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Spatiotemporal variation of agricultural patterns in different geomorphologic and climatic environments in the eastern Loess Plateau, north-central China during the late Neolithic and Bronze Ages

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Abstract

Human settlement and agricultural development are closely linked to local geomorphological and climatic environments. However, the variation in agricultural systems in different environmental and prehistoric contexts remains unknown. We report new archaeobotanical and radiocarbon dates from 34 Neolithic and Bronze Age sites in the Hutuo River Valley (HTRV) in north-central China and compare them with updated archaeobotanical studies in the Sushui River Valley (SSRV) and Henan Province (HNP), to explore the similarities and differences of agricultural patterns under different geomorphologic and climatic environments in north-central China. Our results reveal that humans consistently cultivated foxtail and broomcorn millet in the HTRV from the Miaodigou (6000–5700 cal. a BP) to the Shang-Zhou (3600–2256 cal. a BP) period, despite the introduction of wheat and barley into the area around 4000 a BP. Climate conditions and hilly landforms in the HTRV, SSRV and some parts of the HNP led people to develop foxtail and broomcorn millet dry land farming practices between 7000 and 3000 a BP. Alternatively, in other areas of the HNP, the climate conditions and alluvial plains enabled people to develop a mixed agriculture of millets, soybeans, and rice from 7000 to 4000 a BP, with the addition of wheat between 4000 and 3000 a BP. Farmers’ different agricultural technologies and interactions with foreign cultures may have also influenced the formation of different agricultural patterns in the three regions between 7000 and 3000 a BP. Population growth during 7000–3000 a BP can explain the overall propensity of the higher-yield foxtail millet rather than broomcorn millet as the main cultivated crop. In the HTRV, however, higher proportions of broomcorn millet (as compared to the SSRV and HNP), may reflect the greater drought and heat tolerance of broomcorn millet, representing an adaptive agricultural strategy in the river valley.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 41825001, 41871076, 4210011192 and 41501216), the Open Foundation of MOE Key Laboratory of Western China’s Environmental Systems, Lanzhou University and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Grant Nos. lzujbky-2021-kb01, 2019jbkyzy014 and lzujbky-2018-43), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of Nanjing Agricultural University (Grant Nos. SKYC2021011 and KYYJ202111), Open Fund Project of the State Key Laboratory of Loess and Quaternary Geology (Grant No. SKLLQG2015) and General Project of Philosophy and Social Science Research in Universities in 2021 (Grant No. 2021SJA0052).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Humanities & Social Development, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, 210095, China

    Haiming Li

  2. Institution of Chinese Agricultural Civilization, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, 210095, China

    Haiming Li

  3. Agricultural Archaeology Research Center, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, 210095, China

    Haiming Li

  4. College of Tourism, Huaqiao University, Quanzhou, 362021, China

    Yifu Cui

  5. College of Earth & Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Ministry of Education Key Laboratory of Western China’s Environmental System, Lanzhou, 730000, China

    Yifu Cui, Fengwen Liu, Minmin Ma & Guanghui Dong

  6. Department of Anthropology, University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA, 92093, USA

    Nathaniel James

  7. Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, 63130, USA

    Melissa Ritchey

  8. Institute for Ecological Research and Pollution Control of Plateau Lakes, School of Ecology and Environment Science, Yunnan University, Kunming, 650504, China

    Fengwen Liu

  9. Laboratory for Environmental Archaeology, Archaeological Research Center, Beijing Union University, Beijing, 100191, China

    Junna Zhang

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  1. Haiming Li
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  2. Yifu Cui
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  3. Nathaniel James
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  4. Melissa Ritchey
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  5. Fengwen Liu
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  6. Junna Zhang
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  7. Minmin Ma
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  8. Guanghui Dong
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Haiming Li or Minmin Ma.

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Spatiotemporal variation of agricultural patterns in different geomorphologic and climatic environments in the eastern Loess Plateau, north-central China during the late Neolithic and Bronze Ages

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Li, H., Cui, Y., James, N. et al. Spatiotemporal variation of agricultural patterns in different geomorphologic and climatic environments in the eastern Loess Plateau, north-central China during the late Neolithic and Bronze Ages. Sci. China Earth Sci. 65, 934–948 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-021-9879-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-021-9879-x

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