Carbon and oxygen stable isotopic evidence for diverse sheep and goat husbandry strategies amid a Final Bronze Age farming milieu in the Kyrgyz Tian Shan

Abstract

The mountains of Central Asia during the Bronze and Iron Ages are increasingly being reconceived as an important zone for intensive crop cultivation in combination with pastoralist herding. However, very little information is known about how farming practices intersected with livestock husbandry, especially at high-elevation sites. This paper presents the first insights to ancient animal management strategies in the Tian Shan through incremental carbon and oxygen stable isotope analysis of domesticated caprine teeth recovered from the Chap-1 farmstead located at 2000 m.a.s.l. in Kyrgyzstan (1065 to 825 cal BCE). We implemented a fully reproducible analysis of time-series isotope data in the R programming language. Results show subtle but variable manipulation of domesticated caprine diets at subannual scales, suggesting mixed strategies of providing access to a small amount of C 4 plant biomass, in addition to summer movements to high pastures where the overall carbon isotopic composition of graze was depleted in 13 C compared with that of the environs of the site or lowland pastures. Nevertheless, caprine dietary intake was overwhelmingly dominated by C 3 plants. Analysis of domesticated caprine birth seasonality reveals off-season fall and winter births, which represent a common strategy employed by ancient producers in Central Asia to improve herd security and extend meat and milk availability. This study illustrates a well-integrated system of agro-pastoralist production that can help clarify the social dynamics underlying food systems in the mountain regions of Central and Inner Asia in the Final Bronze Age. It further reveals the capability for more sedentary agro-pastoralist communities to facilitate wider interregional cultural connections, through limited seasonal herding mobility and investment in highland settlement.

Experimental Data from Lacaune and Merino Sheep Provide New Methodological and Theoretical Grounds to Investigate Autumn Lambing in Past Husbandries

“…In sharp contrast to this pattern, predominant autumn and winter sheep births are attested at early and middle Neolithic sites in southern France and the Iberian Peninsula (Tornero et al, 2020;Sierra et al, 2021;Fabre et al, 2021). Autumn births were also reported at Bronze and Iron Age sites in Central Asia (Kazakhstan;Ventresca Miller et al, 2020;Hermes et al, 2022) and at Late Bronze Age sites in the South Caucasus (Chazin, 2021), although current data sets indicate low occurrence. In our opinion, this low occurrence does not reflect the herders' strategy towards autumnal lambing.…”

Subsistence and animal management at Iron Age sites of Quanshuigou and Dumuduebudege in western Xinjiang, China

“…The sites of Quanshuigou and Dumuduebudege are located in western Xinjiang, which was a key region linking Central Asia and the other part of Xinjiang, China, for understanding the evolution of agropastoralist lifeways. In Central Asia, despite that varied animal husbanding strategies such as feeding caprines with or without millets have been recognized (Hermes et al, 2019(Hermes et al, , 2022, mixed pastoralism comprising caprines, cattle, and within one herding group has been developed by local mobile pastoralists during the Bronze Age and Iron Age periods (Ananyevskaya et al, 2021;Chang et al, 2003;Doumani et al, 2015;Frachetti & Benecke, 2009;Haruda, 2018). In Xinjiang, mixed pastoralism including a full range of caprines, cattle, and horses seemed rare in the Bronze Age, but such herds became a typical lifeway throughout the dynastic periods (Dong, 2019).…”

Montane Ecoclines in Ancient Central Asia: A Preliminary Study of Agropastoral Economies in Juuku, Kyrgyzstan

“…Isotopic studies of human remains, animal bone collections, and cereal grains from Kazakhstan Bronze Age and Iron Age sites have revolutionized our previous ideas about archaeological mobility [45][46][47]. In Kyrgyzstan, Hermes, and his colleagues [48] examined the isotopic signatures of carbon and oxygen from sheep and goat teeth at Chap I settlement (1065 to 825 BC). Their results suggest that there was foddering and vertical transhumance during the Final Bronze Age [48].…”

“…In Kyrgyzstan, Hermes, and his colleagues [48] examined the isotopic signatures of carbon and oxygen from sheep and goat teeth at Chap I settlement (1065 to 825 BC). Their results suggest that there was foddering and vertical transhumance during the Final Bronze Age [48]. In European regions, experimental studies on cereal cultivation show marked nitrogen isotopes, especially when crops have been manured and/or irrigated for long periods of time [49]).…”