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Matrilocality during the prehistoric transition to agriculture in Thailand?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 March 2015

R. Alexander Bentley ,
Michael Pietrusewsky ,
Michele T. Douglas  and
Tim C. Atkinson
R. Alexander Bentley
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Durham, 43 Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HN, UK (Email: r.a.bentley@durham.ac.uk)
Michael Pietrusewsky
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Hawai’i-Manoa, 2424 Maile Way, Saunders Hall 346, Honolulu, Hawai’i 96822-2223, USA (Email: mikep@hawaii.edu)
Michele T. Douglas
Affiliation:
Affiliate Graduate Faculty, University of Hawai’i-Manoa, 4020 Edgehill Road, Fort Worth, TX 76116-7325, USA (Email: toomaydoug@cs.com)
Tim C. Atkinson
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, University College London, Gower Street London WC1E 6BT, UK (Email: t.atkinson@ucl.ac.uk)
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Abstract

Stable isotopes in teeth are providing important correlations between ancient people and the geographical location of their childhood homes. In an exciting new application, the authors measured the varying signatures of strontium, oxygen and carbon isotopes in the teeth of a sequence of people buried in Thailand during the period of the introduction and intensification of agriculture. Preliminary results point to the arrival of immigrant men, followed by a change in the relationship between the sexes: the women grow up on local food, the men have access to more widespread resources. This perhaps implies a matrilocal system, where forager men raised elsewhere marry into farming communities. It provides a likely antithesis to the social consequences of introducing agriculture into central Europe.

Keywords

Southeast AsiaNeolithic agriculturemarital residencestrontium isotope analysisoxygen isotope analysis
Type
Method
Information
Antiquity , Volume 79 , Issue 306 , December 2005 , pp. 865 - 881
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2005

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