Domestication of Plants in the Old World
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Domestication of Plants
in the Old World
The origin and spread of domesticated
plants in south-west Asia, Europe,
and the Mediterranean Basin
Fourth Edition
Daniel Zohary
Professor Emeritus
Department of Evolution, Systematics and Ecology
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
Maria Hopf*
Formerly Head of the Botany Department,
Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum,
Mainz, Germany
and
Ehud Weiss
Senior Lecturer
Archaeobotanical Laboratory
The Institute of Archaeology
The Martin (Szusz) Department of Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology
Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
and
Kimmel Center for Archaeological Sciences
Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel
*deceased
1
1
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Second edition published 1993
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Dedicated to the memory of Dr Maria Hopf
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Preface to the fourth edition
Sadly, Dr Maria Hopf passed away since the publication of the third edition. As a token of our enormous appreciation of her warm, kind personality,
her work in the compilation and updating of this
book, and her other scientiic achievements, we
dedicate this edition to her memory.
A considerable amount of new data and research
avenues came to light over the past decade, triggering the preparation of this new edition. Many new
archaeological sites, some from untreated regions,
have been excavated and analyzed archaeobotanically, and new research tools developed. These
tools, mostly in the ield of molecular analysis of
living plants (and animals), drove many enthusiastic research groups to explore questions relating to
the domestication process and the relationship
between crops and their wild ancestors. Such new
representative data are included.
Main changes in the fourth edition
The ield of radiocarbon dating improved dramatically in the last generation, and dating labs are collaborating more extensively with each other and
research. Although not all sites mentioned in this
edition were dated to the same methodical degree,
we now have a much more accurate baseline for
comparison. Therefore, this edition makes use of
calibrated dates, when they are available. As a
result, our ability to compare sites has improved,
and greater accuracy gained in our understanding
of the movement of south-west Asian assemblage
crops beyond their ‘core area’.
In an attempt to improve our knowledge about
the transfer of the Neolithic package to Europe,
Asia, and Africa, we consulted our colleagues for
the most representative sites in each country. As a
result, Chapter 10 ‘Plant remains in representative
archaeological sites’, has been signiicantly updated.
Thirty-eight sites were deleted and sixty-four were
added (36% new sites out of a total of 179 sites).
North Africa has been added to the geographical
coverage of this edition, but the Indian subcontinent was excluded. Many research projects lourished in the Indian subcontinent and eastern Asia in
the last decade, and we believe that these regions
deserve speciic treatment.
We have made the text easier to read, with
renewed artwork, igures, tables, and maps.
Nineteen colour plates and eight new black and
white igures have been added, as well as a new
map, (Map 2) which summarizes the spread of the
south-west Asian Neolithic crop assemblage in
Europe, west Asia, and North Africa.
The concluding chapter now appears at the start of
the book, and is called, ‘The current state of the art.’
We also decided to adhere to geographers’ current
recommendation to use the term ‘south-west Asia’
instead of ‘Middle East’ and ‘Near East,’ which are
both ambiguous and Eurocentric geographic terms.
Acknowledgements
We wish to express our gratitude to the many colleagues who helped us in the preparation of this
edition. We are particularly indebted to those who
advised us on the current state of research in their
regions; this was essential in our ability to present
a much revised edition. Among them are: Felix
Bittmann, Ksenija Borojevic, Laurent Bouby, Otto
Brinkkemper, Ramon Buxó, Ahmed Fahmy,
Andrew Fairbairn, Ferenc Gyulai, Maria Hajnalova,
Roman Hovsepyan, Stefanie Jacomet, Glynis
Jones, Sabine Karg, Mordechai Kislev, Marianne
viii
PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION
Kohler-Schneider, Angela Kreuz, Terttu Lempiäinen,
Elena Marinova, Felicia Monah, Dominique de
Moulins, Aldona Mueller-Bieniek, Mark Nesbitt,
Simone Riehl, David Earle Robinson, Mauro
Rottoli, Anaya Sarpaki, Margareta Tengberg, João
Tereso, Tania Valamoti, Marijke van der Veen,
Karin Viklund, George Willcox. Mordechai Kislev,
Moshe Feldman, and particularly Mark Nesbitt,
offered valuable criticism in reading an initial
revised draft.
We are grateful to Ori Fragman, Mordechai
Kislev, Linda Learn (Class Act Fabrics), Oxford
University Press, for providing new pictures for
this edition, to Reuven Soffer from Soffer
Cartography inc., Jerusalem, for producing all
maps, and to the Photography and Graphic Design
Departments, Weizmann Institute of Science, for
the new and renewed pictures and tables. Also, to
Dorian Fuller for his permission to photograph
Aegilops tauschii from his reference collection, and
to Sue Colledge for sharing with us her Access
database of archaeobotanical inds across southwest Asia and Europe.
Special thanks are due to Elisabetta Boaretto for
her assistance with updating radiocarbon dating,
and to Aaron Rottenberg for his assistance with
updating the molecular analysis. We also want to
thank Anat Hartmann-Shenkman, Yael MahlerSlasky, Leon Cherniaev and Ravit Ferera for their
assistance in preparing this edition.
D.Z.
Jerusalem
E.W.
Ramat-Gan & Rehovot
2011
Preface to the third edition
In the last seven years, considerable progress has
been made in our understanding of the origin and
spread of cultivated plants in west and central Asia,
in the Mediterranean basin, and in the temperate
parts of Europe. Today the wild ancestors of the
crops that initiated and sustained food production
in this part of the world are already well-identiied.
Moreover, the archaeobotanical evidence assembled
on the origins and spread of these cultivated plants
is today much more extensive and convincing than
the data available only a few years ago.
In this third edition, an attempt is being made to
integrate the new evidence and to update the book.
Signiicantly, the additional information does not
contradict the main conclusions presented in the
irst (1988) and second edition (1993). Moreover, it
adds considerably to the clarity of the portrayed
picture.
To keep the book more or less to its original size,
we decided to focus on domestication, and to omit
the chapter on fruit collected from the wild that
appeared in earlier editions. The knowledge about
collection from the wild has increased greatly over
the last few years; we believe the subject deserves to
be treated separately.
We wish to express our gratitude to the many colleagues who helped us in the preparation of this
edition. We are particularly indebted to Corrie
Bakels, Dorian Q. Fuller, David R. Harris, Gordon
C. Hillman, Stefanie Jacomet, Mordechai E. Kislev.
Karl-Heinz Knötrzer, Helmut Kroll, Desanka Kučan,
Naomi F. Miller, Mark Nesbit, Jurgen SchultzeMotel, Krystyna Wasyliltowa. George H. Willcox
and Willem van Zeist.
D.Z.
M.H.
Jerusalem
Mainz
2000
Preface to the second edition
Since the completion of the writing of the irst edition in 1987, archaeobotanical investigations and
the study of Old World crops and their wild relatives has continued apace. An impressive body of
new evidence about crops and sites was added.
Signiicantly, the new information does not contradict the main conclusions that were drawn ive or
six years ago. It conirms them.
In this second edition, an attempt is made to integrate this new evidence. We have also illed a gap
by adding a chapter on dye plants. The revision is
most apparent in the vegetables, in the fruit trees,
and in some of the minor grain crops. Only a few
years ago, our knowledge of their origin and early
history was embarrassingly fragmentary. At least
for some of these crops, the evidence today permits
a sounder synthesis.
D.Z.
M.H.
Jerusalem
Mainz
1993
Preface to the irst edition
South-west Asia, Europe, and the Nile valley arc
unique today for the vast extent of archaeobotanical
exploration. In the last thirty years, hundreds of
Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Bronze Age sites have
been excavated in these territories. Plant remains in
many sites have been expertly identiied, culturally
associated, and radiocarbon-dated, and the inds
have offered critical information on the plants that
formed the start of agriculture in this part of the
world.
Considerable progress has also been achieved in
the ield of the wild ancestry of Old World crop.
The wild progenitors of most of these cultivated
plants have now been satisfactorily identiied, both
by comparative morphology and by genetic analyses. The distribution and ecological ranges of the
wild relatives have been established, and furthermore, comparisons between wild types and their
cultivated counterparts have revealed the evolutionary changes which were brought about by
domestication.
As a result of these achievements, south-west
Asia, Europe, and Egypt emerge as the irst major
geographical area in the world in which the combined evidence from archaeology and living plants
permits a modern synthesis of crop-plant evolution.
The accumulated information provides reasonable
answers to the following questions: (a) What were
the irst plants to be domesticated in the Old World?
(b) Where can the earliest signs of their domestication be found? (c) What were the subsequent main
developments in plant cultivation over these
regions? (d) What crops were introduced into this
area from other parts of Asia and Africa? (c) When
did all these events take place?
In the following chapters an attempt is made to
answer these questions and provide a review of the
origin and the spread of cultivated plants in southwest Asia, Europe, and Africa north of the Sahara,
i.e. the classical ‘Old World’. The aim was to trace
plant domestication and crop-plant evolution in
this part of the globe from its early beginnings up to
classical times. The treatment (Chapters 2–9) is crop
by crop. Chapter 10 adds essential documentation
on representative archaeological sites. The information given is based on work published up to 1985.
D.Z.
M.H.
Jerusalem
Mainz
1987
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Contents
1 Current state of the art
Beginnings of domestication
Neolithic south-west Asian crop assemblage
Wild progenitors
The spread of south-west Asian crops
Availability of archaeological evidence
Early domestication outside the ‘core area’
Beginning and spread of horticulture
Vegetables
Weeds and crops
Migrants from other agricultural regions
1
1
1
3
4
4
5
5
6
7
7
2 Sources of evidence for the origin and spread of domesticated plants
Archaeological evidence
Evidence from the living plants
Radiocarbon dating and dendrochronology
9
9
13
17
3 Cereals
Wheats: Triticum
Einkorn wheat: Triticum monococcum
Emmer and durum-type wheats: Triticum turgidum
Bread wheat: Triticum aestivum
Timopheev’s wheat: Triticum timopheevii
Barley: Hordeum vulgare
Rye: Secale cereale
Common oat: Avena sativa
Broomcorn millet: Panicum miliaceum
Foxtail millet: Setaria italica
Latecomers: sorghum and rice
20
23
34
39
47
51
51
59
66
69
71
72
4 Pulses
Lentil: Lens culinaris
Pea: Pisum sativum
Chickpea: Cicer arietinum
Faba bean: Vicia faba
Bitter vetch: Vicia ervilia
75
77
82
87
89
92
xiii
xiv
CONTENTS
Common vetch: Vicia sativa
Grass pea: Lathyrus sativus
Spanish vechling: Lathyrus clymenum
Fenugreek: Trigonella foenum-graecum
Lupins: Lupinus
95
95
97
97
98
5 Oil- and ibre-producing crops
Flax: Linum usitatissimum
Hemp: Cannabis sativa
Old World cottons: Gossypium arboreum and G. herbaceum
Poppy: Papaver somniferum
Gold of pleasure: Camelina sativa
Other cruciferous oil crops
Sesame: Sesamum indicum
100
101
106
107
109
111
112
112
6 Fruit trees and nuts
Olive: Olea europaea
Grapevine: Vitis vinifera
Fig: Ficus carica
Sycamore ig: Ficus sycomorus
Date palm: Phoenix dactylifera
Pomegranate: Punica granatum
Apple: Malus domestica
Pear: Pyrus communis
Plum: Prunus domestica
Cherries Prunus avium and P. cerasus
Latecomers: apricot, peach, and quince
Carob: Ceratonia siliqua
Citrus fruits
Almond: Amygdalus communis
Walnut: Juglans regia
Chestnut: Castanea sativa
Hazelnut: Corylus avellana
Pistachio: Pistacia vera
114
116
121
126
130
131
134
135
138
140
143
144
145
146
147
149
150
151
151
7 Vegetables and tubers
Watermelon: Citrullus lanatus
Melon Cucumis melo
Leek: Allium porrum
Garlic: Allium sativum
Onion: Allium cepa
Lettuce: Lactuca sativa
Chufa or rush nut: Cyperus esculentus
Cabbage: Brassica oleracea
Turnip: Brassica rapa
Beet: Beta vulgaris
Carrot: Daucus carota
Celery: Apium graveolens
153
153
154
155
156
157
157
158
158
159
159
160
160
CONTENTS
Parsnip: Pastinaca sativa
Asparagus: Asparagus oficinalis
xv
161
161
8 Condiments
Coriander: Coriandrum sativum
Cumin and dill: Cuminum cyminum and Anethum graveolens
Black cumin: Nigella sativa
Saffron: Crocus sativus
163
163
164
164
165
9 Dye crops
Woad: lsatis tinctoria
Dyer’s rocket: Reseda luteola
Madder: Rubia tinctorum
True indigo: Indigofera tinctoria
Saflower: Carthamus tinctorius
166
166
167
167
168
168
10 Plant remains in representative archaeological sites
Iran
Iraq
Turkey
Syria
Israel and Jordan
Egypt
Libya
Morocco
Caucasia and Transcaucasia
Central Asia
Cyprus
Greece
Crete
Former Yugoslavia
Bulgaria
Rumania
Moldavia and Ukraine
Hungary
Austria
Italy
Poland
Czech Republic and Slovakia
Switzerland
Germany
The Netherlands
Belgium
Denmark
Sweden
Norway
Finland
Britain and Ireland
169
169
170
171
172
173
174
176
176
176
176
177
177
179
179
179
181
181
182
183
184
185
185
186
188
189
189
189
190
190
190
190
xvi
CONTENTS
France
Spain
Portugal
191
192
193
Appendix A: Site orientation maps
194
Appendix B: Chronological chart for the main geographical regions mentioned
in the book
197
Appendix C: Information on archaeological sites which appear on Map 2
200
References
201
Index
237
C H A P TER 1
Current state of the art
The aim of this book is to review available information on the origin and spread of domesticated plants
in south-west Asia, Europe, and the Mediterranean
Basin. Two sources of evidence exist: irstly, information obtained by the analysis of plant remains
retrieved from archaeological excavations, where
early archaeological contexts—namely Epipalaeolithic/Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Bronze Age cultures—are the main source; and secondly, data
provided by living plants, particularly by the wild
progenitors of domesticated plants. This chapter
presents the conclusions of the book as determined
from the combined information provided by these
two sources (relevant data and references will be
presented in the following chapters).
Beginnings of domestication
The irst deinite signs of domesticated plants in the
Old World appear in a string of Early Pre-Pottery
Neolithic B (PPNB) farming villages that developed
in south-west Asia (Map 1) by ca. 10,500–10,100
calibrated years before present (cal BP). Spikelet
forks of emmer and einkorn wheat with telltale,
rough disarticulation scars (pp. 24, 30–31) provide
the most convincing evidence that these cereals
were already domesticated by this time, and in this
area. The contemporary appearance of relatively
plump kernels further supports this notion, but
cannot be regarded as a fully reliable indication of
the early stage of domestication. These remains and
further evidence of pre-domestication cultivation
suggest that the actual beginning of wheat cultivation in this area should have been even earlier. No
convincing pre-PPNB domesticated plants have yet
been found.
There is a scholarly debate as to whether agriculture originated in several places across a wide area,
including the Levant and northern Fertile Crescent
(e.g. Weiss et al. 2006; Willcox et al. 2008), or whether
it evolved in only one part of the Fertile Crescent,
such as south-east Turkey (e.g. Lev-Yadun et al.
2000). Although current archaeobotanical data support the irst view, this critical question requires
more archaeobotanical and radiocarbon dating evidence to support any deinitive inding.
Neolithic south-west Asian crop
assemblage
The crops of early Neolithic agriculture in southwest Asia are fairly well recognized. The most
numerous vegetable remains in early farming villages come from three cereals: emmer wheat
(Triticum turgidum subsp. dicoccum), einkorn wheat
(T. monococcum subsp. monococcum), and barley
(Hordeum vulgare). Diagnostic morphological traits
(non-brittle ears, broad kernels) traceable in the
archaeological inds indicate that by 10,500–10,100
cal BP, these domesticated annual grasses were
intentionally sown and harvested in a string of PrePottery Neolithic B sites in south-west Asia. Emmer
wheat and barley seem to have been the more common crops. Einkorn wheat is somewhat less
apparent.
Several grain legumes appear as constant companions of the cereals (see Map 2—Plate 6). The most
frequent pulses in the early Neolithic south-west
Asian contexts are lentil (Lens culinaris) and pea
(Pisum sativum). Two more local legume crops are
bitter vetch (Vicia ervilia) and chickpea (Cicer arietinum). In contrast to the cereals, archaeological
1
2
DOMESTICATION OF PLANTS IN THE OLD WORLD
Asikli Höyük
Çayönü
Cafer Höyük
10,500-10,000 BP
10,000-9,500 BP
Tell Abu
Hureyra
9,500-9,000 BP
einkorn wheat
emmer wheat
Jarmo
Kissonerga-Mylouthkia +
Shillourokambos
Yiftah'el
barley
chickpea
Jericho
Tell Aswad
‘Ain Ghazal
flax
Ali Kosh
lentil
pea
bitter vetch
0
0
100
200
200 miles
400km
Map 1 Archaeological sites in which the earliest south-west Asian domesticated grain crops were reliably identiied.
remains of pulses usually lack morphological features by which initial stages of domestication can be
recognized. Clear indications of lentil domestication
appear at about 10,100–9,700 cal BP; and of pea,
chickpea, and bitter vetch, at about 9,900–9,500
cal BP. Probably all four legumes were cultivated
somewhat earlier, either together with wheats and
barley or soon after the domestication of those cereals. Finally, lax (Linum usitatissimum) belongs to the
south-west Asian group of founder crops. It is
impossible to decide whether the material obtained
from Early Neolithic layers represents collected wild
lax or the remains of domesticated forms. Yet, as in
the case of the legumes both direct and circumstantial evidence indicates that by 9,900–9,500 cal BP,
lax was already domesticated in south-west Asia.
Evidence for early domestication of additional
plants in south-west Asia is much less convincing.
Grass pea (Lathyrus sativus) might have been such a
crop, yet the bulk of its early remains comes from
eighth and seventh millennia BP sites in Greece and
Bulgaria. Signs that rye (Secale cereale) was a southwest Asian Neolithic crop are much rarer. The origin and early spread of the faba bean (Vicia faba) is
even less clear.
The plant remains from south-west Asian PrePottery Neolithic B (PPNB) sites reveal another feature: as a rule, not a single crop but rather a
combination of cereals, pulses, and lax appears in
these early farming villages. Moreover, the assemblage seems to be similar throughout the Fertile
Crescent (see Map 2—Plate 6). In other words, a
common package of grain crops characterizes the
development of agriculture in this ‘core area’.
At almost the same time, signs of herding appear,
implying that sheep and goats had also been
brought under human control. Shortly after, cattle
and pig domestication took place (Zeder 2011).
Thus, an effective south-west Asian Neolithic
food-production ‘package’ was formed, comprising
CURRENT STATE OF THE ART
60
Legened
61
einkorn wheat
emmer wheat
barley
flax
lentil
pea
58
62
71
2,500-2,000 BP
3,000-2,500 BP
3,500-3,000 BP
4,000-3,500 BP
4,500-4,000 BP
5,000-4,500 BP
5,500-5,000 BP
6,000-5,500 BP
6,500-6,000 BP
7,000-6,500 BP
7,500-7,000 BP
8,000-7,500 BP
8,500-8,000 BP
9,000-8,500 BP
9,500-9,000 BP
10,000-9,500 BP
10,500-10,000 BP
63
59
72
70
66
69
65
68
40
56
67
53
57
39
52,55
73
48
21
37
47
49
64
78
22
33
34
44
81
75
41
36
50
82
38
35
54
51
3
1
23
32
4
74
25
6
31
77
24
29
42
43
79
7
27
45
76
5
28
30
26
18
8
19
80
3
46
9
17
2
14
20
10
13
11
12
16
0
0
Scale 1:16,000,000
125
250
375
250
15
500 miles
500 km
83
Map 2 The spread of the south-west Asian Neolithic crop assemblage in Europe, west Asia, and north Africa. For details on the numbered sites,
see Appendix C (p. 200). These are the earliest sites in which domesticated grain crops were found, in each country. (See Plate 6.)
vegetative crops as well as domestic animals.
Indeed, the remains uncovered in south-west Asian
PPNB sites indicate a major shift in food practices.
While in Epi-Palaeolithic contexts, gathering and
hunting of a wide spectrum of wild species is apparent, the PPNB farmers already appear to focus on
domesticates as their principal source of food. A
large proportion of the remains retrieved from these
early farming sites belong to the crops mentioned
above and domestic animals. There is also a sharp
quantitative and qualitative drop in the wild-species
intake. An important conirmation of this ‘package’
concept occurred recently with the discovery of just
such an ensemble of plants and animals in Early
PPNB Cyprus, although some of them were not yet
strictly domesticated.
Wild progenitors
The wild ancestors of most of the food plants of
south-west Asia, Europe, and the Mediterranean
Basin are already well identiied. The distribution
areas and the main ecological preferences of most of
them are also well known. Comparison of this evidence with the archaeological indings reveals that
with practically all early crops, the irst signs of
domestication appear in the same general areas
where the wild ancestral stocks abound today.
The geographic distribution of the wild progenitors of Neolithic grain crops is signiicant. Apart
from lax and barley, the wild ancestors of the
founder crops have a rather limited distribution.
Wild emmer wheat and wild chickpea are endemic
to the Fertile Crescent. Assuming that their distribution did not change drastically during the last ten
millennia, the domestication of these crops could
only have taken place in this restricted area. Because
domesticated emmer wheat appears to be the most
important Neolithic crop throughout south-west
Asia, Europe, and the Mediterranean Basin, the
coninement of its wild progenitor to the Fertile
Crescent delimits the place of origin of this
4
DOMESTICATION OF PLANTS IN THE OLD WORLD
domesticated cereal. It also marks the rather
restricted geographic area where Old World
Neolithic agriculture could have originated. Wild
forms of einkorn wheat, lentil, pea, and bitter vetch
have a somewhat wider distribution, but all, including barley, are centered in the Fertile Crescent; that
is, the region in which the earliest farming villages
have been discovered.
The spread of south-west Asian crops
A most remarkable feature of south-west Asian
Neolithic agriculture is its rapid expansion soon
after establishment in the nuclear area (see Map
2—Plate 6). The quality and quantity of available
archaeobotanical evidence varies considerably from
region to region. Comprehensive information is
available for most parts of Europe, but there is much
sparser and frequently incomplete documentation
from Caucasia, Eastern Europe, and central Asia. In
Africa, critical data on plant remains are available
only for Egypt (but a few current projects might add
vital data for north Africa). In spite of the uneven
documentation, the following main features of the
diffusion of agriculture seem apparent.
The spread of agriculture from its south-west
Asian core to Europe and central Asia involves the
species contained in the Neolithic crop assemblage.
Map 2 (Plate 6) summarizes the information about
the six most important south-west Asian crops:
emmer wheat (including its free-threshing derivatives), einkorn wheat, barley, lentil, pea, and lax.
From the data presented in this map and in Chapter
10, it is evident that crops domesticated in the
south-west Asian core area were the initiators of
food production in Europe, central Asia, and the
Mediterranean Basin (including the Nile Valley).
The earliest farming cultures in these vast regions
always contain wheat and barley, with one, two, or
more of the other south-west Asian founder crops
frequently present as well.
Establishment of the south-west Asian crop
assemblage in the Fertile Crescent and its spread
both west (to Europe) and east (to central Asia and
to the Indian subcontinent) was rapid (see Map
2—Plate 6). From the irst farming communities in
the ‘Levantine Corridor’ at ca. 10,500–10,200 cal BP,
it was found to cover the whole Fertile Crescent by
9,500–9,000 cal BP. By ca. 9,000–8,500 cal BP, agriculture had already appeared in Crete and Greece. By
the end of the ninth millennium BP, these crops
were grown in Obre in Bosnia-Hercegovina and in
Jeitun in Turkmenia. Soon after, agriculture appears
as far west as Balma Margineda in Andorra, Spain,
and Sacarovca in Moldavia—and as far south as
Grotta dell’Uzzo in Sicily. By the second half of the
eighth millennium BP, the Linearbandkeramik
farming culture was already irmly established in
loess soil regions throughout central Europe,
extending to Poland in the east, to northern France,
and Germany in the west. At the same time, early
Neolithic farming villages appeared in south Spain,
the Nile Valley, and in Chokh in Caucasia.
Substantial information on the age and spread of
early farming cultures is available for Europe,
where radiocarbon dating of sites exhibiting evidence of early farming enabled the reconstruction
of the diffusion of agriculture. The evidence from
Caucasia, central Asia, and eastern Europe is much
more fragmentary. Yet the inds retrieved from sites
including Jeitun (p. 176) demonstrate that the diffusion of the south-west Asian crops towards central
Asia happened relatively early, although it took
longer to reach Transcaucasia and the Nile Valley.
All over these vast areas, the start of food production involved the same south-west Asian crops.
Availability of archaeological evidence
Any attempt to reconstruct the origins and diffusion of agriculture in Eurasia and Africa must
address the uneven archaeological record. As
already mentioned, plant remains of Europe,
south-west Asia, and the Mediterranean Basin provide us with a reasonable overview of the beginnings and development of agriculture in these major
areas. In contrast, the archaeobotanical evidence
from central and eastern parts of Asia and from eastern Europe is much less complete. It is very poor in
Africa north of the Sahara. Consequently, while the
early stages of food production in south-west Asia
are relatively well documented, most founder crops
are adequately identiied, and the expansion to
Europe and west Asia are convincingly elucidated,
there are far fewer solid facts on crop domestication
and the development of farming in east Asia (Smith
CURRENT STATE OF THE ART
1998). However in the last few years, archaeobotanical indings in these agricultural domains have
improved considerably. The history of crop domestication in the African Savanna belt is still largely
uncharted and we still know very little about the
evolution of the unique crop assemblage of this
region (Harlan 1992a).
The time and place of origin of the majority of the
east and south Asian crops, and of practically all the
sub-Saharan African crops, are yet not fully established. In numerous cases, the wild progenitors
have not yet been satisfactorily identiied or they
are only very supericially known. However, critical
archaeobotanical information has been assembled
on at least two principal crops; rice (Oryza sativa)
and foxtail millet (Setaria italica). Their essential role
in the independent rise of farming in China is now
well documented.
At present, our picture of crop-plant evolution in
Eurasia and Africa is unbalanced. While there is
relatively reliable information on its development
in the classical Old World, we are largely uninformed of events south and east of this area. We also
know relatively little about the early interactions
between west Asia and the major agricultural provinces in east and south Asia, and in Africa south of
the Sahara.
Early domestication outside
the ‘core area’
Signs of additional domesticants start appearing
soon after the introduction of south-west Asia
agriculture to Europe, central Asia, and the
Mediterranean Basin. Addition of some of these
crops obviously took place outside south-west
Asia, but they developed within the already established agriculture of the south-west Asian crop
assemblage. The poppy, Papaver somniferum, provides a well-documented example of such domestication. Both the area of distribution of the wild
poppy and the archaeological inds (p. 109–111)
indicate that P. somniferum was brought into
domestication in west Europe. It was added to the
south-west Asian grain-crop assemblage after the
latter’s establishment in western Europe. Chufa,
Cyperus esculentus, is another example of an early
local addition, this time in the Nile Valley (p. 158).
5
Its dry tubers were found in large quantities in
Egypt from pre-dynastic times on. The early
appearance of broomcorn millet, Panicum miliaceum, in the Caspian basin and the Czech
Republic (pp. 69–70) might indicate another local
addition. However, since the archaeological evidence from central and east Asia is still inadequate,
it is impossible to decide whether the Caspian P.
miliaceum was added to the expanding south-west
Asian crop assemblage after it reached central
Asia, or whether this cereal represents an east
Asiatic domestication independent of the southwest Asian diffusion.
Beginning and spread of horticulture
Olive, grapevine, ig, and date palm seem to have
been the irst principal fruit crops domesticated in
the Old World. Deinite signs of olive and date-palm
domestication appear in Chalcolithic Levant about
6,800–6,300 cal BP. Indications of date-palm domestication are also available from contemporary lower
Mesopotamia. We still do not know the extent of
Chalcolithic horticulture. Except for the IsraelJordan area, the archaeobotanical information from
seventh–sixth millennia BP sites in the Levant is
still insuficient. The picture changes drastically in
the Early Bronze Age (irst half of the ifth millennium BP). From this time on, olives, grapes, and igs
emerge as important additions to grain agriculture,
initially in the Levant and soon after, in Greece.
These crops were subsequently planted throughout
the Mediterranean Basin. The extensive Bronze Age
cultivation of olives and grapes is indicated by the
appearance of numerous presses and remains of
storage facilities for olive oil and wine. At the same
time, dates were domesticated on the southern
fringes and the warm river basins of the south-west
Asia, and they abound in the Nile Valley during the
New Kingdom.
Apple, pear, plum, and cherry seem to have been
added much later to Old World horticulture, as
deinite signs of their domestication appear only
in the irst millennium BC. Their culture is almost
entirely based on grafting, so they could have been
domesticated extensively only after the introduction of this sophisticated method of vegetative
propagation.
6
DOMESTICATION OF PLANTS IN THE OLD WORLD
Remains of fruit trees rarely show diagnostic anatomical traits enabling archaeobotanists to distinguish between fruits collected from the wild or
those harvested from domesticated orchards. To a
large extent, recognizing domestication in fruit
crops is based on circumstantial evidence, such as
the inding of fruit remains in areas in which the
wild forms do not occur or on the quantitative analysis of artefacts associated with fruit products (e.g.
oil, wine). It is dificult, therefore, to determine the
initial stage of fruit crop domestication: in other
words, it might well be that olive, grape, ig, or date
cultivation did not originate in the Chalcolithic
(sixth millennium BP), but was already active in the
late Neolithic (seventh millennium BP).
Despite these uncertainties, the following have
been conirmed: (a) the earliest deinite signs of fruit
tree domestication appear in the south-west Asia;
(b) horticulture developed only after the irm establishment of grain agriculture; (c) as with grain crops,
several local wild fruits were taken into domestication at about the same time; (d) domestication of
fruit crops relied heavily on the invention of vegetative propagation; (e) planting of perennial fruit trees
is a long-term investment, promoting a fully settled
way of life; (f) soon after its successful establishment, horticulture spread from its original ‘core
area’ into new territories in the Mediterranean Basin
and south-west Asia; and (g) after the introduction
of grafting (pp. 114–115), the domestication of a
whole group of ‘second-wave’ fruit crops became
possible.
Available archaeobotanical evidence of the
beginning of fruit-crop domestication can also be
supported by information on the wild relatives.
Wild olive, grapevine, ig, and date are widely
distributed over the Mediterranean and southwest Asia. They have a wide geographic distribution, so this by itself does not provide critical
values for a precise delimitation of the place of
origin of these fruit crops. Yet it is reassuring to
know that forms from which domesticated clones
could have been derived thrive in wild niches in
the east Mediterranean basin. Therefore, evidence
from the living plants complements the archaeological inds. Most probably olive, grapevine,
date, ig, as well as pomegranate and almond,
were irst brought into domestication in the same
general area where, several millennia earlier, grain
agriculture was successfully established in the
Old World. Thus, during the sixth millennium BP,
eastern Mediterranean Basin human societies
belonging to the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age cultures, were introduced to the use of copper and
bronze, and they also mastered horticulture.
Vegetables
This is the least-known group of domesticated food
plants of the Old World. Vegetable material consists
almost entirely of perishable soft tissues, which
stand a meagre chance of charring and surviving as
archaeological remnants (p. 153). Consequently,
only few vegetable remains have been detected in
excavations. The exceptions here are Egyptian and
Judean Desert caves. In Egypt, especially arid country vegetables placed in pyramids and graves commonly survived by desiccation, and show that
garlic, leek, onion, lettuce, melon, watermelon, and
chufa were cultivated in the Nile Valley in the second and the irst millennia BC. As amply described
by Keimer (1924, 1984), vegetable gardens constituted an important element of food production in
Egyptian dynastic times.
Beyond Egypt there are almost no early archaeobotanical inds of vegetable crops. However, early
literary sources show that by the start of the second
millennium BC, vegetable gardens lourished not
only in the Nile Valley but also in Mesopotamia.
Furthermore, in both areas the crops grown were
more or less the same. The only major exception
was chufa which was restricted, almost entirely, to
Egypt.
In summary, available evidence makes it clear
that by the Bronze Age vegetable crops were part of
food production both in Lower Mesopotamia and
in Egypt. It is very likely that this geographic pattern is not accidental. In both regions, we are faced
with the dense human settlement of very arid environments. Survival in these zones depends on utilization of limited areas of irrigated or looded land
which is bordered by large, barren deserts. Areas
with no vegetation have little to offer in the way of
supplementary resources of green wild plants. This
shortage invites human initiative. The early development of vegetable gardens might have been
CURRENT STATE OF THE ART
caused by such needs. It must be taken into consideration that this picture is partly skewed by the lack
of evidence in other regions.
Weeds and crops
Several Old World grain plants, oil producers, and
vegetables seem to be ‘secondary crops’; that is,
they irst evolved as weeds and were only later
established as crops (p. 16). Oat, Avena sativa, rye,
Secale cereale subsp. cereale, and gold of pleasure,
Camelina sativa, are well-documented examples of
this mode of evolution under domestication.
Turnip, lettuce, carrot, beet, leek, and several other
vegetables are also very likely to have entered
domestication through the same ‘back door’. The
incorporation of secondary crops into Old World
food production seems to have happened rather
late, since deinite signs of their domestication
appear in Europe and west Asia only in the second
and irst millennia BC.
Migrants from other agricultural regions
With few exceptions, the classical ‘Old World’
(south-west Asia, the Mediterranean Basin, and
temperate Europe) received crops from other agricultural regions rather late in its agricultural history. Foreign crops that arrived in this area (in
pre-Columbian times) fall into the following geographical groups (Zohary 1998):
(a) Temperate climate crops from central
and/or east Asia
Broomcorn millet (Panicum miliaceum) and foxtail
millet (Setaria italica) seem to represent the earliest
arrivals. The origin of P. miliaceum is not fully
understood, but it was probably taken into domestication in central Asia–north China (p. 69–71). It
already appears in Caucasia and in central Europe
in sites around the irst half of the eighth millennium BP. S. italica, now recognized as a founder
crop of north China agriculture (p. 71), appeared
in central Europe in the irst half of fourth millennium BP, some four thousand years later. For
millet, as well, the available information suggests
arrival from the east (p. 69). However, the pos-
7
sibility of independent domestication of foxtail
millet in the west has not been ruled out yet. Hemp
(Cannabis sativa) reached Anatolia and Europe
much later. Its remains appear (pp. 106–107) from
the eighth century BC onwards. Apricot (Armeniaca
vulgaris) and peach (Persica vulgaris) could have
been taken into domestication either in central
Asia or in China (pp. 154–155); the domesticated
pistachio (Pistacia vera) must have originated in
central Asia (pp. 151–152). The peach seems to
have reached the Mediterranean Basin by the middle of the irst millennium BC. Apricot and pistachio arrived only in Roman times.
(b) Warm-weather crops from south and/or
east Asia
A group of more tropical crops (sensitive to freezing
temperatures) that originated in south and/or east
Asia, seem to have migrated into the south-west
Asia and the Mediterranean Basin from the Indian
subcontinent. Many of these cultigens were already
grown in India and Pakistan in the second millennium BC. Sesame (Sesamum indicum) is apparently
the earliest of these migrants (pp. 112–113).
Undisputed remains of this Indian oil crop already
appear in south-west Asia in Iron Age (ca. 900–600
BC) contexts. The citron (Citrus medica) was grown
in the east Mediterranean basin (p. 146) by the end
of the fourth century BC. Asian rice (Oryza sativa)
seems to have arrived (pp. 73–74) in Hellenistic or
early Roman times. The cucumber (Cucumis sativus)
might also have been introduced at the same time
(p. 155). Finally, Old World cottons (Gossypium
arboreum and/or G. herbaceum) could have already
spread from the Indian subcontinent into the southwest Asia (pp. 107–109) during Roman rule.
However, a fully developed cotton industry
appeared in this area only in Early Islamic times.
An impressive introduction of Indian and southeast Asian crops was undertaken by the Arabs soon
after their conquests (Watson 1983; Zohary 1998).
The Early Islamic diffusion (eigth–eleventh centuries AD) includes lemon (Citrus limon), lime
(C. aurantiifolia), bitter orange (C. aurantium), pummelo (C. maxima), and indigo (Indigofera tinctoria)—
all of which are discussed in this book. It also
involves sugar cane (Saccharum oficinarum) and