This paper presents the results from archaeobotanical remains collected from ten medieval settlements and fort sites in the region of present-day Slavonia, Croatia. From the 12th century ad, Slavonia was part of the Kingdom of Hungary, although the region benefited from a certain amount of autonomy. Examining the archaeobotanical data from this period shows a diverse agricultural system, where crop

We present a species distribution model (SDM) of Fagopyrum esculentum (buckwheat) in China using present distribution data and estimates for the past based on palaeoclimatic reconstructions. Our model estimates the potential area suitable for buckwheat cultivation over the last 8,000 years, with northeast China consistently showing the highest suitability, providing insights on the discrepancy between

Although the Xinzhai period (1850–1750 cal bce) has been widely regarded as a critical time for the development of urbanization in China, little is known about the labour and social organization of the time. In this paper, archaeobotanical assemblages have been used to explore evidence of crop processing and they have provided further insights into the organization of labour and society at the Xinzhai

Non-pollen palynomorphs (NPPs) form a large group of biological objects found in palynological slides besides pollen grains. This includes various remains of algae and fungi, shells, resting stages and eggs of invertebrates, among others. Publications of NPP-types started in the 1970s with studies of BvG and colleagues, and large numbers of new types continue to be published every year. For an overview

This paper reconstructs the vegetation history of the Lake Pueyrredón area during the Holocene and contextualizes the use of space and resources by hunter-gatherer groups according to palaeoenvironmental evolution. The pollen analysis of the Los Flamencos lake sequence is presented and integrated with local archaeological pollen data. Early Holocene vegetation consisted of a dwarf-shrub-grass steppe

Eleusine coracana (finger millet) is a nutritious and easily storable grain that can be grown in unfavourable environments and is important to the food security of millions of farmers in Africa and South Asia. Despite its importance and promise as a sustainable crop for smallholders in the Global South, its history remains poorly understood. Eleusine coracana has only rarely been recovered from archaeological

The East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) significantly influences the precipitation and vegetation dynamics in that region. Previous studies have assessed the spatial and temporal dynamics of the EASM, however vegetation responses to Holocene climate change and their driving mechanisms are yet to be understood. In this study, our multi-proxy records from southeast China are used to better understand Holocene

Agricultural economies of the Hellenistic era (323–30 bce) are poorly understood from primary plant and animal remains despite the extent of sites and rich historical records dating to this period. Here we present archaeobotanical remains from Hellenistic Ashkelon, an urban centre on the Mediterranean coast of the southern Levant, in comparison with a survey of the extant literature on Hellenistic

This article presents some major aspects of environmental resource management by the Guaraní indigenous people in southern Brazil and the Río de La Plata basin. Drawing upon a broad interdisciplinary database from various authors since the 16th century AD, we suggest that the Guaraní passed down a system of knowledge about their particular way of life through many generations, which had begun in the

The ad 79 eruption of the Vesuvius severely affected the floodplain surrounding the ancient city of Pompeii, i.e. the Sarno River floodplain. The landscape was covered with volcaniclastic materials that destroyed the ecosystem but, at the same time, preserved the traces of former environmental conditions. This study provides—for the first time—a pollen sequence reconstructing the environmental evolution

Observing natural vegetation dynamics over the entire Holocene is difficult in Central Europe, due to pervasive and increasing human disturbance since the Neolithic. One strategy to minimize this limitation is to select a study site in an area that is marginal for agricultural activity. Here, we present a new sediment record from Lake Svityaz in northwestern Ukraine. We have reconstructed regional

Pollen and plant macrofossils are often well-preserved in coastal sediments, providing a palaeoenvironmental record of sea-level and landscape change. In this study, we examine the pollen and plant macrofossil assemblages of a well-dated saltmarsh sediment core from southwest Newfoundland, Canada, to establish recent coastal vegetation and land use change, to increase the knowledge of anthropogenic

Grape (Vitis vinifera L. ssp. vinifera) has been identified as part of the Indus Civilization crop assemblage. As a non-native crop, with a wild ancestor that does not grow in the region, its presence in northern South Asia ca. 3200–1300 bc has thus been used to argue variously as evidence for crop diffusion, long distance trade, and the adoption of foreign agricultural strategies and foodways. Grape

The present study concerns the Phoenician-Punic site of Motya, a small island set in Western Sicily (Italy), in the Marsala Lagoon (Stagnone di Marsala), between Trapani and Marsala. A big disposal pit, datable to between the first half of the 8th and the mid-6th century bc, was identified in Area D. This context was sampled for plant macro-remains through bucket flotation. Palynological treatment

An international research project (FWF I-1693) recently finished investigating archaeological sites in the hinterland of the lake pile dwelling sites of Mondsee and Attersee in Oberösterreich (Upper Austria), with the goal of reconstructing the spatial networks of Copper Age (agri-)cultural landscapes and human-environmental interactions in the region. Charred plant macroremains from the two hinterland

Quantitative estimates of past vegetation cover are needed both regionally so human-landscape interactions can be better understood, and globally to evaluate the effects of changing vegetation cover on the climate system. Models reducing the bias in the pollen representation of vegetation cover have been developed in the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere, while experience applying them in

The grazing lands of the High Atlas are vulnerable to climate change and the decline of traditional management practices. However, prior to the mid-20th century, there is little information to examine historical environmental change and resilience to past climate variability. Here, we present a new pollen, non-pollen palynomorph (NPP) and microcharcoal record from a sub-alpine marsh (pozzine) at Oukaïmeden

Due to the complex relationship between pollen and vegetation, it is not yet clear how pollen diagrams may be interpreted with respect to changes in floristic diversity and only a few studies have hitherto investigated this problem. We compare pollen assemblages from moss samples in two southeastern European forests with the surrounding vegetation to investigate (a) their compositional similarity,

A correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-021-00835-0

The taxonomic resolution of palynological identification is determined by morphological criteria that are used to define pollen types. Different levels of taxonomic resolution are reached in palynology, depending on several factors such as the analyst’s expertise, the palynological school, the aim of the study, the preservation of the pollen grains, the reference collections and the microscope facilities

Archaeobotanical analyses together with historical records can provide unique information about the cargoes and histories of sunken ships, which are found as wrecks at the bottom of the seas all over the world. An interdisciplinary research project was undertaken on the Vrouw Maria (Lady Mary), a Dutch wooden two-masted merchant ship that sank on October 9th in 1771 in the Finnish Baltic Sea. She rested

This paper presents the first archaeobotanical results on plant macroremains other than charcoal from the Early and Middle Epipalaeolithic site of Kharaneh IV in the Azraq basin, one of the largest Epipalaeolithic sites in the southern Levant and one of the few with evidence for multiple phases of occupation. The analysis of the substantial archaeobotanical assemblage from the site provides new insights

Fire is inextricably linked to the vegetation that provides the fuel load. For palaeofire records to contribute meaningfully to the reconstruction of past landscape fire history, it is helpful to identify the vegetation that has been burnt, for example, grassy versus woody vegetation in tropical savannas. The morphological characteristics of charcoal particles can provide useful information on source

Knowledge about the vegetation history of Sardinia, the second largest island of the Mediterranean, is scanty. Here, we present a new sedimentary record covering the past ~ 8,000 years from Lago di Baratz, north-west Sardinia. Vegetation and fire history are reconstructed by pollen, spores, macrofossils and charcoal analyses and environmental dynamics by high-resolution element geochemistry together

The El Tigre archaeological site (39°46′49″ S; 62°22′32″ W) is located in the south of Provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina, on an ancient delta of the Río Colorado. Its sedimentary sequence shows periods of landscape stability and soil formation processes during the period ca. 1,000–400 years bp. The aim of this paper is to investigate the evolutionary history of the vegetation in order to understand

We present here the first comprehensive archaeobotanical investigation from the prehistoric farming settlement of Chap I (1065–825 cal bce), located in a high altitude valley in the central Tien Shan mountains, Kyrgyzstan. A total of 40,651 plant remains (seeds, chaff and other plant parts) have been identified, making this archaeobotanical study the first of its kind from Kyrgyzstan to enable a wider

Several hundred archaeobotanical studies now provide a broad overview of plant husbandry practices in northern France from the Bronze Age to the medieval period. Some unknowns nevertheless remain concerning the species considered as possible minor crops. They often have an ambiguous status, which deserves a closer examination in order to specify their possible cultivation and uses. This is the case

Shielings are the historically known form of transhumance in Scandinavia, where livestock were moved from the farmstead to sites in the outlands for summer grazing. Pollen analysis has provided a valuable insight into the history of shielings. This paper presents a vegetation reconstruction and archaeological survey from the shieling Kårebolssätern in northern Värmland, western Sweden, a renovated

The Tigray region in Ethiopia witnessed the rise and fall of the Pre-Aksumite and Aksumite communities between the mid 2nd millennium bce and the late 1st millennium ce. Despite the importance of these entities in recent African prehistory, the issue of how they interacted with their surrounding environment has only been addressed very recently. Here, we present the first systematic anthracological

Plant-based artefacts are rarely preserved in archaeological contexts in the Iberian Peninsula. Very few sites with specific conditions such as waterlogging, aridity or carbonization have preserved organic material. The aim of this paper is to establish an identification criterion for identifying organic raw materials used for manufacturing plant-based artifacts by using optical microscopy. The coiled

Potential Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, 26,500–15,000 bp) members of the Eastern Beringia (now Alaska-Yukon, northwest North America) vascular flora were recognized based on their contemporary co-occurrence in easternmost Siberia (formerly part of Western Beringia). Of 1,633 indigenous terrestrial Alaska-Yukon taxa, 835 also occur in easternmost Siberia, including 526 arctic/alpine and 90 subarctic taxa

In this paper we present the analysis of archaeobotanical material retrieved by means of flotation from well-secured features during recent excavation work carried out in 2019 and 2020 by the German-Israeli Tell Iẓṭabba Excavation Project in the Seleucid-founded town of Nysa-Scythopolis. Founded under Antiochus IV Epiphanes (175–164 bce) and destroyed by the Hasmonaeans in the later years of John Hyrcanus

The so-called Triticoid-type grains are known from several prehistoric sites in southwest Asia and their identification has long been unclear. They resemble the grains of wheats and researchers suggested they may represent an extinct Triticeae species, possibly closely related to wild crop progenitors. In this study we identify the Triticoid-type grains as Heteranthelium piliferum (Banks & Sol.) Hochst

The aim of this paper is to present recent advances in the microbotanical analyses of an organic residue on a potsherd from a late Holocene hunter-gatherer site in Argentine Patagonia, which is the first evidence of this kind for the processing of starchy food. Standard methods were carried out for starch grain recovery and morphometric analysis, care being taken in the prevention of cross-contamination

Analysis of plant remains of 73 taxa obtained from the graveyard of the Haihun Marquis (circa 59 bc) at Nanchang, China, is presented. Chronology was confirmed by direct AMS radiocarbon dating of both a seed and wood, while plant seeds were collected by wet sieving. Detailed composition of the samples suggests that the fundamental landscape of the graveyard was composed of Platycladus orientalis, a

Pistacia spp. remains are common finds among archaeobotanical assemblages in prehistoric sites in Southwest Asia, both in the form of endocarps and charcoal remains. However, in the absence of a systematic study of the fruit morphology, the archaeobotanical remains of Pistacia cannot be identified to the species level and this deprives us of important information on their past geographical distribution

European land-use indicators in North America typically include pollen from Poaceae (grasses), Ambrosia (ragweed), Rumex (dock), and/or Plantago (plantain). A potential complement to this list is Fabaceae (legumes), members of which were introduced by colonists to eastern North America. Historical records show that Trifolium (clover) was widespread from the earliest days of colonization, and several

Paleoethnobotanical assemblages from the Northwestern region of North America often yield geophyte subterranean organs, but these carbonized remains are difficult to identify to species or genus level. We examine 11 species (8 genera) of the most ethnographically prevalent Northwest geophyte foods for macro- and micro-morphologic geophyte features, with a focus on bulbs from the Asparagales and Liliales

A system of farming with an alternation of land use between being cultivated or left fallow as grassland (Feldgraswirtschaft) developed in southwestern Germany since the Bronze Age. It involved fallow periods, where the arable land is left without crops in order to let it recover its fertility for several years while becoming grassland. This led to regeneration of the topsoil humus, which could later

Burnt offering sites reflect the physical and spiritual aspects of human life in the inner Alps during the Bronze and Iron Ages. Burnt offerings were made in ceremonies with various parts including fire rites, from which the carbonised macro-remains testify to a significant use of plants. The individual finds and records provide information about diet, firewood supply, economic and social behaviour

New plant macrofossil studies in northwestern France enable a better insight into agriculture through the Bronze and Iron Age. Most of the previous analyses, carried out in Calvados (Normandy) on Late Iron Age dwellings, suggested distinctive characteristics such as the increase of Avena (oat) and the abundance of pulses in storage pits. The collection of a new database with 25 sites was done in response

The amount and strength of archaeobotanical and archaeological data available for the territory of the Plain of Troyes, in Champagne (north-eastern France), make it possible to write a local history of domestic plants. The story begins with the arrival of the early Neolithic farmers (5200 bc), introducing agriculture with the first staple crops, the hulled wheats emmer and einkorn, pea, lentil, and

Past vegetation, fire, and climate dynamics, as well as human impact, have been reconstructed for the first time in the highlands of the Gilan province in the Alborz mountains (above the Hyrcanian forest) for the last 4,300 cal yrs bp. Multi-proxy analysis, including pollen, spores, non-pollen palynomorphs, charcoal, and geochemical analysis, has been applied to investigate the environmental changes

This study presents the results of a palynological investigation on a sediment core from the seasonal and saline Lake Maharlou in the Zagros Mountains in southwest Iran. We emphasised studying the role of man in modifying the vegetation of the area and the dominant agricultural practices during the Imperial Persia period (2,500–1,299 cal bp; 550 bc-ad 651), particularly the Achaemenid Empire (2,500–2

A key question in archaeobotany concerns the role of herbivore dung in contributing plant remains to archaeobotanical assemblages. This issue has been discussed for at least 40 years and has motivated several archaeobotanical studies on identifying dung-derived deposition of plant remains. Meanwhile, microarchaeological methods have developed and continue to be developed for detecting dung in archaeological

Understanding the significance of pollen diversity is key to reconstructing plant diversity over long timescales. Here we present quantitative pollen-plant diversity comparisons for a mountainous area of the Western Mediterranean region. Samples were collected between 430–1,865 m elevation and pollen-plant diversity assessed through richness and turnover (beta-diversity) metrics. We found statistically

Little is known about the prehistoric domestication and cultivation of crops in the Eastern Himalayas (eastern Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh), due to a lack of archaeological and archaeobotanical research in the area. This paper reconstructs the lexical terminology for grains in the East Bodish language sub-family in Eastern Bhutan. Historical linguistic methods suggest that the immediate

Cores and trenches drilled or dug in religious and secular buildings in the hilltop town of Bergamo (northern Italy) were investigated by means of micro/macrobotanical and pedochemical analysis to unravel the cultural vegetation history of the area during ca. seven centuries across the Bronze—Iron Ages. We explore the predictive power of biological proxies, nutrients, and coupled 14C datings to reveal

Studies of the origins of agriculture in the Near East have revealed that the eight plant species known as “Founder Crops”, i.e. emmer, einkorn, barley, lentils, peas, chickpeas, bitter vetch and flax, derived from annual self-pollinating wild predecessors, were all domesticated in roughly the same period. Recent research however has prompted new debate on whether there are really only eight “Founder

This paper outlines a model for the domestication of Panicum miliaceum (broomcorn millet) in Northern China. Data from 43 archaeological sites indicate a continuous increase in average grain size between 6000 and 3300 bc. After this date there is a divergence, with grain size continuing to increase in some populations, while others show no further size increase. The initial increase in grain size is

Multi-proxy analysis of the coprolites which were found during excavations at two Late Neolithic (fourth millennium bc) pile-dwelling sites (Črnelnik and Stare gmajne) in Slovenia yielded some new insights into human–dog relations and behaviour. The digested content is presented in a multidisciplinary approach, in which palynological, palaeoparasitological, archaeobotanical and archaeozoological features

The Near East and the Caucasus are commonly regarded as the original domestication centres of Vitis vinifera (grapevine), and the region continues to be home to a high diversity of wild and cultivated grapevines, particularly within Georgia. The earliest chemical evidence for wine making was recorded in Georgian Neolithic sites (6000–5800 bc) and grape pips, possibly of the domesticated morphotype

This study applied size and shape analyses through traditional and geometric morphometrics to quantify the differences between three taxa: Lathyrus sativus (grass pea), Lens culinaris (lentil) and Vicia faba (broad bean). This analysis represents a pilot study in view of a wider future application of this technique to identify the role of legumes throughout the Western Mediterranean in the Bronze and

The mountain foothills of inner Asia have served as a corridor of communication and exchange for at least five millennia, using historically documented trade routes such as the Silk Road and the Tea-Horse Road. Recent research has illustrated the important role that this mountain corridor played in the dispersal of crops and farming technology between northeast and southwest Asia 5,000 to 1,000 years

Besides natural climate variations, human activities can also cause significant changes in regional vegetation composition, especially during the late Holocene period. Southwest China has experienced a long history of human activities in terms of deforestation and agricultural development. Here we present a continuous fossil pollen record covering the past 2,100 years from Beihai Wetland in western

Previous reviews of Middle Neolithic agricultural practice (4400–3500 cal bc) in southern France have highlighted a change in crop assemblages after 4000 cal bc, with a reduction of naked wheat and an increase of emmer and partly of einkorn. The recent investigation of three wells from the site of Les Bagnoles (4250–3800 cal bc) in the periphery of the southern Rhône valley yielded an unprecedented

Understanding about regional versus local changes in vegetation is critical in answering archaeological questions, in particular at a time when humans are assumed to have caused higher disturbances at local scales rather than regional scales; this is the case during the Neolithic. The aim of this paper is to assess the impact of Neolithic land use on regional and local vegetation dynamics, plant composition

The online Archaeobotanical Literature Database (ArchbotLit) is an important tool for getting targeted access to archaeobotanical publications. It offers the opportunity for archaeobotanists, archaeologists, freelancers, students and an interested public to easily obtain information about cultivated plants and their development. In addition it increases the visibility of archaeobotanical studies beyond

We used pollen, plant macrofossil, and charcoal records to investigate local long-term timberline shifts and changes in vegetation composition in relation to fire activity at the modern upper forest limit (ca. 2,000 m a.s.l.) in the Mont Bégo area, Maritime Alps of France and Italy. The area is an important place for Alpine archaeology because it has thousands rock-art carvings whose age cannot be