Understanding everyday agro-pastoral practice is critical for reconstructing the formation and maintenance of ancient societies. The ancient Near East (Southwest Asia) has one of the longest histories of agro-pastoral practice and one of the richest textual datasets anywhere on the globe. Yet, our knowledge of local, day-to-day agro-pastoral management strategies remains conjectural in many regions of Southwest Asia during the Bronze Age (late 4th–2nd millennium BCE). In this study we used phytoliths, dung spherulites, and Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy to identify and examine dung-rich sediments from Khani Masi, a mid-second millennium BCE Kassite site located in the Kurdish Region of Iraq. While micro-remain and geochemical approaches have not yet been widely applied in Mesopotamia (Ancient Iraq), they have the potential to shed light on the production systems supporting its Bronze Age cities, states, and empires. Our aim was to investigate (1) the range of local pastoral management strategies, (2) the degree of integration between agricultural and pastoral practice, and (3) the presence of signals related to the local ecology, seasonality, and environmental change and continuity.

Phytolith results indicate that sheep-goat herds were primarily free grazed on wild grasses. The dominance of wild grass inflorescences, a potentially strong seasonality indicator, may suggest transhumant pastoralism. However, further evidence, including occasional foddering with cereal chaff, a diverse range of crop types, and significant accumulation of burnt dung within the site, collectively suggests a closely linked local agro-pastoral subsistence economy. This study provides much-needed empirical botanical data as well as productive insights for future application of phytolith studies in the Mesopotamian region, and sheds new light on agro-pastoral practice in the Zagros foothills during the second millennium BCE Kassite period.

了解日常农牧业实践对于重建古代社会的形成和维持至关重要。古代近东（西南亚）拥有最长的农牧业实践历史之一，也是全球任何地方最丰富的文本数据集之一。然而，在青铜时代（公元前 4 世纪晚期至公元前 2 世纪），我们对西南亚许多地区当地日常农牧业管理策略的了解仍然是推测性的。在这项研究中，我们使用植硅体、粪便球晶和傅里叶变换红外 (FTIR) 光谱来识别和检查来自位于伊拉克库尔德地区的公元前 2000 年中叶的卡西特遗址 Khani Masi 的富含粪便的沉积物。虽然微残留和地球化学方法尚未在美索不达米亚（古伊拉克）得到广泛应用，它们有可能揭示支持其青铜时代城市、州和帝国的生产系统。我们的目的是调查 (1) 当地牧区管理策略的范围，(2) 农业和牧区实践之间的整合程度，以及 (3) 与当地生态、季节性、环境变化和连续性相关的信号的存在.

植硅体结果表明，绵羊群主要在野草上自由放牧。野草花序的主导地位，一个潜在的强烈季节性指标，可能表明跨人类的畜牧业。然而，进一步的证据，包括偶尔用谷壳作为饲料、多种作物类型以及场地内大量燃烧的粪便，共同表明当地农牧民生计经济密切相关。这项研究为美索不达米亚地区植硅体研究的未来应用提供了急需的经验植物数据以及富有成效的见解，并为公元前第二个千年卡西特时期扎格罗斯山麓的农牧实践提供了新的思路。