Journal
ANTIQUITY
Volume 89, Issue 347, Pages 1051-1063Publisher
CAMBRIDGE UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.15184/aqy.2015.94
Keywords
China; Neolithic; cultivation; archaeobotany; irrigation; ecology
Categories
Funding
- Suzhou Museum at Caoxieshan
- Zhejiang Province Institute of Archaeology and Cultural Relics at Tianluoshan and Maoshan
- UK Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) [NE/G005540/1]
- NERC [NE/K003402/1]
- NERC [NE/K003402/1, NE/G005540/1] Funding Source: UKRI
- Natural Environment Research Council [NE/G005540/1, NE/K003402/1] Funding Source: researchfish
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The cultivation of rice has had a major impact on both societies and their environments in Asia, and in China in particular. Phytolith assemblages from three Neolithic sites in the Lower Yangtze valley reveal that in early rice fields the emphasis was on drainage to limit the amount of water and force the rice to produce seed. It was only in the later third millennium BC that the strategy changed and irrigated paddies came into use. The results demonstrate that plant remains, including weed assemblages, can reveal wetter or drier growing conditions, showing changes in rice cultivation from flooded and drained fields to large, intensively irrigated paddies.
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