Aim: Domestic animals first appeared in the archaeological record in northern Africa c. 9000 years before present and subsequently spread southwards throughout the continent. This geographic expansion is well studied and can broadly be explained in terms of the movement of pastoralist populations due to climate change. However, no studies have explicitly evaluated changes in the climatic niche of these domesticates. A priori, one cannot assume a relationship between the geographic spread of animal production and changes in climatic niche breadth because their relationship is highly variable. Therefore, we investigated Holocene changes in the climatic niche of domestic animals (animal production) and compared these to changes in the climatic niche of hunted terrestrial ungulates. Location: The African continent. Time period: 9000–500 BP. Major taxa studied: Domestic animals, hunted (wild) terrestrial ungulates. Methods: For the first time, we applied methods from environmental niche dynamics to archaeological data to reconstruct and quantify changes in the climatic niche breadth of animal production during the African Holocene. We used faunal remains from archaeological assemblages and associated radiocarbon dates to estimate the proportion of the African climate space used for animal production and hunting at 500‐year intervals. Results: We found that the climatic niche of domestic species broadened significantly with the geographic spread, most notably during the termination of the African Humid Period, whilst no such broadening occurred for the climatic niche of hunted species. Main conclusions: Our results provide a quantitative measure of the extent to which humans have constructed and adapted the climatic niche of animal production to manage their domestic animals across increasingly diverse ecological conditions. By incorporating ecological analysis into estimations of past land use, our methods have the potential to improve reconstructions of land use change, and to provide a foundation on which further niche construction hypotheses may be tested.

中文翻译：

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重建非洲全新世动物生产用地气候生态位广度

目的：家畜首次出现在北非的考古记录中 c．距今 9000 年，随后向南传播到整个大陆。这种地理扩张得到了很好的研究，可以从气候变化导致的牧民人口移动方面进行广泛的解释。然而，没有研究明确评估这些驯化动物的气候生态位的变化。先验地，人们不能假设动物生产的地理分布与气候生态位宽度的变化之间存在关系，因为它们的关系是高度可变的。因此，我们调查了家畜（动物生产）气候生态位的全新世变化，并将这些变化与被猎杀的陆生有蹄类动物的气候生态位的变化进行了比较。地点：非洲大陆。时间段：9000–500 BP。研究的主要分类群：家畜、猎杀的（野生）陆生有蹄类动物。方法：我们第一次应用从环境生态位动力学到考古数据的方法来重建和量化非洲全新世期间动物生产的气候生态位宽度的变化。我们使用考古组合中的动物遗骸和相关的放射性碳日期来估计以 500 年为间隔用于动物生产和狩猎的非洲气候空间的比例。结果：我们发现家养物种的气候生态位随着地理分布显着扩大，最显着的是在非洲湿润期结束时，而猎杀物种的气候生态位没有发生这种扩大。主要结论：我们的结果提供了人类构建和适应动物生产的气候生态位以在日益多样化的生态条件下管理家畜的程度的定量测量。通过将生态分析纳入对过去土地利用的估计，我们的方法有可能改善土地利用变化的重建，并为进一步检验生态位建设假设提供基础。