Multi-isotope evidence of population aggregation in the Natufian and scant migration during the early Neolithic of the Southern Levant

Abstract

Human mobility and migration are thought to have played essential roles in the consolidation and expansion of sedentary villages, long-distance exchanges and transmission of ideas and practices during the Neolithic transition of the Near East. Few isotopic studies of human remains dating to this early complex transition offer direct evidence of mobility and migration. The aim of this study is to identify first-generation non-local individuals from Natufian to Pre-Pottery Neolithic C periods to explore the scope of human mobility and migration during the Neolithic transition in the Southern Levant, an area that is central to this historical process. The study adopted a multi-approach resorting to strontium (87Sr/86Sr), oxygen (δ18OVSMOW) and carbon (δ13C) isotope ratio analyses of tooth enamel of 67 human individuals from five sites in Jordan, Syria, and Israel. The isotope ratios point both to a significant level of human migration and/or mobility in the Final Natufian which is compatible with early sedentarism and seasonal mobility and with population aggregation in early sedentary hamlets. The current findings, in turn, offer evidence that most individuals dating to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic were local to their respective settlements despite certain evidence of non-locals. Interestingly, isotopic data suggest that two possible non-local individuals benefitted from particular burial practices. The results underscore a decrease in human mobility and migration as farming became increasingly dominant among the subsistence strategies throughout the Neolithic transition of the Southern Levant.

Insights into Natufian Social Identity: A Case Study from the Graveyard of Hayonim Cave

“…Yet, if we consider the fact that the size of a Natufian group as reflected in the site sizes was still not large enough to sustain an autonomously viable mating system, those groups had to interact at some point, on a regular basis (Santana et al . 2021).…”

“…Unlike the clear evidence for the existence of a Levantine 'interaction sphere' in the PPNB (Bar-Yosef & Belfer-Cohen 1989), the data to claim a Natufian 'interaction sphere' are rather fuzzy and the information as regards locations and circumstances of Natufian inter-group meetings is mute. Yet, if we consider the fact that the size of a Natufian group as reflected in the site sizes was still not large enough to sustain an autonomously viable mating system, those groups had to interact at some point, on a regular basis (Santana et al 2021).…”

Mobility and kinship in the world’s first village societies

“…These houses, beneath which the dead are most often buried, have been suggested as having been used by families ( 20 ) or more complex socially organized kin ( 21 , 22 ). Bioarchaeology in southwest Asia has since provided an insight into genetic relatedness, enabling past kinship behaviors to be determined directly from human remains via biological anthropology and geochemistry ( 23 – 27 ) and most recently by ancient DNA ( 28 – 33 ); see also SI Appendix , SI Text 2 for an extended discussion. Genetic data, however, provide evidence of the population origins of a community, rather than their birth location.…”

Considerations on the mechanisms of integration of the dead in the early sedentary societies of the Near East (Natufian, 15-11.6 ka cal BP)

“…Moreover, strontium isotope studies suggest continuing significant mobility of individuals during the course of their life within the Natufian territory (e.g. Santana et al, 2021). In the permanent hamlets, many burials are located within the domestic space.…”

“…Some graves, especially among the earliest, seem to narrate an individual or collective memory through an elaborate staging of the burials. The deceased, or more frequently the deceased buried together, were not necessarily the centre of attention: their place in the grave is shared, even peripheral (Bocquentin 2014;2021). There may be an accumulation of corpses in neat but unusual positions, or a group of individuals arranged in a circle around a broken mortar, or a complex arrangement associating the dead with dogs (the only domestic animal) and/or selected remains of hunted species (Valla, 1999;2012;Grosman et al, 2008).…”