Origin and spread of wheat in China

Wheat was added as a new crop to the existing millet and rice based agricultural systems of China. Here we present 35 radiocarbon ages from wheat seeds collected from 18 sites between western (Xinjiang Province) and eastern (Henan Province) China. The earliest wheat ages cluster around 2100-1800 BCE in northern China&#39;s Hexi corridor of Gansu Province, where millet was already a well-established crop. Wheat first appears in Xinjiang and Henan about 300-400 years later, and perhaps a little earlier than this in Xinjiang, and we hypothesize that the likely route of wheat into China was via Russia through Gansu.</p

Subsistence and the isotopic signature of herding in the Bronze Age Hexi Corridor, NW Gansu, China

Dietary patterns at two Bronze Age sites in the Hexi Corridor are investigated by the analysis of stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes in faunal bone collagen. The findings are compared with archaeobotanical remains from one of the sites which include high proportions of millet (Panicum miliaceum and Setaria italica) as well as the western derived cereals wheat (Triticum aestivum), barley (Hordeum vulgare) and oat (Avena sativa). The isotopic data indicate domestic omnivores (Canis and Sus) had diets dominated by millet. Minimally offset delta(15)N values between herbivore and omnivore fauna suggest low consumption of animal protein by omnivores. Diets of herded animal (Bos and Caprinae) included only low proportions of C4 foods, suggesting that these animals were not regularly foddered with millet plants, and that their grazing areas were mostly beyond the agricultural zone. The wide range in delta(15)N values amongst herbivore fauna (4.1 parts per thousand-11.8 parts per thousand) suggests grazing occurred in a variety of ecological zones, and this would be consistent with the occurrence of long-distance transport of livestock in the region.</p