Identification of archaeobotanical Pistacia L. fruit remains: implications for our knowledge on past distribution and use in prehistoric Cyprus

Rousou, Maria; Andréa, Parés; Douché, Carolyne; Ergun, Müge; Tengberg, Margareta

doi:10.1007/s00334-020-00812-z

Cited by 7 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…The plant remains collected from both the heavy and the light fractions were sent to the archaeobotanical laboratory at the University of Tübingen for study. Plant remains were identified using an Euromex stereo microscope with up to 30× magnification using the Senckenberg seed reference collection available there (with roughly 20,000 seed taxa), various identification keys, recently published archaeobotanical research, seed catalogues and floras (for example, Post 1980;Jacomet 2006;Kislev et al 2006;2009a;Nesbitt 2009;Neef et al 2012;Danin and Fragman 2016;Rousou et al 2021). In a few cases, where the light fraction (0.2 mm) was larger than 200 ml, a riffle type sample splitter was used to produce sub-samples of one half or less (for Area S: L.1187, L.1122; Area P: L.2049).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agricultural resources in the Bronze Age city of Tel Lachish

Nicoli’

Riehl

Webster

et al. 2022

Veget Hist Archaeobot

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In this paper, we present the results of the plant macrofossil analyses from the site of Tel Lachish, Israel with focus on the botanical assemblage of the Middle and Late Bronze Age layers collected in two different areas of the tell: Area S, a trench on the western edge of the site, whose samples belong to Late Bronze Age deposits, and Area P, the palace area on the top of the mound with samples ranging from the Middle to Late Bronze Age. Systematic sampling of these areas and analysis of the remains have extended our knowledge of the agricultural resources of one of the most influential Late Bronze Age cities in the southern Levant. Multivariate statistics have been applied to gain insight into regional patterns of crop growing. Fruit crops account for the majority of the identified remains from this site, which also included large quantities of Hordeum vulgare (barley) and Triticum dicoccum (emmer wheat) grains. The virtual lack of chaff remains is not solely a matter of preservation, since the Late Bronze Age assemblage preserved fragile small seeds. Rather, this finding suggests that cereal processing took place some distance from the area of deposition. Overall high diversity, ubiquity and proportions of fruit crops indicate that these played a fundamental role in their cultivation and probably also in cultural life at Lachish throughout the 15th–12th centuries bce.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agricultural resources in the Bronze Age city of Tel Lachish

Nicoli’

Riehl

Webster

et al. 2022

Veget Hist Archaeobot

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“…Areas with a high-water table are worse for pistachio cultivation. There are numerous recommendations for soil requirements, see for more details [14], and experts suggest that one of the most important variables in pistachio production [14][15][16] is a hot and long summer (25)(26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35) • C), with low humidity. P. vera rootstocks express sensitivity to specific climatic and environmental conditions and have varying levels of tolerance to fungus.…”

Section: Botany and Ecologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although wild pistachio drupes are smaller than domesticated ones [8], it is impossible to confidently differentiate individual specimens of the morphotypes, due to the wide reaction norm of developmental plasticity in the species. Even nuts collected from the same tree may vary considerably in shape and size, one recent morphological study showed that domesticated pistachio endocarps range from 9.91 to 19.15 mm in length and between 6.54-11.65 mm in width [31]. Talebi and colleagues [32] linked a high level of genetic diversity among P. vera to the different geographic distribution zones of analyzed accessions.…”

Section: Domesticationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Pistachio (Pistacia vera L.) Domestication and Dispersal Out of Central Asia

et al. 2022

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The pistachio (Pistacia vera L.) is commercially cultivated in semi-arid regions around the globe. Archaeobotanical, genetic, and linguistic data suggest that the pistachio was brought under cultivation somewhere within its wild range, spanning southern Central Asia, northern Iran, and northern Afghanistan. Historically, pistachio cultivation has primarily relied on grafting, suggesting that, as with many Eurasian tree crops, domestication resulted from genetically locking hybrids or favored individuals in place. Plant domestication and dispersal research has largely focused on weedy, highly adaptable, self-compatible annuals; in this discussion, we present a case study that involves a dioecious long-lived perennial—a domestication process that would have required a completely different traditional ecological knowledge system than that utilized for grain cultivation. We argue that the pistachio was brought under cultivation in southern Central Asia, spreading westward by at least 2000 years ago (maybe a few centuries earlier to the mountains of modern Syria) and moved eastward only at the end of the first millennium AD. The seeds remain rare in archaeological sites outside its native range, even into the mid-second millennium AD, and may not have been widely cultivated until the past few hundred years.

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Revisiting the concept of the ‘Neolithic Founder Crops’ in southwest Asia

Arranz‐Otaegui

Roe

2023

Veget Hist Archaeobot

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Zohary and Hopf coined the term ‘founder crops’ to refer to a specific group of eight plants, namely three cereals (einkorn, emmer and barley), four legumes (lentil, pea, bitter vetch and chickpea), and a fibre/oil crop (flax), that founded early Neolithic agriculture in southwest Asia. Zohary considered these taxa as the first cultivated and domesticated species, as well as those that agricultural communities exploited and eventually spread to Europe and other regions. As a result, these eight species soon become the hallmark of the Neolithic plant-based subsistence. However, the ‘founder crops’ concept was defined at the end of the 1980s, when the development of agriculture was considered a rapid event, and therefore, terms like domestication, agriculture and plant cultivation were used interchangeably in the literature. The aim of this paper is thus to revisit concept of the ‘Neolithic founder crops’. Through a critical review of the archaeobotanical evidence gathered in the last 40 years, we evaluate the relative contribution of the ‘eight founder crop’ species to the plant-based subsistence across different periods of the southwest Asian Neolithic. We conclude that multiple groups of ‘founder’ species could be defined depending on whether one seeks to represent the most exploited plants of the Neolithic period, the first cultivated and domesticated crops, or the species that agricultural communities cultivated and eventually spread to Europe. Improved understanding of Neolithic plant-based subsistence in general, and agriculture in particular, will be attained by moving beyond conventional narratives and exploring the evolutionary history of plants other than the original ‘founder’ species.

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Identification of archaeobotanical Pistacia L. fruit remains: implications for our knowledge on past distribution and use in prehistoric Cyprus

Cited by 7 publications

References 24 publications

Agricultural resources in the Bronze Age city of Tel Lachish

Agricultural resources in the Bronze Age city of Tel Lachish

Pistachio (Pistacia vera L.) Domestication and Dispersal Out of Central Asia

Revisiting the concept of the ‘Neolithic Founder Crops’ in southwest Asia

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