The biocultural origins and dispersal of domestic chickens

Abstract

Though chickens are the most numerous and ubiquitous domestic bird, their origins, the circumstances of their initial association with people, and the routes along which they dispersed across the world remain controversial. In order to establish a robust spatial and temporal framework for their origins and dispersal, we assessed archaeological occurrences and the domestic status of chickens from ∼600 sites in 89 countries by combining zoogeographic, morphological, osteometric, stratigraphic, contextual, iconographic, and textual data. Our results suggest that the first unambiguous domestic chicken bones are found at Neolithic Ban Non Wat in central Thailand dated to ∼1650 to 1250 BCE, and that chickens were not domesticated in the Indian Subcontinent. Chickens did not arrive in Central China, South Asia, or Mesopotamia until the late second millennium BCE, and in Ethiopia and Mediterranean Europe by ∼800 BCE. To investigate the circumstances of their initial domestication, we correlated the temporal spread of rice and millet cultivation with the first appearance of chickens within the range of red junglefowl species. Our results suggest that agricultural practices focused on the production and storage of cereal staples served to draw arboreal red junglefowl into the human niche. Thus, the arrival of rice agriculture may have first facilitated the initiation of the chicken domestication process, and then, following their integration within human communities, allowed for their dispersal across the globe.

Redefining the timing and circumstances of the chicken's introduction to Europe and north-west Africa

“…This is a similar timeframe to their arrival on the Balearic Islands, where a chicken bone has been directly dated to the eighth to sixth century BC (Ramis et al 2017). It seems likely that chickens were transported throughout the Mediterranean along routes ecologically suited to these thermophilic birds (Pitt et al 2016), probably via early Greek, Etruscan and Phoenician maritime trade (Peters et al 2022).…”

“…A directly dated chicken skeleton from the Czech Republic (Kyselý 2010), along with zooarchaeological and iconographic data from Bulgaria, indicate their arrival in Central Europe in the sixth to fifth centuries BC (Boev 1995). Chickens were also introduced into France and southern Britain by the sixth to fifth centuries BC (Kitch 2006;Peters et al 2022).…”

“…Globally, the first convincing evidence for close relationships between humans and chickens comes from complete skeletons placed alongside Bronze Age human burials in Thailand (e.g. Ban Non Wat, c. 800 BC) and China (Dasikongcun royal cemetery, 1320-1046 BC) (Peters et al 2022). The same applies to Italy, where the earliest identified chicken is from a tenth to ninth-century BC tomb (Corbino et al 2022), with other possible eighth-century examples (see OSM) (De Grossi Mazzorin & Minniti 2019; Trentacoste 2020), although, crucially, none of these have been directly dated.…”

“…In addition to those dated from Weston Down (CKN8) and Houghton Down (CKN9) in Britain, articulated chicken remains have been recovered from Iron Age sites across Europe (e.g. Peters et al 2022). For the Czech Republic, Kyselý (2010) reported an adult cockerel skeleton from Rubín that is radiocarbon dated to 2380 ±30 BP (542-393 cal BC, at 93.9% confidence).…”

“…West and Zhou's (1988) work continues to be cited frequently, although several recent studies have questioned the validity of the evidence it presents (e.g. Eda et al 2016;Peters et al 2016;Huang et al 2018;Peters et al 2022). Based on comprehensive zooarchaeological re-analyses and ecological modelling, these publications argue that chickens could not have been domesticated in the seventh millennium BC, and that the third millennium BC is more probable.…”