Dry, rainfed or irrigated? Reevaluating the role and development of rice agriculture in Iron Age-Early Historic South India using archaeobotanical approaches

Domestic rice agriculture had spread across the mainland Indian subcontinent by c.500 BC. The initial spread of rice outside the core zone of the central Gangetic Plains is thought to have been limited by climatic constraints, particularly seasonal rainfall levels, and so the later spread of rice into the dry regions of South India is largely supposed to have relied on irrigation. This has been associated with the development of ritual water features in the Iron Age (c.1000–500 BC), and to the subsequent development of tanks (reservoirs) during the period of Early Historic state development (c.500 BC–500 AD). The identification of early irrigation systems within South Asia has largely relied on early historical texts, and not on direct archaeological evidence. This initial investigation attempts to identify irrigated rice cultivation in the Indian subcontinent by directly examining rice crop remains (phytolith and macrobotanical data) from four sites. The evidence presented here shows that, contrary to accepted narratives, rice agriculture in the Iron Age-Early Historic South India may not have been supported by irrigated paddy fields, but may have relied on seasonal rainfall as elsewhere in the subcontinent. More caution is urged, therefore, when using terms related to ‘irrigation’ and ‘agricultural intensification’ in discussions of the Iron Age and Early Historic South Asia and the related developments of urbanism and state polities

Early rice agriculture in South Asia. Identifying cultivation systems using archaeobotany

South Asia saw the cultivation of rice perhaps as early as c.6500 BC. Domestic rice agriculture had spread across the Indian subcontinent by c.1500 BC, and to Sri Lanka by c.500 BC. The initial spread of rice outside the core zone of the central Gangetic Plains is thought to have been limited by climatic constraints, particularly seasonal rainfall levels. The later spread of rice into the dry regions of South India and Sri Lanka is largely supposed to have relied on irrigation, which would have contributed significantly to global methane levels. The identification of early irrigation within the South Asian archaeological record has largely focused on dating irrigation structures such as tank walls and damns. The results support historical texts and places the initial phase of damn and tank construction in Central and South India at around 600-200 BC and link it to the desire of rulers of early states to gain fame as beneficent kings by improving agricultural yields. However, no investigations into the establishment of irrigated agriculture have been conducted using archaeobotanic data. This project looks at macrobotanical and phytolith evidence from six early rice producing sites from across South Asia: Tokwa, Golbai Sasan, Gopalpur, Perur, Kodumanal and Mantai. Traditional analysis of the weed flora and correspondence analysis of the phytolith data has allowed the rice field systems of each of these sites to be recreated and placed within the wider South Asia context. This shows that, contrary to accepted narratives, rice agriculture in South India was not supported by irrigated paddy fields but may have relied on seasonal rainfall as elsewhere in the subcontinent. Equally, the evidence from Sri Lanka does not support irrigated paddy field cultivation but rather rainfed cultivation, perhaps supplemented by irrigation. This project was funded by NERC as part of the Early Rice Project (www.ucl.ac.uk/rice)

Shifting cultivators in South Asia: Expansion, marginalisation and specialisation over the long term

This paper will consider alternative perspectives on the long-term history of shifting cultivation in India and Sri Lanka. Ethnographic and historical accounts of shifting cultivation, often by groups marginal to centres of urbanism and agrarian civilisation, are reviewed. Shifting cultivation persists in hill regions which are more marginal for sedentary, high intensity agriculture and state procurement of taxation. This can be considered as a strategy both to exploit more marginal lands and to avoid state domination. The origins of this historical equilibrium are hypothesized to lie with the expansion of later Neolithic agriculture (4000–3000 BP) and the development of hierarchical polities in the Indian plains in the Iron Age (mainly after 3000 BP). The archaeological record of early agriculture indicates that cultivation precedes sedentary villages, suggesting that shifting cultivation may have been a widespread economic system in the Neolithic, in both the Ganges Valley and the Deccan Plateau of South India. These areas are more suited to sedentary cultivation that could support higher population densities. Therefore, as populations grew in the Neolithic the economic system shifted to sedentary agriculture. The expansion of trade networks, hierarchical societies and demographic density pushed shifting cultivation practices into increasingly marginal settings, where this became an interdependent strategy. Specialist hunter–gatherers trading in forest products became an increasingly important aspect of forest exploitation as did cultivation of ‘cash crop trees’. The potential to detect the effect of some of these processes in archaeological and palynological evidence is explored

Comparing Pathways to Agriculture

The transition from foraging systems to agricultural dependence is a persistent focus of archaeological research, and the focus of a major research project supported by the European Research Council (ERC grant no. 323842, ’ComPAg’). Gordon Childe, director of the Institute of Archaeology 1947–1957, influentially defined the Neolithic revolution as that which instigated a series of changes in human societies towards sedentism (settling in one place), larger populations, food production based on domesticated plants and animals, transformed cosmologies and the dawn of new malleable technologies such as ceramics and textiles (Childe 1936)

Archaeobotanical Investigations into Golbai Sasan and Gopalpur, Two Neolithic-Chalcolithic Settlements of Odisha

This paper presents the results of plant macro-remain and phytolith analyses from two Neolithic-Early Historic mounded settlement sites in Odisha, eastern India: Gopalpur and Golbai Sasan. Macrobotanical and phytolith samples were taken throughout the stratigraphy and the results are presented here. The plant remains confirm the presence of a distinct agricultural economy in Neolithic-Chalcolithic Odisha based on rice (Oryza sativa), pulses (Vigna spp., Macrotyloma uniflorium and Cajanus cajan) and millets (Bracharia ramosa, Panicum spp., Setaria spp. and possibly Paspalum sp.). Crop processing activities have been reconstructed using both phytoliths and macro-remains, and suggest that threshing occurred off site as part of a communal harvesting strategy. Potential differences between the economies of Golbai Sasan and Gopalpur are suggested, with a broader range of pulses present at Gopalpur. Radiocarbon dates from individual rice grains and legumes provide a secure chronology for the sites. This paper therefore provides the first published details for the agricultural base of the Neolithic-Chalcolithic coastal lowlands in Odisha, as well as new AMS radiocarbon dates for the Odishan Neolithic-Chalcolithic period

A step forward in tropical anthracology: understanding woodland vegetation and wood uses in ancient Sri Lanka based on charcoal records from Mantai, Kirinda and Kantharodai

The aim of this study is to present the anthracological results from three archaeological sites located in the North, North West and South East of Sri Lanka. The study is based on the observation and analysis of 1689 charcoal fragments using for support the reference collection of South Indian wood at the Institute of Archaeology ( UCL), Inside Wood (2004-onwards) and several wood anatomy atlases. Mantai (200 BCE-850 CE), an urban site, has yielded 25 taxa with significant presence of cf. Cocos nucifera among other taxa. Kantharodai (400-170- BCE), an urban site, has yielded 19 taxa from arid zones (Fabaceae, Rubiaceae), mangroves (Rhizophoraceae) and dune zones (cf. Cocos nucifera). Kirinda (500–900 CE), a fishing settlement, has yielded 24 taxa including Fabaceae (Dalbergia, Acacia) and Rubiaceae, belonging to dry deciduous forest and open savannas. This collective data set allows for the identification of discernible patterns related to the use of ecological interfaces between the forest and the open plains, used and actively managed by humans, and the possibility to identify if this changed with an increase in maritime trade and/or changes in agriculture over time. This study provides evidence of the differences in the vegetation present as well as use of wood fuel and other specific uses of wood for each site examined. It also sheds new light on tropical anthracology regarding quantification and accuracy in taxa identification

Spice and rice: Pepper, cloves and everyday cereal foods at the ancient port of Mantai, Sri Lanka

Lying on the north-west coast of Sri Lanka, the ancient port of Mantai was ideally situated as a 'hub' for trade between East and West from the first millennium BC onwards. Excavations at the site were interrupted by civil war in 1984, delaying publication of these results and leading to the underestimation of Mantai's importance in the development of Early Historic Indian Ocean trade. Renewed excavations in 2009-2010 yielded extensive archaeobotanical remains, which, alongside an improved understanding of the site's chronology, provide important new insights into the development of local and regional trade routes and direct evidence for early trade in the valuable spices upon which later empires were founded

A tale of two rice varieties: Modelling the prehistoric dispersals of japonica and proto-indica rices

© The Author(s) 2018. We model the prehistoric dispersals of two rice varieties, japonica and proto-indica, across Asia using empirical evidence drawn from an archaeobotanical dataset of 400 sites from mainland East, Southeast and South Asia. The approach is based on regression modelling wherein goodness of fit is obtained from log–log quantile regressions of the archaeologically inferred age versus a least-cost distance from the origin(s) of dispersal. The Fast Marching method is used to estimate the least-cost distances based on simple geographical features. We explicitly test three hypotheses for the arrival of japonica rice to India where, it has been proposed, it hybridized with the indigenous proto-indica, subsequently spreading again throughout India. Model selection, based on information criteria, highlights the role of the Inner Asia Mountain Corridor in introducing japonica rice into northeast India, followed closely by a ‘mixed-route’ model, where japonica was also almost simultaneously introduced via Assam, Bangladesh and Myanmar. Finally, we estimate the impact of future archaeological work on model selection, further strengthening the importance of the Inner Asia Mountain Corridor

A stable isotope perspective on archaeological agricultural variability and Neolithic experimentation in India

Agriculture has been crucial in sustaining human populations in South Asia across dramatically variable environments for millennia. Until recently, however, the origins of this mode of subsistence in India have been discussed in terms of population migration and crop introduction, with limited focus on how agricultural packages were formulated and utilised in local contexts. Here, we report the first measurements of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope values in well-preserved charred crop remains from sites spanning the Neolithic/Chalcolithic to the Early Historic in two very different environmental zones: tropical East India and the semi-arid Deccan. The results show that this approach offers direct insight into prehistoric crop management under contrasting environmental constraints. Our preliminary results plausibly suggest that early farmers in India experimented with and made strategic use of water and manure resources in accordance with specific crop requirements and under varying environmental constraints. We suggest that the development of modern crop isotope baselines across India, and the application of this methodology to archaeological assemblages, has the potential to yield detailed insight into agroecology in India's past

The Khmer did not live by rice alone: Archaeobotanical investigations at Angkor Wat and Ta Prohm

21 pages. Published first in "Archaeological Research in Asia" by ElsevierThe Angkorian Empire was at its peak from the 10th to 13th centuries CE. It wielded great influence across mainland Southeast Asia and is now one of the most archaeologically visible polities due to its expansive religious building works. This paper presents archaeobotanical evidence from two of the most renowned Angkorian temples largely associated with kings and elites, Angkor Wat and Ta Prohm. But it focuses on the people that dwelt within the temple enclosures, some of whom were involved in the daily functions of the temple. Archaeological work indicates that temple enclosures were areas of habitation within the Angkorian urban core and the temples and their enclosures were ritual, political, social, and economic landscapes. This paper provides the first attempt to reconstruct some aspects of the lives of the non-elites living within the temple enclosures by examining the archaeobotanical evidence, both macroremains and phytoliths, from residential contexts and data derived from inscriptions and Zhou Daguan's historical account dating to the 13th century CE. Research indicates that plants found within the temple enclosure of Ta Prohm and Angkor Wat were grown for ritual or medicinal use, and also formed important components of the diet and household economy.We wish to thank the APSARA National Authority for their collaboration and permission to undertake excavations within the Angkor Wat and Ta Prohm enclosures. We thank So Malay and Martin King for administrative support, and Greater Angkor Project 2013–2015 field crew members, whose labor supported this research. This work was supported by the Australian Research Council [grant number DP1092663]. The 2015 fieldwork at Angkor Wat was also supported by the National Geographic Society's Committee for Research and Exploration Grant and a Dumbarton Oaks Project Grant. The phytolith samples from Angkor Wat were collected by Tegan McGillivray in 2015, processed at University College London by Lindsay Duncan, counted by Alison Weisskopf and analysed by Eleanor Kingwell-Banham. Archaeobotanical research at Ta Prohm was supported by Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) [grant number NE/N010957/1]. We also wish to thank The Robert Christie Foundation. Finally, we would like to thank Philip Piper for the financial support of the dating of botanical remains through the Australian Research Council Future Fellowship [grant number FT100100527] and Rachel Wood for radiocarbon dating the samples