Investigation of Adaptation to the Arid Zone in the Levantine Early Neolithic

黎凡特新石器时代早期对干旱地区适应的考察

• 批准号: 0410097
• 负责人: Donald Henry
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Tulsa
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2004
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2004-07-01 至 2009-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0410097&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Investigation; Adaptation; Arid; Zone; Levantine

Through support from The National Science Foundation, Dr. Donald Henry and an international group of collaborating scientists will continue the investigation of the Early Neolithic site of Ayn Abu Nukhayla, located in southern Jordan. The site falls at the time when humans were first beginning to engage in cereal cultivation and animal (sheep/goat) herding. The research builds on earlier NSF supported work and focuses on understanding how the occupants of this 8,500 year site were able to exploit a setting that today is one of the driest on earth. The research continues to center on the excavation of this large, architecturally rich site in conjunction with geologic and paleoenvironmental investigations of the nearby area. The study will have three specific components: (1) a high resolution climatic-environmental reconstruction; (2) an evaluation of alternative subsistence-settlement models using cementum increment analysis and stable isotope signatures; and (3) a detailed inter-site spatial analysis that is intended to trace the social and economic dimensions of the settlement. The remarkable growth and expansion of the Near Eastern Early Neolithic followed by disruption is often attributed to climatic-environmental changes, but researchers disagree on the timing and direction of such changes. The proposed research will address this issue through the recovery of environmental proxy data in the form of plant ( pollen, phytolith, diatom) and geologic (sedimentological, geochemical, and isotopic) evidence from deposits of a large dry lake near the site. Additionally, the geologic column should identify rather precisely the first appearance of cultivated cereals and herding as reflected in cereal pollen and phytoliths (silica elements from plants) and fecal spherulites (calcite bodies in sheep/goat dung) . Earlier soundings and pilot studies confirm the presence of such data in association with datable charcoal. Extrapolation of the radiocarbon chronometry established from the earlier soundings indicates that a high resolution, climatic-environmental record can be developed through deeper soundings that stretches back some 8-12,000 years ago. Earlier research indicates the occupants of Ayn Aba Nukhayla followed a combination of foraging, herding, and farming thought to have been integrated within a strategy of transhumance (i.e., seasonal and elevational shifts in settlement). This is likely to have involved farming the nearby mudpan (watered from upland run-off) from Fall through Spring followed by abandonment of the site during the warm-dry season for the movement of herds to upland pastures. To test this idea, the cementum increments of the teeth of hunted (hare, gazelle, ibex) and herded (sheep/goats) animals will be studied to provide seasonal information relative to the occupation of the site. Also, differences in vegetation and geologic substrates between the local setting and the nearby uplands offer a means of tracing herding practices through the analysis of stable isotope signatures derived from herbivore teeth and bones.The well preserved occupational floors within the fills of the pithouses also provide an unusual opportunity to study spatial patterns of human interaction in an Early Neolithic community. Despite interest in understanding changes in community organization that are likely to have accompanied the emergence and elaboration of food production, there remains considerable disagreement on the composition of households and community structure. While the spatial patterning of features, artifacts, and ecofacts (bones, plant and dung signatures) can trace the degree to which households were economically and socially autonomous, such detailed spatial studies have here-to-fore not been undertaken in the region Broader impacts of the proposed research include a pedagogical component in which graduate students will engage in a full range of science related tasks involving research design, field and laboratory instrumentation, data management, hypothesis testing, and report preparation.

通过国家科学基金会的支持，唐纳德亨利博士和一个国际合作科学家小组将继续调查位于约旦南部的艾因阿布努海拉的新石器时代早期遗址。 该遗址位于人类第一次开始从事谷物种植和动物（绵羊/山羊）放牧的时间福尔斯。 这项研究建立在早期NSF支持的工作基础上，重点是了解这个8,500年遗址的居住者如何能够利用今天地球上最干燥的环境之一。 研究继续集中在这个大型建筑丰富的遗址的挖掘上，并结合附近地区的地质和古环境调查。 这项研究将有三个具体组成部分：（1）高分辨率的气候-环境重建;（2）利用牙骨质增量分析和稳定同位素特征评价替代生计-定居模式;（3）详细的地点间空间分析，旨在追踪定居点的社会和经济层面。 近东新石器时代早期的显着增长和扩张，以及随之而来的破坏通常被归因于气候环境变化，但研究人员对这种变化的时间和方向存在分歧。 拟议的研究将解决这个问题，通过恢复环境代理数据的形式，植物（花粉，植硅石，硅藻）和地质（沉积学，地球化学和同位素）的证据，从附近的一个大型干湖的存款。 此外，地质柱应该相当精确地识别第一次出现的种植谷物和放牧，反映在谷物花粉和植硅体（植物中的硅元素）和粪便球粒（绵羊/山羊粪便中的方解石体）。 早先的探测和试点研究证实，存在与可定年木炭有关的此类数据。根据早期探测建立的放射性碳测时法的外推表明，可以通过大约8 - 12 000年前的更深探测建立高分辨率的气候环境记录。 早期的研究表明，艾因阿坝努海拉的居住者遵循了觅食、放牧和耕作的结合，这些结合被认为是一种跨季节放牧的策略（即，季节性和海拔高度的变化）。 这很可能涉及从秋季到春季在附近的泥盘（从高地径流中灌溉）耕作，然后在温暖干燥的季节放弃该地点，将牛群转移到高地牧场。 为了验证这一想法，将研究狩猎（野兔，瞪羚，野山羊）和放牧（绵羊/山羊）动物的牙齿的牙骨质增量，以提供与该网站的占领有关的季节性信息。 此外，当地环境和附近高地之间的植被和地质基质的差异提供了一种通过分析来自食草动物牙齿和骨骼的稳定同位素签名来追踪放牧实践的方法。保存完好的职业地板内的坑填充也提供了一个不寻常的机会来研究新石器时代早期社区人类互动的空间模式。尽管人们有兴趣了解社区组织的变化，这些变化可能伴随着粮食生产的出现和发展，但在家庭组成和社区结构方面仍然存在很大分歧。 虽然特征、人工制品和生态事实的空间模式（骨头，植物和粪便特征）可以追溯到家庭在经济和社会上的自主程度，这种详细的空间研究迄今尚未在该地区进行。拟议研究的更广泛影响包括教学部分，研究生将参与涉及研究设计的全方位科学相关任务，现场和实验室仪器、数据管理、假设检验和报告准备。