Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-xxrs7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T00:39:22.468Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Investigating early agriculture in Central Asia: new research at Jeitun, Turkmenistan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

D. R. Harris
Affiliation:
Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H OPY, England
V. M. Masson
Affiliation:
Institute of History of Material Culture, Academy of Sciences, 191041 St Petersburg, Dvortzovaya nab. 18, Russia
Y. E. Berezkin
Affiliation:
Institute of History of Material Culture, Academy of Sciences, 191041 St Petersburg, Dvortzovaya nab. 18, Russia
M. P. Charles
Affiliation:
Department of Prehistory & Archaeology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, England
C. Gosden
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, La Trobe University, Bundoora VIC 3083, Australia
G. C. Hillman
Affiliation:
Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31–34 Gordon Square, London WC1H OPY, England
A. K. Kasparov
Affiliation:
Institute of History of Material Culture, Academy of Sciences, 191041 St Petersburg, Dvortzovaya nab. 18, Russia
G. F. Korobkova
Affiliation:
Institute of History of Material Culture, Academy of Sciences, 191041 St Petersburg, Dvortzovaya nab. 18, Russia
K. Kurbansakhatov
Affiliation:
South-Turkmenistan Multi-disciplinary Archaeological Expedition of the Turkmenistan Academy of Sciences, Ashkabad, Turkmenistan, CIS.
A. J. Legge
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, Centre for Extra-Mural Studies, Birkbeck College, University of London, 26 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DQ, England
S. Limbrey
Affiliation:
Department of Ancient History & Archaeology, University of Birmingham, PO Box 363, Birmingham B15 2TT, England

Abstract

In 1989 ANTIQUITY published a special section of papers on the archaeology of the steppe zone, to notice the special role of that great sweep of land that links the northern fringes of early prehistoric agriculture in Europe and Asia. A new international team has now returned to Jeitun, the key early agricultural site in Turkmenistan, on the edge of the Kara Kum desert.

Type
Papers
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Berezkin, Y.E. 1992. Jeitun excavation during the years 1989–1991, Preliminary results, in Masson, (ed.): 1330[in Russian].Google Scholar
Charles, M. & Hillman, G. 1992. Crop husbandry in a desert environment: evidence from the charred plant macro–remains, in Masson, (ed.): 8394[in Russian].Google Scholar
Costantini, L. 1981. The beginning of agriculture in the Kachi Plain: the evidence of Mehrgarh, in Allchin, B. (ed.), South Asian Archaeology: 2931. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dolukhanov, P.M. 1981. The ecological prerequisites for early farming in southern Turkmenia, in Kohl (ed.): 359–85.Google Scholar
Harris, D.R. 1986. Plant and animal domestication and the origins of agriculture: the contribution of radiocarbon accelerator dating, in Gowlett, J.A.J. & Hedges, R.E.M. (ed.), Archaeological results from accelerator dating: 512. Oxford: Oxford University Committee for Archaeology. Monograph 11.Google Scholar
Harris, D.R. 1992. Pollen and charcoal-particle analysis, in Masson, (ed.): 104–6. [in Russian].Google Scholar
Harris, D.R. & Hillman, G.C. (ed.). 1989. Foraging and farming: the evolution of plant exploitation. London: Unwin Hyman.Google Scholar
Harris, D.R. & Limbrey, S. 1992. The present-day environmental setting of Jeitun, in Masson, (ed.): 713 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Hedges, R.E.M., Housley, R.A., Bronk, C.R., & Van KLINKEN, G.J. 1992. Radiocarbon dates from the Oxford AMS System: Archaeometry Datelist 15, Archaeometry 34: 337–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hillman, G.C. 1981. Reconstructing crop husbandry practices from charred remains of crops, in Mercer, R. (ed.), Farming in British prehistory: 123–62. Edinburgh: John Donald.Google Scholar
Hillman, G.C. 1984. Traditional husbandry and processing of archaic cereals in recent times: the operations,products and tools which might feature in Sumerian texts. Part I: the glume wheats, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 1: 114–52. Google Scholar
Hillman, G.C. 1985. Traditional husbandry and processing of archaic cereals in recent times: the operations, products and tools which might feature in Sumerian texts. Part 11: the free-threshing cereals, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 2: 131. Google Scholar
Jarridge, J.F. & Meadow, R.H. 1980. The antecedents of civilization in the Indus Valley, Scientific American, 243: 122–33. CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kasparov, A.K. 1980. Bone collection at the Jeitun settlement, in Masson, (ed.). 5076. [in Russian].Google Scholar
Kohl, P.L. (ed.). 1981. The Bronze Age civilization of central Asia. New York: M.E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Kohl, P.L. 1984. Central Asia: Palaeolithic beginnings to the Iron Age. Paris: Editions Recherche sur les Civilisations. Synthèse 14.Google Scholar
Korobkova, G.F. 1981. Ancient reaping tools and their productivity in the light of experimental tracewear analysis, in Kohl (ed.): 325–49.Google Scholar
Korobkova, G.F., Lollekova, O. & Sharovskaya, T.A. 1992. Use-wear analysis of tools from the third level at Jeitun, in Masson, (ed.): 3449 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Kurbansakhatov, K. 1992. Excavation of the third level at Jeitun, in Masson, 1992: 3034 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Kurbansakhatov, K. 1992. Excavation of the third level at Jeitun, in Masson, 1992: 3034 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Legge, A.J. 1992. The exploitation of sheep and goat at Jeitun, in Masson, (ed.): 7783 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Legge, A.J. & Rowley-CONWY, P.A. 1987. Gazelle killing in Stone Age Syria, Scientific American 257: 8895.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Limbrey, S. 1992a. Auger survey of alluvial sediments and soils, in Masson, (ed.): 99103 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Limbrey, S. 1992b. Micromorphological study of yard deposits, in Masson, (ed.): 94–6 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Lisitsina, G.N. 1984. The Caucasus – a centre of ancient farming in Eurasia. in van Zeist & Casparie (ed.): 285–92.Google Scholar
Masson, V.M. 1957. Jeitun and Kara–tepe, Sovetskaya Arkheologiya 1: 143–60 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Masson, V.M. 1961. The first farmers in Turkmenia, Antiquity 35: 203–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Masson, V.M. 1971. The Jeitun settlement: the emergence of a productive economy. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian]. Materials and Research on the Archaeology of the USSR 180. Google Scholar
Masson, V.M. (Ed.). 1992. New research at the Jeitun settlement (preliminary reports on the work of the Soviet-British expedition). Ashkabad: Academy of Sciences of Turkmenistan [in Russian]. Google Scholar
Massonv, M. & Sarianidi, V.I. 1972. Central Asia: Turkmenia before the Achaemenids. London: Thames & Hudson..Google Scholar
Mellaart, J. 1975. The Neolithic of the Near East. London: Thames & Hudson..Google Scholar
Payne, S. 1973. Kill-off patterns in sheep and goats: the mandibles from Aš van Kale, Anatolian Studies 23: 281303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Popov, K.P. 1979. Pistachio in Central Asia. Ashkabad: N.I. Vavilov All-Union Institute of Plant Industry, Kara-Kala [in Russian].Google Scholar
Pumpelly, R. (ed.). 1908. Explorations in Turkestan: expedition of 1904: prehistoric civilizations of Anau. Washington (DC): Carnegie Institution of Washington.Google Scholar
Shevchenko, A.I. 1960. Towards a history of domestic animals in southern Turkmenistan, Trudy YuTAKE 10: 464–77 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Van ZEIST, W. & Casparie, W.A. (ed.). 1984. Plants and ancient man: studies in palaeoethnobotany. Rotterdam: Balkema.Google Scholar
Yanushevich, Z.V. 1984. The specific composition of wheat finds from ancient agricultural centres in the USSR, in van Zeist & Casparie (ed.): 267–76.Google Scholar
Yanushevich, Z.V. 1989. Agricultural evolution north of the Black Sea from the Neolithic to the Iron Age, in Harris & Hillman (ed.): 607–19.Google Scholar
Zohary, D. 1989. Domestication of the Southwest Asian Neolithic crop assemblage of cereals, pulses, and flax: the evidence from the living plants, in Harris & Hillman (ed.): 358–73.Google Scholar
Zohary, D. & Hopf, M. 1988. Domestication of plants in the Old World. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Zohary, M. 1973. Geobotanic foundations of the Middle East. Stuttgart: Gustav Fischer.Google Scholar