Risk, Reliability and Resilience: Phytolith Evidence for Alternative ‘Neolithization’ Pathways at Kharaneh IV in the Azraq Basin, Jordan

Abstract

‘Neolithization’ pathway refers to the development of adaptations that characterized subsequent Neolithic life, sedentary occupations, and agriculture. In the Levant, the origins of these human behaviors are widely argued to have emerged during the Early Epipaleolithic (ca. 23 ka cal BP). Consequently, there has been a pre-occupation with identifying and modeling the dietary shift to cereal and grains during this period, which is considered to have been a key development that facilitated increasing sedentism and, eventually, agriculture. Yet, direct evidence of plant use in the form of macrobotanical remains is extremely limited at Epipaleolithic sites and the expected ‘Neolithization’ pathway has not been robustly demonstrated. However, new direct microbotanical phytolith evidence from the large aggregation site of Kharaneh IV, in the Azraq Basin, suggests that increasingly settled occupation was not the result of wild grass and cereal use, but rather the result of a typical hunter-gatherer balance, based on the use of mostly reliable resources supplemented by some risky resources. Moreover, and illustrating this balance, the direct botanical evidence emphases the importance of the wetlands as an under-recognized reliable plant resource. Significantly, the use of these reliable wetland plant resources at Kharaneh IV represents an unexpected ‘Neolithization’ pathway.

Centered on the Wetlands: Integrating New Phytolith Evidence of Plant-Use From the 23,000-Year-Old Site of Ohalo Ii, Israel

“…For example, in the Great Basin, wetlands were used more intensively in the Holocene as the productivity of those settings increased relative to the surrounding dryland environments (Kelly 2001). Similar dynamics have been described by Nicholas (2007:247–248) for the Paleoindian and Early Archaic hunter-gatherers at Robbins Swamp in the northeastern United States and by Ramsey et al (2016) for the Early and Middle Epipaleolithic hunter-gatherers at Kharaneh IV in the Azraq Basin, Jordan.…”

“…Wild plant exploitation among Early and Middle Epipaleolithic hunter-gatherers (ca. 23,000–15,500 cal BP) has received comparatively less scholarly attention or study, mostly due to the scarcity of sites in this time period with well-preserved macrobotanical remains (Bar-Yosef and Belfer-Cohen 2010; but see Ramsey et al 2015; Ramsey et al 2016; Ramsey and Rosen 2016).…”

A systematic review of wild grass exploitation in relation to emerging cereal cultivation throughout the Epipalaeolithic and aceramic Neolithic of the Fertile Crescent

“…We therefore have to speculate whether wild grasses were continuously gathered throughout the Epipalaeolithic and the phytolith evidence rather points to shifting subsistence strategies, depending on the changing availability of plant resources through space and time. Phytolith evidence from Kharaneh IV in the Azraq basin in Jordan, combined with Ohalo II, indeed suggests that localized year-round habitations during the Early-Middle Epipaleolithic in the southern Levant were mainly based on wetland resources and not primarily on the exploitation of wild grasses and cereals [ 58 , 106 , 107 ].…”

The Zagros Epipalaeolithic revisited: New excavations and 14C dates from Palegawra cave in Iraqi Kurdistan

“…The WA backed bladelet category comprises arched backed bladelets, backed and obliquely truncated bladelets, and other backed and truncated bladelets ( [9]: pp. [131][132][133][134][135][136][137][138][139][140][141][142][143]. When compared to the combined proportions of similar categories in the EFEC assemblage, the WA appears to contain slightly lower proportions of these microlith types (Fig 34) while scalenes appear in similar proportions in both assemblages.…”