Descrizione del progetto
L’avvento dell’agricoltura nell’ottica dell’interazione tra esseri umani e piante
Non disponiamo ancora di una completa comprensione del modo in cui i cacciatori-raccoglitori hanno iniziato a prendersi cura delle piante. Avvalendosi principalmente di resti vegetali ritrovati presso siti archeologici, il progetto del Consiglio europeo della ricerca PalaeOrigins esplorerà il modo in cui i cacciatori-raccoglitori vissuti nel periodo dell’Epipaleolitico (ovvero tra i 23 000 e gli 11 600 anni fa) gestivano le proprie risorse terriere e vegetali. Inoltre, il progetto stabilirà se siano state dinamiche di tipo climatico o culturale ad aver portato all’avvento della produzione vegetale a scopo alimentare. Il progetto introdurrà un approccio olistico ad alta risoluzione per l’analisi della sussistenza basata sulle piante.
Obiettivo
The transition from foraging to farming represents one of the most transcendental shifts in the history of humanity. Decades of research in southwest Asia have shown that this process culminated with the development of Neolithic agricultural systems c. 10 ka cal. BP. Yet, how it started, that is, how hunter-gatherers became, for the first time, engaged with the management of plants, continues to be largely undetermined. Palaeorigins aims to fill this major gap of knowledge. Benefiting from the exceptional Epipalaeolithic archaeobotanical materials that are now available (c. 23-11 ka cal. BP), it will ask: To what extent were Epipalaeolithic hunter-gatherers managing the land and the plant resources around them? Did climatic factors trigger plant resource intensification, or were cultural dynamics, like the need for specific foodstuffs, that first motivated plant-food production? To achieve such an ambitious aim PalaeOrigins will pioneer a holistic and high-resolution approach to study the plant-based subsistence. It will use a unique combination of traditional and most novel archaeobotanical materials, state-of-the-art stable isotope analyses, computational science, and theoretical models to: 1) Reconstruct the distribution and availability of plant resources during the environmental shifts of the late Pleistocene and the early Holocene; 2) Determine how plant procurement strategies, land uses and management activities articulated during the Epipalaeolithic period; and 3) Define hunter-gatherers' food culture, assessing their plant-food selection, processing and consumption practices. Taken together, PalaeOrigins will move beyond traditional Neolithic-centred paradigms to explain the origins of plant-food production. It will open up new research horizons, merging science and theory, to elucidate the nature of the human-environment interactions that paved the way to agriculture, and ultimately, changed the course of our history.
Campo scientifico
- humanitieshistory and archaeologyhistoryprehistory
- natural sciencescomputer and information sciencescomputational science
- medical and health scienceshealth sciencesnutrition
- natural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencespalaeontologypaleoecology
- humanitieshistory and archaeologyarchaeologybioarchaeology
Parole chiave
Programma(i)
- HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme
Argomento(i)
Meccanismo di finanziamento
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC GrantsIstituzione ospitante
48940 Leioa
Spagna