The measurement of meaning

An Atlas of Past and Present Pollen Maps for Europe: 0-13000 Years Ago, and The Overlay Maps.

Time is divided by geologists according to marked shifts in Earth's state. Recent global environmental changes suggest that Earth may have entered a new human-dominated geological epoch, the Anthropocene. Here we review the historical genesis of the idea and assess anthropogenic signatures in the geological record against the formal requirements for the recognition of a new epoch. The evidence suggests that of the various proposed dates two do appear to conform to the criteria to mark the beginning of the Anthropocene: 1610 and 1964. The formal establishment of an Anthropocene Epoch would mark a fundamental change in the relationship between humans and the Earth system.

Defining the Anthropocene

Phylogenetic Variation in the Silicon Composition of Plants

http://www.u.arizona.edu/~mstiner/pdf/Stiner_etal1995.pdf

Differential Burning, Recrystallization, and Fragmentation of Archaeological Bone

Silica skeletons (fossilized sections of epidermal tissue) are frequent components in Near Eastern archaeological sediments. Culm (straw) and husks (grain bracts) produce different cell patterns that allow determination of plant part; this in turn provides information about use of activity areas. Identification of taxa is still preliminary; data is presented for wheat, barley, date palm, and three genera of weedy grasses. The distinctive anatomical characteristics of wheat, barley and date palm have not yet been compared to all possible wild confusers. However, within Levantine archaeological sites, strong suggestions of these cultigens can be proposed based on phytolith evidence.

Preliminary Identification of Silica Skeletons from Near Eastern Archaeological Sites: An Anatomical Approach

1 Holocent Climate and Society 2 Tools for Understanding Paleoenvironments in the Southern Levant 3 Land and History: Introduction to the Modern Landscape and Historical Framework 4 Paleoenvironments of the Near East: The Retreat of the Pleistocene 5 Holocene Paleoenvironments of the Near East 6 From Hunter-Gatherers to Village Farmers: The Role of Climate Change in the Origins of Agriculture 7 Early Complex Societies: Climate Change and Collapse of Early Bronze Age Societies 8 Empires in the Desert 9 Civilizing Climate

https://www.paleoanthro.org/static/journal/content/PA20080203.pdf

Civilizing Climate: Social Responses to Climate Change in the Ancient Near East

Identifying ancient irrigation: a new method using opaline phytoliths from emmer wheat

Climatic forcing during the Younger Dryas (∼12.9–11.5 ky B.P.) event has become the theoretical basis to explain the origins of agricultural lifestyles in the Levant by suggesting a failure of foraging societies to adjust. This explanation however, does not fit the scarcity of data for predomestication cultivation in the Natufian Period. The resilience of Younger Dryas foragers is better illustrated by a concept of adaptive cycles within a theory of adaptive change (resilience theory). Such cycles consist of four phases: release/collapse (Ω); reorganization (α), when the system restructures itself after a catastrophic stimulus through innovation and social memory—a period of greater resilience and less vulnerability; exploitation (r); and conservation (K), representing an increasingly rigid system that loses flexibility to change. The Kebarans and Late Natufians had similar responses to cold and dry conditions vs. Early Natufians and the Pre-Pottery Neolithic A responses to warm and wet climates. Kebarans and Late Natufians (α-phase) shifted to a broader-based diet and increased their mobility. Early Natufian and Pre-Pottery Neolithic A populations (r- and K-phases) had a growing investment in more narrowly focused, high-yield plant resources, but they maintained the broad range of hunted animals because of increased sedentism. These human adaptive cycles interlocked with plant and animal cycles. Forest and grassland vegetation responded to late Pleistocene and early Holocene climatic fluctuations, but prey animal cycles reflected the impact of human hunting pressure. The combination of these three adaptive cycles results in a model of human adaptation, showing potential for great sustainability of Levantine foraging systems even under adverse climatic conditions.

https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/109/10/3640.full.pdf

Climate change, adaptive cycles, and the persistence of foraging economies during the late Pleistocene/Holocene transition in the Levant

Interwoven with the debate regarding the biologic replacement of Neanderthals by modern humans is the question of the degree to which Neanderthals and modern foragers differed behaviorally. We consider this question through a detailed spatial analysis of artifacts and related evidence from stratified living floors within a 49–69 k.y.a. rock shelter site, Tor Faraj, in southern Jordan. The study involves a critical evaluation of living floors, the identification of site structure, and the decoding of the site structure in an effort to understand how the inhabitants of the shelter organized their behaviors. The site structure of Tor Faraj is also compared to occupations of modern foragers in ethnographic and archaeological contexts. When the information from the excavation of Tor Faraj is considered with evidence from other late Middle Paleolithic sites, there seems to be little basis for the claims that constraints in the behavioral organization of Neanderthals led to their replacement by modern foragers.

Arlene M. Rosen

Papers

Preliminary Identification of Silica Skeletons from Near Eastern Archaeological Sites: An Anatomical Approach

Civilizing Climate: Social Responses to Climate Change in the Ancient Near East

Identifying ancient irrigation: a new method using opaline phytoliths from emmer wheat

Climate change, adaptive cycles, and the persistence of foraging economies during the late Pleistocene/Holocene transition in the Levant

Human Behavioral Organization in the Middle Paleolithic: Were Neanderthals Different?