Early indicators to C4 plant consumption in central Kazakhstan during the Final Bronze Age and Early Iron Age based on stable isotope analysis of human and animal bone collagen

Ananyevskaya, Elina; Aytqaly, A.K.; Бейсенов, Арман; Dmitriev, Evgeniy; Garbaras, Andrius; Kukushkin, I. A.; Loman, Valeriy; Šapolaitė, Justina; Usmanova, Emma; Varfolomeev, V.V.; Voyakin, Dmitryi; Zhuniskhanov, Aidyn; Matuzevičiūtė, Giedrė Motuzaitė

doi:10.1016/j.ara.2017.12.002

Cited by 39 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Populations of the Late Bronze Age, Late Iron Age, and the Middle Ages from the Minusinsk Basin and southern Kazakhstan, with a mixed diet consisting of terrestrial animals, C 3 plants, and millet, have higher δ 13 C values of ca. –17 ÷ –15‰ (Motuzaite Matuzeviciute et al 2015; Svyatko et al 2017b; Ananyevskaya et al 2018). Abundant information on the stable isotopes of a millet-based diet in mainland China (e.g.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Paleodietary Patterns of the Cherepakha 13 Site Population (Early Iron Age) in Primorye (Maritime) Province, Russian Far East, based on Stable Isotope Analysis

et al. 2018

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New paleodietary data were obtained after the discovery and excavation in 2015-2017 of the Cherepakha 13 site in the southern part of Primorye (Maritime) Province in far eastern Russia. The site is located near the coast of Ussuri Bay (Sea of Japan) and belongs to the Yankovsky cultural complex of the Early Iron Age 14 C-dated to ca. 3000 BP (ca. 1200 cal BC). The stable isotope composition of the bone collagen for 11 humans and 30 animals was determined. For humans, the following values (with ±1 sigma) were yielded: δ 13 C =-10.2 ± 0.8‰; and δ 15 N = +12.4 ± 0.3‰. The majority of terrestrial animals show the usual isotopic signals: δ 13 C =-19.4 ÷ -23.3‰; and δ 15 N = + 4.6 ÷ +6.6‰ (for wolves, up to +10.1‰); dogs, however, have an isotopic composition similar to humans: δ 13 C = -11.7 ± 1.2‰; and δ 15 N = +12.4 ± 0.4‰. Marine mammals have common values for pinnipeds: δ 13 C = -13.7 ÷ -14.6‰; and δ 15 N = +17.4 ÷ +18.0‰. The main food resources for the population of Cherepakha 13 site were (1) marine mollusks, fish, and mammals; and (2) terrestrial mammals; and possibly C 4 plants (domesticated millets).

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Paleodietary Patterns of the Cherepakha 13 Site Population (Early Iron Age) in Primorye (Maritime) Province, Russian Far East, based on Stable Isotope Analysis

et al. 2018

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“…Ecologically rich areas like the Minusinsk Basin have groups exhibiting high levels of millet consumption during the mid-second millennium BC (Murphy et al 2013;Svyatko et al 2013). What is most astonishing is that, even in the most arid parts of central Kazakhstan, by the second half of the second millennium BC, people appear to have been consuming millet (Ananyevskaya et al 2018). By the midfirst millennium BC, most populations across Eurasia were consuming significant levels of millet (fig.…”

Section: Isotope Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Imagined Past?

Spengler

Miller

Schmaus³

et al. 2021

Current Anthropology

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Nomads, or highly specialized mobile pastoralists, are prominent features in Central Asian archaeology, and they are often depicted in direct conflict with neighboring sedentary peoples. However, new archaeological findings are showing that the people who many scholars have called nomads engaged in a mixed economic system of farming and herding. Additionally, not all of these peoples were as mobile as previously assumed, and current data suggest that a portion of these purported mobile populations remained sedentary for much or all of the year, with localized ecological factors directing economic choices. In this article, we pull together nine complementary lines of evidence from the second through the first millennia BC to illustrate that in eastern Central Asia, a complex economy existed. While many scholars working in Eurasian archaeology now acknowledge how dynamic paleoeconomies were, broader arguments are still tied into assumptions regarding specialized economies. The formation of empires or polities, changes in social orders, greater political hierarchy, craft specialization-notably, advanced metallurgy-mobility and migration, social relations, and exchange have all been central to the often circular arguments made concerning so-called nomads in ancient Central Asia. The new interpretations of mixed and complex economies more effectively situate Central Asia into a broader global study of food production and social complexity.

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“…Aggregated populations had economies based on pastoral products such as meat and milk from sheep and goats (Outram and Kasparov, 2007;Outram et al, 2012;Haruda, 2018). Human diets were supplemented by low levels of millet consumption (Ananyevskaya et al, 2018) suggesting that groups engaged in limited cultivation or agricultural production; although this has not been proven definitively through recovery of archeobotanical remains.…”

Section: Foddering and Water Management In The Semi-arid Steppe During The Final Bronze Agementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Human modification of landscapes to increase growth of crops or pasture in the steppe is an important way to facilitate resilient economies, necessary when population density is high, as in the Final Bronze Age across Saryarka. As the consumption of domesticated crops was relatively minimal during this period (Ananyevskaya et al, 2018), the alteration of waterways increased the productivity of rangelands and cultivated fields. Sheep at Kent were closely managed, with evidence that they were foddered during the winter with grasses cut at the end of the summer months (Ventresca Miller et al, 2020).…”

Section: Foddering and Water Management In The Semi-arid Steppe During The Final Bronze Agementioning

confidence: 99%

Ecosystem Engineering Among Ancient Pastoralists in Northern Central Asia

et al. 2020

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Ecosystem engineering is an innovative concept that recognizes that organisms impact their environment, and that these changes can be detected over time. Thus, additional datasets from the ecological longue durée are necessary, specifically in response to the onset of the Anthropocene and the impacts of humans and their commensal organisms upon ecologies of all scales. For example, the management and herding of domesticated animals are recognized as having dramatic implications for soil stability, vegetation coverage, and even atmospheric composition the world over. Yet, the point at which pastoralism became a recognizable factor in altering earth systems, with large-scale environmental ramifications, is poorly understood. Here, we respond to this by reviewing and presenting data from the archeological and paleoenvironmental record across northern Central Asia in order to assess broader ecosystem impacts of pastoralism, from time periods when this economic pattern was a relatively novel component of local ecologies and involved limited population densities, through to periods in which it became intensive, coincident with agriculture, and linked to increased sedentism. Probing diverse, published analytical datasets and case studies, we examine pastoral adaptations and environmental impacts, highlighting a region where tensions surrounding resilience and sustainability of pastoralism have peaked in modern times. We draw upon these findings to examine the challenges faced by pastoralists today, and the ways in which archeological data might inform on management decisions into the future.

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Early indicators to C4 plant consumption in central Kazakhstan during the Final Bronze Age and Early Iron Age based on stable isotope analysis of human and animal bone collagen

Cited by 39 publications

References 32 publications

Paleodietary Patterns of the Cherepakha 13 Site Population (Early Iron Age) in Primorye (Maritime) Province, Russian Far East, based on Stable Isotope Analysis

Paleodietary Patterns of the Cherepakha 13 Site Population (Early Iron Age) in Primorye (Maritime) Province, Russian Far East, based on Stable Isotope Analysis

An Imagined Past?

Ecosystem Engineering Among Ancient Pastoralists in Northern Central Asia

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