domesticated grain crop native to the tropical and subtropical regions of Asia, which presently ranks among the most important grains in a global diet. <em>Oryza sativa</em> is comprised of two distinct phylogenetic subspecies, namely <em>japonica</em> and <em>indica</em>, for which genetic evidence indicates at least two centres of domestication: the Lower Yangtze valley for the broad thick-grained japonica (c. 4000 BC) and the Gangetic basin for the thin elongated indica variety (c. 2500 BC) (Fuller et al 2010; idem 2011; Nesbitt et al 2010: 325–7). Modern genetics of landraces from northeast India may indicate a third distinct origin for the so-called <em>aus</em> rice varieties (Londo et al 2006: 9581–2). The genetic history of this taxon is further complicated by post-domestication hybridisation between domesticates and their wild ancestors as well as the presence of rarer forms like the aromatic rice varieties (<em>basmati</em> in South Asia and <em>sadri</em> from Iran) which may be of independent origin (Nesbitt et al 2010: 324–5). In South Asia domesticated rice is attested at various archaeological sites in the Ganges basin from the mid-3rd millennium BC onwards. It subsequently appears at mature and late Harappan levels in north-western India (c. 2000 BC) before arriving at the edge of the eastern Iranian plateau at Pirak on the north Kachi plain in the early 2nd millennium BC (Costantini 1981; Fuller 2006: 36; Sato 2005). The presence of rice at Pirak heralds its gradual westward movement along the Iranian plateau via overland and perhaps even coastal routes into western Iran and Mesopotamia.