This paper explores the contribution of plant food to the diet of societies in Kazakhstan that are often assumed to be pastoralist. Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analysis, together with radiocarbon dating, was carried out on human and animal bones from 24 Chalcolithic, Bronze Age, Early Iron Age, Hunic and Turkic sites across Kazakhstan. We use these data to examine dietary differences across time and space within and between populations. Our results show that at the Bronze Age sites of mountainous southern Kazakhstan people consumed C4 plants, likely domesticated millets (Panicum miliaceum or Setaria italica) and probably cultivated C3 plants (wheat or barley). By directly dating individuals with high δ 13 C values we were able to find the earliest evidence of the consumption of large quantities of millet in Central Asia to date. By contrast, there is little input of C4 plants to diets of individuals dating to the Bronze Age from northern Kazakhstan. Stable isotope data from later periods all across the region has shown that from the Early Iron Age and continuing through to the Turkic period, C4 plants were a major component of the human food web. The wide variety of stable isotope results, both within and between contemporary sites, indicates a diversity of foodways, rather than a uniform focus on pastoralism.

This paper presents new radiocarbon dates and the results of the first archaeobotanical investigations at Eneolithic Botai site, for the first time aiming to explore the plant food component in the diet of Botai population and if the inhabitants of the Botai were a part of an early crop food exchange network. Our excavation of a hut circle and associated radiocarbon dating placed its occupation within a date range commencing around 3550 and 3030 cal BC and ending between 3080 and 2670 cal BC. A separate feature (likely a stove or kiln), excavated in test trench E, would seem to be younger, around 2000 cal BC. The dating of the site thus also indicates a previously unknown later occupation at Botai, opening further discussions on human subsistence and interaction as well as horse management in northern Eurasia from the Eneolithic to the Bronze Age. The archaeobotanical results, derived from systematic sampling and analysis of macrobotanical remains, plant phytoliths, and molecular biomarker analysis show that the Botai populations were not part of any wider crop network. The relatively small seed count would indicate that plant foods did not constitute a substantial component of economic life. On the other hand, the presence of miliacin could suggest possible millet cultivation or consumption in this region at some point in the past, possibly after the main occupation period of Botai.