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7/26/2019 Moore a. M. T. and Hillman C. G. the Ple
1/14
Society for merican rchaeology
The Pleistocene to Holocene Transition and Human Economy in Southwest Asia: The Impact ofthe Younger DryasAuthor(s): A. M. T. Moore and G. C. HillmanSource: American Antiquity, Vol. 57, No. 3 (Jul., 1992), pp. 482-494Published by: Society for American ArchaeologyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/280936.
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2/14
THE PLEISTOCENE TO HOLOCENE TRANSITION
AND HUMAN ECONOMY IN SOUTHWEST ASIA:
THE
IMPACT
OF
THE
YOUNGER
DRYAS
A. M. T. Moore and G. C.
Hillman
We
present
new evidence
suggesting
that
the
Late
Glacial
worldwide
episode
of
cooling
known as
the
Younger
Dryas (ca.
11,000-10,000
B.P.)
had a
significant
impact
on
climate,
vegetation,
and human
economy
in
southwest
Asia. In the Levant
a
new
pollen
core extracted
from
Lake
Huleh and
plant
remains
from
the
early village
of
Abu
Hureyra
1
indicate that
forest gave
way
to
steppe
in
response
to
the onset
of
drier
climatic
conditions
contemporary
with the
Younger
Dryas.
Similar
effects
may
be seen in
pollen
cores
from
elsewhere
in southwest
Asia.
This alteration
in
climate
and
vegetation
obliged
the inhabitants
of
Abu
Hureyra
to
modify
their
plant
gathering,
and
led to
significant
disruptions
in
culture
and
settlement
over a wide area. We
argue
that
the stresses
induced
by
these
events
were a
contributing
factor
in the
subsequent development
of
agriculture
in southwest
Asia.
Presentamos
nuevas
evidencias
que
indican
que
el
episodio
de
enfriamiento
global
a
fines
del
periodo
glacial
conocido
como
Younger
Dryas (ca.
11,000-10,000
A.P.)
tuvo
un
significativo
impacto
en el
clima,
la
vegetaci6n
y
la
economia
humana
en el suroeste de Asia. En
el
Levante,
una nueva columna
de
polen
extraida del
Lago
Huleh
y
restos botdnicos
recuperados
en la
aldea
temprana
de Abu
Hureyra
1 indican
que
los
bosques
fueron
reemplazados por estepas
en
respuesta
a condiciones
climdticas mds secas
contempordneas
con
el
Younger
Dryas.
Consecuencias
semejantes
se observan
en columnas
de
polen
provenientes
de
otros
lugares
en
el suroeste
de Asia.
Esta
alteraci6n
en el clima
y
la
prdctica
de recolecci6n
de
plantas
produjo significativos
cambios
en la cultura
y
el asentamiento
en un
drea extensa.
Sostenemos
que
las tensiones
inducidas
por
estos hechos
contribuyeron
al
subsiguiente
desarrollo
de la
agricultura
en
el suroeste
de Asia.
The
transition
from
hunting
and
gathering
to
farming
in
southwest
Asia
coincided
with the
environmental
changes
that
marked the
close of the Pleistocene:
a worldwide increase
in
temperature
that
melted ice sheets
and caused
sea
levels to
rise,
alterations
in
atmospheric
circulation
systems,
and
shifts
in
vegetation
zones.
The climatic
amelioration
was an
uneven
process,
with
episodes
of
increased
warmth
alternating
with
reversions
to
cooler
conditions.
Our aim
in
this
paper
is to
examine
new
evidence
thatat least
one
major
episode
of
cooling,
the
Younger Dryas,
apparently
had
a
profound
effect on the
environment of southwest
Asia,
and
contributed
significantly
to
the
adjustments
in
human
adaptations
that
resulted
in
the
development
of
agriculture.
The
region
within
southwest Asia
with the
most
substantial
record of
environmental
and
cultural
change
is the Levant.
The
Younger
Dryas
climatic
episode
occurred there
during
the second
stage
of
the
Epipaleolithic,
Epipaleolithic
2
(ca.
12,500-10,000
B.P.),
one constituent
culture
of
which
was
the Natufian
in Palestine. This
stage
is
important
because
it
was the
last
period
of
hunting
and
gathering
before
the
dvent of
agriculture;
it
was
also
during
the
Epipaleolithic
2
that
the inhabitants
of some
sites
on
the
middle
Euphrates
River and
in
Palestine
adopted
a more
sedentary
mode
of
life. The
changes
in
economy
and settlement that
took
place
then
are
obviously
of
crucial
importance
for
understanding
the circumstances
in
which
agriculture
developed.
THE
YOUNGER
DRYAS
The
Younger
Dryas
was first
recognized
in
the
pollen
record
of
northern
Europe.
During
the Late
Glacial,
as the
temperature
rose and the
glaciers began
to
retreat,
the tundra
vegetation
was
replaced
by
birch and
pine
woodland;
these
trends
began
during
the
Bo6lling
nd Allerod
pollen
phases
(Iversen
A. M.
T.
Moore,
The Graduate
School,
Yale
University,
1504A
Yale
Station,
New
Haven,
CT 06520-7425
G.
C.
Hillman,
Department
of
Human
Environment,
Institute
ofArchaeology,
University
College
London,
31-
34
Gordon
Square,
London,
WC1H
OPY,
England
AmericanAntiquity, 57(3), 1992,pp. 482-494.
Copyright
?)
1992
by
the
Society
for
American
Archaeology
482
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3/14
REPORTS
1954).
Then
in
the
ensuing Younger
Dryas (pollen
zone
III)
the
temperature
fell
sharply,
the
glaciers
advanced
once
more,
and the woodlands
retreated
southward,
giving way
to
open
tundra
charac-
terized
by Dryas
octopetala
from which the
name of the
episode
is
derived. This
phase
lasted
approximately
1,000
radiocarbon
years,
from
11,000
to
10,000
B.P.
(Berger 1990).1
Radiocarbon
dates for the end of the Younger Dryas are subject to uncertainty because they fall in a period during
which the calibration
curve levels
off
for at least three
centuries;
the
age
of this
event
has,
however,
been established
at
11,100 dendroyears
B.P.
(Becker
and Kromer
1986;
Becker et
al.
1991).
The
pollen
evidence
suggests
that
the
climate
turned
so cold
during
the
Younger
Dryas
that
it
approached
the conditions
of the full
glacial.
This has been confirmed
by
studies of fossil
coleoptera
in
Britain
(Coope
1977:330).
In
the
succeeding
Preboreal and Boreal
phases
the
temperature
rose once
more
and the forest
advanced
rapidly
northward.
The
precise
timing
and effects of the rises and falls
in
temperature
are still
subjects
of
discussion;
the evidence
of
fossil
coleoptera,
for
example,
while
confirming
the
oscillatory
nature
of
late
glacial
environmental
change, suggests
that the
fluctuations
in
temperature may
have
preceded
by
several centuries
the
advances and retreats of the forest
zones
(Coope
1975:167).
The Younger Dryas period of cooling was originally defined in northern Europe, but parallel
vegetation
changes
occurred
elsewhere, making
it a
worldwide
phenomenon.
We therefore
use
the
term
Younger Dryas,
not
just
for the advance
of
Dryas-dominated
tundra in
the
far
north,
but
also
for all the other
changes
in
vegetation
that were induced
by
the same climatic
episode.
It is
the one
period
of
cooling
of
sufficient
intensity
and duration to be seen
clearly
in
the
stage
1
Late
Glacial
section
in
deep-sea
cores
from
the Pacific
(Shackleton
and
Opdyke 1976).
It also
appears
as a
well-
defined
episode
in the Greenland
ice
cores
(Dansgaard
et al.
1982:Figure
1).
Studies
of
coral
reefs
off Barbados have
provided
direct
evidence
of the effect on sea levels of the
Younger Dryas
cooling.
The rise in
sea level slowed
sharply
between
11,000
and
10,500 B.P.,
and
then increased
slightly
from
10,500
to
10,000
B.P.
(Fairbanks
1989:639).
The
Younger Dryas
coincided
with
the
episode
of
major
mammal
extinctions
in
Eurasia
and North
America, lending weight
to the
hypothesis
that
such
rapid
climatic
fluctuations
contributed
to
those
events.
Haynes
(1991:447)
has
argued
that
a
brief, intense period of drought, corresponding in time to the Younger Dryas, was a factor in the
demise
of
many
species
of the
Rancho
La Brea fauna
in North America.
Given that the
Younger Dryas
episode
of
cooling
was a
worldwide
phenomenon,
its
effects should
have been felt
in southwest
Asia,
but
pollen
cores
and
sedimentological analyses
have
provided
little indication
that
it had a
significant
influence
on
the environment
there. The
main
reason
for
this is that
the
environmental
sequences
for
the different
regions
of southwest
Asia are still
very
coarsely
delineated.
Relatively
few
pollen
cores
have been
analyzed,
and
they
have not
provided
such
detailed
replicated
sequences
of
vegetation
change
as those
from northern
Europe,
North
America,
and
elsewhere.
Furthermore,
they
are
dated
with
very
few
radiocarbon
determinations.
Pollen cores
extracted
from locations
in
the
Levant,
the
Ghab
section
of the Orontes
Valley
and
Lake
Huleh,
much of which
today
is a
marsh,
for
example (Figure
1),
showed that
the forest
cover
expanded during the Late Glacial (Niklewski and van Zeist 1970; van Zeist and Bottema 1982:
Figure
14.6).
The Ghab
core
suggested
that
the
forest
expanded
quite
steadily.
The Huleh
sequence,
analyzed
by
Tsukada
and reviewed
by
van
Zeist
and
Bottema,
did
indicate
that
the
vegetation
cover
fluctuated
during
the
period
in
which the
forest
was
expanding,
but this
section
of
the
core lacked
radiocarbon dates.
A
general
increase
in
forest
cover, especially
cedar,
until
sometime
between
12,000
and
11,000
B.P.
is
again
apparent
at
Karamik
Batakhgi
in
western
Anatolia,
and the
same
could
be inferred
for
oak
forest
at
Sogot
Golii,
although
with
only
two
dates
available
in each
case,
exact correlation
is difficult
(van
Zeist and
Bottema
1982:Figures
14.4,
14.14;
van
Zeist
et
al.
1975).
A
steady
increase
in
forest
cover
could
also
be
seen
in the
cores
from
Lake
Zeribar
in
the
Zagros
Mountains,
but
there it
was
delayed
until
the
mid
Holocene
(van
Zeist and Bottema
1977:Figures
Ib and
II, 1982:Figure 14.2),
reflecting
the arrival
of trees
migrating
from forest
refuges
remote from
Zeribar.
The information available from geomorphological studies was even more sketchy. Fluctuations
in
the levels of lakes across
southwest
Asia
provided
some
information
for a
very
general
recon-
struction
of climatic
sequences (Roberts
1982),
but
they
were not detailed
enough
to
detect the
483
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4/14
AMERICAN
ANTIQUITY
Figure
1.
Locations of
Lake
Huleh,
the
Ghab,
and the
prehistoric
village
of Abu
Hureyra
in
the Levant.
impact
of the
Younger Dryas
episode. Sedimentological
studies
in
the southern Levant and Sinai
yielded very
little relevant
information for the Late Glacial
(Goldberg
1981).
This
evidence,
limited
though
it
was,
seemed to
suggest
that,
as the
temperature
rose
during
the
Late
Glacial,
rainfall also
increased,
leading
to an
expansion
of forest cover
(van
Zeist and Bottema
1982).
Thus
it
appeared
that
the transition to
farming
took
place
in
quite
favorable environmental
conditions
(Moore
1985:12).
THE
NEW
EVIDENCE
Our
impression
of a
steady improvement
in
environment over much of southwest Asia from
the
Late Glacial into the early Holocene needs to be revised in the light of two new lines of evidence
that have been
obtained
in
the Levant
(Figure 1).
Firstly,
Baruch
and
Bottema
(1991)
have
recently
extracted
and
analyzed
a new
pollen
core
from
the Huleh Basin
that
provides
a more
detailed,
well-
484
[Vol.
57,
No.
3,
1992]
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5/14
REPORTS
depth
-lm
^--
9 270
+
120
B.
P
GrN-17067
I
10,440
?
120
B.P
GrN-1 068
-11,540+
100 B.R
GrN-14986
|
17,140
?220
B.P
-1 .67m
G*
GrN-14463
arboreal nonorboreal
pollen
0
25 50 75 100%
Figure
2. The ratio
of
arboreal
to nonarboreal
pollen
in
the
diagram
from Lake
Huleh
(after
Baruch
and
Bottema
1991).
dated
sequence
of
vegetation change
from
the end
of the
Pleniglacial
ca.
17,000
B.P. into
the
early
Holocene
(Figure 2).
The
information most
pertinent
for our
discussion concerns the
changing
ratio
between arboreal and nonarboreal
pollen.
At the end of
the
Pleniglacial
the ratio of tree
pollen
to
grasses
and
steppe plants
was
low,
about 20
percent.
Then at
an estimated date of ca.
15,000
B.P.
the ratio of tree
pollen
increased
steadily
until it
reached
a
maximum of 75
percent
at
11,540
?
100
B.P.
(GrN-14986).
Baruch
and Bottema
suggest
that the
increase
in
tree cover was caused
by
a
marked rise
in
precipitation
because
it
happened during
the
period
of
Late
Glacial
warming.
Others such
as
El-Moslimany (1986)
reasonably argue
that such a
change
can be attributed more
specifically
to
increased
availability
of
moisture
during
the
growing
season of
spring
and
summer,
regardless of precipitation during the autumn and winter. Thereafter the forest shrank and/or thinned
rapidly
until ca.
10,650
B.P. when
the ratio
was
slightly
less than
25
percent
arboreal
pollen.
It
recovered to
nearly
50
percent
at
10,440
+
120
B.P.
(GrN-17068),
and then declined
again
over
485
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6/14
AMERICAN
ANTIQUITY
the next few centuries. The same trends
may
be
detected
in
the Tsukada
core,
but are more
clearly
visible
in
the Baruch and Bottema
diagram
where
they
are more
closely
dated.
It
appears
from Baruch
and Bottema's
analysis
that the
improved
conditions for forest
growth
that
took
place
in
the
region during
the
Late Glacial were
spread
over several millennia. The
improvement thus tends to correlate with the lengthy period of climatic warming to be seen in the
Barbados coral
reefs
(Fairbanks 1989).
The most
important
observation for
us,
however,
is the
sharp
reversal
in
the arboreal-nonarboreal
pollen
ratio from ca.
11,500
to
10,650
B.P.
that Baruch
and
Bottema
believe marks the
Younger Dryas. Evidently
the cooler conditions that obtained
then
were
associated with
a
sharp
decline in
precipitation during
the
growing
season and thus
to a
substantial reduction
in
forest cover.
The
second
important
source of new evidence for environmental
change
in the Levant
during
the
Younger Dryas
is the
food-plant
remains recovered from the
early village
of Abu
Hureyra
on
the
Euphrates.
The first settlement
there,
Abu
Hureyra
1,
of
Epipaleolithic
2
cultural
affinities,
was
inhabited from ca.
11,500
to
10,000
B.P.
(Moore 1991) by
a settled
population
of hunters and
gatherers
(Hillman,
Colledge,
and Harris
1989;
Legge
and
Rowley-Conwy 1987).
Charred seeds
and
fruits recovered through systematic flotation have provided a record both of vegetation change and
human
plant exploitation
throughout
the
occupation
of this
village (Hillman,
Colledge,
and Harris
1989:Figure 14.1).
On later sites with
clear
patterns
of context-related
variation,
diachronic
change
in
plant
use can
generally
be demonstrated
only
when there are
large
numbers
of
productive samples
derived
from
equivalent
context
types
from each
phase
of
occupation (Charles
and
Hillman
1992;
Hillman
1981).
It is
possible
to use the floated
samples
from
Epipaleolithic
Abu
Hureyra
(from
39
of the 80 levels
excavated)
to
explore
diachronic
change by
virtue
of the fact that
(a)
the source
deposits
were
relatively
uniform,
and were dominated
in
most cases
by
mixed
accumulations
of
ashes
from
many years
of
fires that
incorporated
numerous
cycles
of seasonal
activities,
and
(b)
most of the float
samples
were extracted
from
very large
volumes
of these
deposits
(ranging
from
370 to
4,000
liters
in
all but three
cases),
and
each
contained
literally
thousands of identifiable
items
of
food
plants.2
The Abu Hureyra 1 sequence of occupation has been divided into three periods, of which Period
1A
(ca.
11,500-11,000 B.P.)
is
the oldest.
During
1A the
inhabitants
gathered
plant
foods
from
three
vegetation
zones,
the
moist flood
plain
of
the
Euphrates,
the
adjacent
steppe,
and
a
broad
forest-steppe
ecotone
that was
within
foraging
distance
of the site.
The
latter extended
eastward
from the
edge
of
the
oak-Rosaceae
forest that
lay
an unknown distance
to the west.
The
predominant
vegetation
of the Abu
Hureyra region
was
steppe,
just
as
it is
today.
However,
three classes
of food
plants represented
in
the remains
indicate that conditions
were
much moister
during
the
spring
and
summer
growing
seasons than
they
are
now
(Figure 3). Firstly,
remains
of fruit
stones
and seeds
of
the
hackberry
tree Celtis
tournefortii,
plum, pear,
and
medlar,
all characteristic
of
the
Mediterranean
oak-Rosaceae
forest
zone,
together
with seed remains
of
a white-flowered
asphodel Asphodelus
microcarpus,
characteristic
of the Mediterranean
zone
generally,
indicate
that the oak-Rosaceae
forest fringe must have been a great deal closer than the ca. 120 km to the west to which it could
theoretically
extend
under
natural conditions
today.
Secondly,
the
presence
of Pistacia
fruitlet remains
and the
apparent
absence of Pistacia
wood
charcoal
suggests
that,
although
this tree did not
grow
close
enough
for its
twigs
or wood
to be
gathered
as
fuel,
it
must have
grown
much closer than
it
does
today
(Hillman,
Colledge,
and
Harris
1989).3
The nearest
patches
of
Pistacia
steppe-woodland
are
now
high
on the
Jebel
Abu
Rujmein
90
km to the
south,
and
on the
Jebel
Abdul
Aziz
180
km to the east-northeast.
In Period
1
A Pistacia
probably
penetrated
the
steppe
in
the form of
lines of trees
growing
along
low wadi
terraces,
perhaps
to within a
few kilometers
of Abu
Hureyra,
just
as
it
today penetrates
the
Azraq
Desert
Basin
in
eastern
Jordan
along
the
Wadi
Butum.
The
third
source of evidence
that
Period
1A
was characterized
by
relatively
moist
springs
and/
or summers
comes from the
remains
of
wild
einkorn
wheat and
two wild
ryes.
Today
these
wild
cereals are characteristic of the ecotone between oak-Rosaceae forest and steppe, and although two
of them are able to extend
well
beyond
the
forest
fringe
on
deep,
fine-grained
soils
(Blumler
1984,
1992),
recent
surveys suggest
that
they
cannot
penetrate
steppe
as
far as the
Pistacia
steppe
woodland
486
[Vol.
57,
No.
3,
1992]
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7/14
FRUIT
REES
&
HERBACEOUS
PERENNIALS
PISTACIA
OF
FOREST
FOREST-STEPPE
WILD
EREALSODAY YPICAL
OFOPENOAK OREST ND
OAKFOREST-STEPPECOTONE
PERENNIAL
USS
OFSTEPPE
AND
F
ABUHUREYRA
TRENCH
m
OCCUPATION E
E
. .
SEQUENCE
LEVELS
X
*
10,000
B.. ?
400
402
AM~
411
10
412
420
418
419
10,400
B.P
427
425
426
430
lB
449
454
455
457
1
1,000
B.P
467
468
473
1A
^
A
474
469
470
471
11,500
B.P
I
0
50
100
I I I
200
I numbers of charred seeds or fruits per 200 I1f
deposit
Figure
3.
Trends
in
the
exploitation
of wild
cereals, pulses,
and
other
open-forest
plants
by
the
inhabitants
of
Abu
occupation.
The
diagram
is based
on a small
portion
of the evidence recovered
(compare
Hillman,
Colledge,
and Harris
19
L
I
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8/14
AMERICAN
ANTIQUITY
(Hillman, Colledge,
and
Harris
1989). Today,
even without
grazing
and
cultivation,
it is
unlikely
that
they
could
grow any
closer
than
100
km
to the
west and north.
However,
to
have been
gathered
by
the
people
of
Abu
Hureyra
1,
they
must have been
growing very
much
nearer than that.
This
pattern
of
gathering
persisted
throughout
Period 1A. Then
an
abrupt change
took
place.
The
inhabitants
appear
to have ceased
all
gathering
of tree
fruits
of
the
forest
or forest
fringe.
One
explanation
is that
the
fruits
were
now
out
of
range
of
foragers
from Abu
Hureyra simply
because
increasing aridity
was
preventing
fruit formation
on trees
in
the
nearest areas
of
the
forest
fringe,
and
was
thereby
inducing
the start
of a
forest
retreat.
This
explanation
is
arguably
supported by
the
ensuing
set of
changes
at the
beginning
of
Period 1B
(ca.
11,000-10,400 B.P.),
which show a
brief
episode
of
sharply
increased
exploitation
of the wild
cereals,
grains
of
feather-grass
(Stipa spp.),
and
seeds
of
asphodel (Figure
3; Hillman,
Colledge,
and Harris
1989:Figure 14.1).
This fits
the
temporary
increase
in
yields
from
forest-fringe
grasses
and other herbs
such as
asphodel
that
might
be
expected
when the trees started
dying
back
and
cast
less shade on
the herb
layer.4
However,
our evidence
for
this brief
episode early
in
1
B
comes
from two
rich
samples
and, despite
the essential
similarity
of
the
formation
processes
reflected
in
most
of the Abu
Hureyra
1
levels and the
huge
amounts
of
deposit sampled, a difference in two such samples could theoretically represent no more than aberrant
taphonomy.
Very
soon thereafter
we
see a
more
abrupt
and
unequivocal
change,
a
complete
cessation
of the
use
of
asphodel
seed,
perhaps
for
food
or
medicine,
and
a dramatic decline
in
the use
of the three
wild
cereals and at
least some
of
the
feather
grass species.
These
changes,
combined
with
declining
exploitation
of Pistacia
fruitlets,
suggest
that
advancing aridity
was now also
causing
a retreat
of
the herbaceous
plants
of the forest
fringe, following
the earlier
dieback
of
the
trees.
This
view
is
supported by
the
increased
use
of
small-seeded
legumes
such
as
the
clovers
and
medicks
(Trifolium,
Trigonella,
and
Medicago spp.),
which
require
careful
detoxification,
and
that
we
regard
as "fallback
foods,"
which would
generally
have served as
staples
only
when other
major
plant
foods
were
becoming
scarcer.
In
addition,
a
number
of these small-seeded
legumes
can
tolerate
very
arid
conditions,
and some of them
would
have continued
to
be available
in undiminished
abundance.
We
estimate
from the 12 radiocarbon dates for Period 1B that this
abrupt
change
began
about
10,600
B.P.
(Moore
1992).
These
trends
became even
more
marked
in Period 1C
(ca.
10,400-
10,000 B.P.),
when
we also
see a decline
in the use
of
valley-bottom
foods,
perhaps reflecting
reduced
overbank
flooding
as a result
of
lower levels
of
precipitation
over
the Anatolian
catchment of
the
headwaters
of
the
Euphrates.
Abu
Hureyra
is
in
a semiarid
region
where
slight changes
in
climate
can lead to
major
adjustments
in
the
composition
and extent
of
vegetation
zones
and
their
component
communities
(cf.
Davis
1986;
Webb
1986).
We
argue
that
the most
economical
explanation
of
such
a
series of
shifts
in
the
pattern
of
plant collecting
is an alteration
in
the
composition
of
plant
communities
in
the
Abu
Hureyra
catchment
brought
about
by
climatic
change. Certainly,
Abu
Hureyra
1
was inhabited
long
enough
for
the effects of
the Late
Glacial
climatic
fluctuations
to be
reflected
in
the
vegetation
record, and Periods 1B and 1C coincided with the Younger Dryas when cooler and/or more arid
conditions
prevailed
in
many regions.
Reduction
in
moisture
availability during
the
spring
and/or
summer
growing
seasons
in lowland
and
some
upland
areas of southwest
Asia
is
strongly
indicated
by
the
forest
retreat
seen
in the
pollen
cores from
Lakes
Huleh and
Zeribar,
and Karamik
Batakligi
(van
Zeist
and Bottema
1977, 1982;
van
Zeist et
al.
1975),
and this can
arguably
be
extended
to
the
Ghab as
well.
It
is
precisely
this
reduction
in the
availability
of
growing-season
moisture
that
we
see reflected
in
the
record
of
vegetation change
at Abu
Hureyra.
As
aridity
increased
in
the
Younger
Dryas,
the
forest
and
forest-steppe
ecotone
retreated
westward,
to be
replaced by
more
drought-resistant
types
of
steppe.
In
consequence,
the
availability
of
many
former
foods
was
progressively
reduced,
and
in
compensation
the
inhabitants
of
Abu
Hureyra
seem
to
have increased
their
consumption
of
other
foods
such
as the
small-seeded
legumes,
thus
allowing
them
to continue
occupation
for
several
centuries more.5 However, the population was already sedentary by Period 1A, and the constraints
on
population
growth
occasioned
by
a
mobile existence
would
probably
have
already
been
relaxed
(Hillman 1987).
The
resulting
combination
of
increasing
population
and
declining
availability
of
488
[Vol.
57,
No.
3,
1992]
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9/14
REPORTS
previously preferred plant staples
in
the
vicinity
of Abu
Hureyra
may
have
imposed
increasing
stresses on the
carrying
capacity
of
the local
environment,
and so
contributed to the
temporary
abandonment of
the
settlement. When
Abu
Hureyra
was
reoccupied
a few
centuries
later,
its
new
inhabitants
were
already
farmers.
The records of Late Glacial
vegetation
change
from the
new
Huleh core and Abu
Hureyra
show
analogous
trends: an
initial
flourishing
of
forest and
forest-fringe
vegetation
reflecting
a
relative
abundance of
growing-season
moisture,
followed
by
a
sharp
reversal as drier
conditions set
in
during
the
Younger
Dryas.
Direct
comparison
of
radiocarbon
dates would
suggest
that the effects were
experienced
slightly
earlier in
the southern
Levant than farther
north. That
may
have been
so,
but
we
also need
to allow
for the
possibility
of
interlaboratory
error
when
comparing
sequences
of dates
obtained
by
different
laboratories.
Recent
studies
have
shown
that the dates
obtained
by
different
laboratories for the
same
samples
may
vary
systematically by
several
hundred
years
(Scott
et al.
1990).
In
any
case,
the
abrupt
change
in
vegetation
at
both
localities
correlates with the
worldwide
Younger
Dryas episode
of
cooling.
Having
established that
the
Younger
Dryas
had a
significant
effect on the
environment of
the
Levant, we should examine some of the other pollen cores obtained years ago to see if its impact
can
be
discerned
elsewhere in
southwest Asia. The
section of the
original
Ghab core
covering
the
Late
Glacial and
earlier
Holocene
(pollen
zone
Z)
exhibited
much the
same trends as
the new Huleh
core: a
major
expansion
of
forest
followed
by
a
decrease,
then
a modest
growth
of tree cover
once
more
(Niklewski
and van
Zeist
1970:Figure 3).
The
core
had three
radiocarbon
dates,
but
only
one
of them
related
to the
last
40,000
years.
This date
of
10,080
?
55 B.P.
(GrN-5810)
seemed
to
correspond
to the
climax of
the main
period
of
forest
expansion,
suggesting
that the
Ghab
vegetation
sequence
was
out of
phase
with the
rest of the
Levant.
Given that
the
vegetation
sequences
from
Lake
Huleh and
Abu
Hureyra
seem to
correlate
quite well,
and that
Abu
Hureyra
is
just
180
km
downwind
of the
Ghab,
the
most
likely explanation
for this
discrepancy
is
that the
radiocarbon
date,
obtained from
a
sample
of
shells,
is
discordant with
its
stratigraphic
position.
Baruch
and
Bottema
(1991)
have
also
allowed the
possibility
that
the date
may
be
in
error.
If
that is
the
case,
then the evidence from the Ghab core would indicate that the cooler conditions of the
Younger
Dryas
were
also felt in
northwest
Syria
where
they
caused a
synchronous
decline
in
tree
cover.
Away
to
the
east at
Lake
Zeribar in
the
Zagros Mountains,
the Late
Glacial
was
marked
by
an
increase in the
pollen
of
herbaceous
plants
at the
expense
of
chenopods
and
Artemisia
(van
Zeist
and
Bottema
1982:Figure 14.2),
implying
an
increase
in
moisture
during
the
growing
season.
That
trend
was
sharply
reversed
for
several
centuries after ca.
11,500
B.P.,
an
event
that
again
correlates
chronologically
with
the
Younger
Dryas.
It
implies
that
there
was a
decrease
in
moisture
during
this
period,
just
as we
have seen in
the
Levant.
A
similar
reduction
in
moisture
availability
during
the
growing
season
can
likewise
be
inferred from
the
dramatic
decline in
cedar
pollen
after ca.
11,500
B.P. at
Karamik
Batakligi in
western
Anatolia,
and
from its
continued
depression
until
the
start
of the
Holocene
(van
Zeist et al.
1975).
Another contiguous region with a good pollen record from the Pleniglacial through the Holocene
is
northern
Greece
(van
Zeist
and
Bottema
1982).
The
general
trend
in
the
published
pollen
curves
is
similar:
dry, steppic
conditions
in
the
Pleniglacial
that
persisted
into
the Late
Glacial.
Then
oak
and
pine
forest
spread
throughout
the
region
as
temperature
and
growing-season
moisture
increased.
The
initial
phase
of
tree
growth
at
Tenaghi Philippon
on the
Plain
of
Drama took
place
during
the
Late
Glacial,
and
was then
sharply
reversed at
an
estimated
date of
ca.
10,500
B.P.,
before
resuming
once
more in
the
early
Holocene
(Wijmstra
1969:523).
This
return to
dry, steppic
conditions
appears
to
correspond
approximately
to the
Younger
Dryas,
and
correlates
with the
vegetation
record
from
southwest
Asia.
These
pollen
sequences
all
suggest
that
the
colder
conditions
of the
Younger
Dryas
had a
significant
impact
on
vegetation
throughout
southwest Asia
and
also in
the
extreme
southeast
of
Europe.
Everywhere
the
Younger
Dryas
in
southwest
Asia was
accompanied
by
a
decrease in
moisture
that
caused a temporary reversion to partially steppic conditions more typical of the Pleniglacial.
It
should
also be
noted
that
the five
pollen
cores
cited
above
exhibit
synchrony
not
only
with
the
Younger
Dryas episode,
if
the
Ghab date
is
adjusted
as
proposed,
but
also with
the two
preceding
489
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10/14
AMERICAN
ANTIQUITY
changes
in
vegetation
cover.
All
five
indicate a
period
of intense
aridity
from
approximately
18,000
to
15,000
B.P. This was
followed,
ca.
15,000
to
11,500 B.P.,
by
a
sharp
increase
in
growing-season
moisture
reflected
in dramatic
forest
expansion
at Lake
Huleh,
the
Ghab,
Karamik
Batakligi,
and
Tenaghi Philippon,
and
an increase
in
grasses
and
other
herbs,
at
the
expense
of the
more
arid-
tolerant Artemisia and
chenopods,
in the then
mountain-steppe
flora around Lake Zeribar.
ARCHAEOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS
The new evidence has a number of
significant
implications
for
our
understanding
of human
adaptations during
the late
Epipaleolithic
in the Levant and the
subsequent adoption
of
agriculture.
The
improvement
in
the environment
that
began
in the
Late Glacial
ca.
15,000
B.P.
provided
increasingly
favorable conditions for
hunter-gatherers throughout
the
region
from late
in
Epipaleo-
lithic
1
into
early
Epipaleolithic
2. This
helps
to
explain
the florescence of such
groups,
for
example
those
labeled Geometric
Kebaran and
early
Natufian
in
the southern Levant
(Bar-Yosef
and Belfer-
Cohen
1989),
and the
Epipaleolithic
inhabitants
of
Abu
Hureyra
1A
on
the
Euphrates.
The climatic
reversal that followed profoundly altered the environment in which such groups lived. The return
of drier conditions
sharply
reduced
the extent of the forest and
caused the rich
zone
of
open
forest-
steppe along
its
edge
to
retreat
westward,
and
probably
to diminish
in
width.
Thus there was
a
sharp
reduction
in
the extent
of those zones most
favorable
for
the,
by
now
quite
numerous,
groups
of
Epipaleolithic
2
hunter-gatherers.
Those
conditions
appear
to have
lasted about a
millennium,
coincident
with the duration
of the
Younger Dryas
elsewhere.
The environment
improved
towards
the end of the
period,
on the
evidence of the new Huleh
core and that
from the
Ghab,
but
the ratio
of arboreal
pollen
never reached the
level it had attained
in
the
Late Glacial before
the onset of
the
Younger Dryas.
It has
always
seemed
anomalous
that the
pollen
cores
suggested
a
steady
improvement
of con-
ditions
from
the Late Glacial into
the
early
Holocene,
while
Leroi-Gourhan's
studies of
the
pollen
from
Epipaleolithic
2
sites
indicated that
their environs were
often
quite steppic (Darmon
and Leroi-
Gourhan 1991; Henry 1989:73; Leroi-Gourhan 1984). That anomaly is now resolved; evidently
steppe species
of
plants
increased
around those sites
during
the
eleventh
millennium
B.P. because
the
climate
became
drier.
The
decrease
in moisture
availability
set
in
during
Epipaleolithic
2
and
would
have had
a
con-
siderable
impact
on
prevailing
human
patterns
of
foraging.
It
may
have
taken several centuries
for
the
full
effects
to be
felt,
especially
on sites
in
the better-watered
zones,
but
they
would
have been
experienced by people throughout
the
Levant,
and
adjustments
in
subsistence
would
have been
necessary.
The
pattern
of
hunting
remained
the same
throughout
the
sequence
of
occupation
at Abu
Hureyra
1,
indicating
that the
deterioration
in
climate
had no
adverse effect
on
the
density
of
the
herds of
Persian
gazelle
(Gazella
subgutturosa),
a
steppe species
that was
the main
source
of meat
(Legge
and Rowley-Conwy 1987). That may have been
the case
elsewhere, although
at
other
Epipaleolithic
2 sites
in
the forest
zone the increase
in
the
proportions
of the
various
gazelle
subspecies
killed
compared
with
Epipaleolithic
1
(Moore
1982:227) may partly
reflect
the onset
of more
steppic
conditions.
We
have
seen,
however,
that
the
inhabitants
of
Abu
Hureyra apparently
modified
their
gathering
of
plants
in
response
to
the
alterations
in
the
vegetation
in
the site catchment.
Abu
Hureyra
is the
only
Levantine
site excavated
so far that was
inhabited
throughout
the
Younger Dryas,
and
is also
the
only
one
to have
yielded
a
long
sequence
of
plant
remains.
Thus we
should
not
expect
to
see such
direct
evidence
of
changes
in
subsistence
from other sites
occupied
for
shorter
lengths
of
time.
There is
much other
evidence,
however,
of
major changes
in
culture
and the
pattern
of
settlement
as
the Levantine
environment
deteriorated.
Most of
the more
substantial
sites
in
the
Natufian heartland were
inhabited
during
the earlier
stages
of
that culture.
It is on
those
sites,
Mugharet
el Wad
(Garrod 1957),
Ain
Mallaha
(Perrot
1966), Wadi Hammeh 27 (Edwards et al. 1988), and several others, that the Natufian culture has
been
found
in
its
most
developed
form.
They
were substantial sites with huts
and
other
structures,
rich
assemblages
of
bone and
ground-stone
artifacts,
and also
exquisite
naturalistic
carvings
in
bone
490
[Vol.
57,
No.
3,
1992]
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11/14
REPORTS
and
stone. As Garrod
(1957:224)
noted
in
her
original
survey
of the
culture,
and Valla and
Henry
have since
reaffirmed
(Henry
1989:181;
Valla
1988:582),
most of
those elements ceased to be
made
in
the
later
Natufian,
and
occupation
on sites in
the
heartland was
disrupted.
It
now
appears
that
this
disturbance in
the
pattern
of settlement
in
the later Natufian
coincided with the
environmental
deterioration of
the
Younger
Dryas.
It would seem
that
conditions worsened
sufficiently
to
upset
the
pattern
of
subsistence
plant
gathering
at sites
in
the
Natufian heartland
and with it
the
relatively
sedentary
life of
their inhabitants.
If
supplies
of
wild
plants
and
animals were no
longer
so
abundant
close
by
those
sites
because of
environmental
deterioration,
their
inhabitants would have
been
obliged
to
modify
their
subsistence activities.
It
appears
that
heir
initial
response
was
to resume
a
more
mobile
pattern
of
hunting
and
gathering,
which
had
probably
characterized life
in
the
Plen-
iglacial.
Farther
south,
in the
Negev
and
Sinai,
there
were
quite
rapid
changes
in
culture
and the
pattern
of
settlement,
but there
was
continuity
of
occupation
(Goring-Morris
1987:436-439). Thus,
the
deterioration
in
climate
apparently
had less
impact
there.
The
transition
from
Epipaleolithic
to
Neolithic
ca.
10,000
B.P.
coincided with the
end of
the
Younger
Dryas
climatic
episode.
It
was a time of
major
readjustment
in
culture
and
patterns
of
settlement throughout the Levant. Settlements in the steppe zone were abandoned. Thus, the Azraq
Basin
and the
oasis
of El
Kum
were
deserted
(Cauvin
1981:387;
Garrard et
al.
1988),
not to be
reoccupied
for
at least a
millennium. Even
in
the
better-watered
zones
occupation
ceased
at
nearly
all
sites.
At the few
settlements like
Abu
Hureyra, Jericho,
and Beidha
that were
inhabited
both
in
the
Epipaleolithic
and
the
succeeding Neolithic,
occupation
was
briefly disrupted
at the
end of
the
Epipaleolithic.
The
new
Neolithic
pattern
of
settlement
was
based
initially
on
a
relatively
few
large
sites
in
locations with
rich
soils
and
ample
surface
water,
that is in
locations that
were
suitable for
agriculture.
Remains of
domesticated
cereals and
pulses
have been
found
at
Jericho and Tell
Aswad,
dating
from
about
10,000
B.P.
(Hopf 1983;
van
Zeist and
Bakker-Heeres
1979),
and a little
later
at Abu
Hureyra.
The
economic and
cultural
transformations
that
marked the
transition
from
Epi-
paleolithic
to
Neolithic
therefore
appear
to have
been
rapid.
COMMENTARY
The
Younger
Dryas
climatic
episode
evidently
had a
significant
impact
on
the
environment of
southwest
Asia. It
interrupted
the Late
Glacial
improvement
in
climate
and
vegetation,
and
caused
a brief
return
to
the
conditions
of the
Pleniglacial.
The
consequences
were
severe for
the
Epipaleolithic
2
peoples
of the
Levant.
Their
modes of
gathering
were
disrupted
and the
resulting
stresses
led to
widespread
dislocation in
patterns
of
settlement. It is
surely
no
coincidence that
the
transition
from
Epipaleolithic
to
Neolithic and
from
hunting
and
gathering
to
farming happened
at
about
the
same
time,
just
as
the
Younger
Dryas
had run
its
course. We
suggest
that
the
disruption
that took
place
in
Epipaleolithic
2
patterns
of
adaptation
acted as a
powerful
incentive
for
the
peoples
of
the
Levant
to
develop
new
modes of
subsistence.
The
Younger
Dryas episode
was
not the
only
factor
that led
to this result. Among other processes, the advent of sedentary life, demonstrated at Abu Hureyra
at
least,
and
population
growth
during
the
Epipaleolithic
undoubtedly
contributed to
the
outcome
(Hillman
1987;
Moore
1985:13).
Nevertheless,
it was
probably
a
significant
catalyst
in
each of
the
areas within
southwest Asia
where
cultivation is
likely
to have
begun.
Acknowledgments.
We
wish to
thank
Sytze
Bottema or
helpful
discussions
concerning
he new
Huleh
pollen
core,
and for
kindly
allowing
us
to
reproduce
here
part
of
the
pollen
diagram prepared
by
Uri
Baruch
and
Bottema.We
also
thankthe
reviewers or
American
Antiquity
and other
colleagues
who
have
offered
onstructive
comments on
earlier
draftsof
this
paper.
The
hypothesis
explored
herewas
developed
during
the
1990-1991
academic
year
when
Moore
held a
National
Endowment
for the
Humanities
Fellowship
for
University
Teachers;
the
support
of
the
National
Endowment is
gratefully
acknowledged.
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NOTES
'
All
the radiocarbon dates
we
quote
in
this
paper
are uncalibrated.
2
The
probability
that these edible
species
of seed
actually
served as food is discussed
in
Hillman,
Colledge,
and Harris 1989.
3
The Pistacia
species
identified
here are the terebinths
P. atlantica and
P.
khinjuk,
and not the
nut-producing
P.
vera.
4
Although many Stipa species thrive in arid steppe and desert steppe, some species such as S. lagascai seem
to form their densest stands closer
to the forest
fringe.
5Whether
overexploitation
of
particular plant
foods
played
a role here is unknown.
Certainly,
ethnobotanical
studies of recent
foragers suggest
that
they
would have been
acutely
aware of the
risk,
and
correspondingly
were
careful to avoid it
(see,
for
example,
Hallam
1989:142;
Lee
1959:163-164;
Lee
1979;
Shipek 1989).
The
well-
documented
overkill of certain wild animals
by
hunter-gatherers
is
unlikely
to have
many parallels among
food-
plant species,
as
plant
utilization
strategies
can be devised
and
implemented
with much
greater
precision
(Hillman,
Madeyska,
and Hather
1989:180).
Received December
12,
1991;
accepted
February
21,
1992
494
[Vol.
57,
No.
3,
1992]