Late Quaternary Climate Change and Human Adaptation in Arid China (eBook)

F. Chen, X. Gao, D.B. Madsen (Herausgeber)

eBook Download: EPUB

2011 | 1. Auflage
244 Seiten
Elsevier Science (Verlag)
978-0-08-054431-1 (ISBN)

Infos

Due to political pressures, prior to the 1990s little was known about the nature of human foraging adaptations in the deserts, grasslands, and mountains of north western China during the last glacial period. Even less was known about the transition to agriculture that followed. Now open to foreign visitation, there is now an increasing understanding of the foraging strategies which led both to the development of millet agriculture and to the utilization of the extreme environments of the Tibetan Plateau. This text explores the transition from the foraging societies of the Late Paleolithic to the emergence of settled farming societies and the emergent pastoralism of the middle Neolithic striving to help answer the diverse and numerous questions of this critical transitional period.

* Examines the transition from foraging societies of the Late Paleolithic to the emergence of settled farming societies and the emergent pastoralism of the middle Neolithic
* Explores explanatory models for the links between climate change and cultural change that may have influenced the development of millet agriculture
* Reviews the relationship between climate change and population expansions and contraditions during the late Quaternary

Inhalt

Front Cover 1
Late Quaternary Climate Change and Human Adaptation in Arid China 4
Copyright Page 5
Table of Contents 6
Part I Introduction 8
Chapter 1 Archeology at the margins: Exploring the Late Paleolithic to Neolithic transition in China’s arid west 10
Abstract 10
1. Introduction 10
2. The Expedition Era 10
3. Archeological Bureaucracy 11
4. Isolation and Politics 11
5. The New Wave 12
6. Modeling the Paleolithic to Neolithic Transition 12
Acknowledgments 13
References 13
Part II Climate Change 16
Chapter 2 Responses of Chinese desert lakes to climate instability during the past 45,000 years 18
Abstract 18
1. Introduction 18
2. Methods and Data Base 19
3. Results and Discussion 19
4. Conclusion 29
Acknowledgement 29
References 29
Chapter 3 Post-glacial climate variability and drought events in the monsoon transition zone of western China 32
Abstract 32
1. Introduction 32
2. Geographical Setting 33
3. Laboratory Methods 34
4. Result and Discussion 35
Acknowledgements 44
References 44
Chapter 4 Vegetation evolution in arid China during marine isotope stages 3 and 2 (~65-11 ka) 48
Abstract 48
1. Introduction 48
2. Palaeo-Vegetation Records Available and Their Limitations 48
3. Vegetation Evolution 50
References 54
Chapter 5 Holocene vegetation and climate changes from fossil pollen records in arid and semi-arid China 58
Abstract 58
1. Introduction 58
2. Modern Environmental Settings 59
3. Data Sources and Methods 61
4. Holocene Regional Vegetation Changes 61
5. Holocene Climate Changes in Arid and Semi-arid China 69
6. Concluding Remarks 70
Acknowledgments 71
References 71
Part III Theoretical Perspectives 74
Chapter 6 Variation in Late Quaternary central Asian climates and the nature of human response 76
Abstract 76
1. Introduction 76
2. Part I – Late Quaternary Climate Change 76
3. Part II – Hypothesized Human Response to Climate Change in Arid China 78
4. Discussion and Summary 84
Acknowledgments 85
References 85
Chapter 7 The transition to agriculture in northwestern China 90
Abstract 90
1. Introduction 90
2. Agriculture as an Evolutionary Problem 90
3. Late Pleistocene – Early Holocene Prehistory of North China 98
4. Middle Holocene Population Movement from the Upper Yellow River 103
5. Conclusion 104
Acknowledgments 104
References 104
Part IV Regional and Chronological Perspectives 110
Chapter 8 Late Pleistocene climate change and Paleolithic cultural evolution in northern China: Implications from the Last Glacial Maximum 112
Abstract 112
1. Introduction 112
2. Hunter-gatherer Mobility 113
3. Late Pleistocene Human Biogeography in Northern China 113
4. Cultural Evolution and the LGM 121
5. Raw Materials, Paleolithic Tool Technology, and Human Mobility 125
6. Hunter-Gatherer Occupation of the Western Loess Plateau 125
7. A Speculative Model of Cultural Evolution in Northeast Asia 127
8. Conclusion 130
Acknowledgments 131
References 131
Chapter 9 A short chronology for the peopling of the Tibetan Plateau 136
Abstract 136
1. The Biogeographic Problem 136
2. Plateau Colonization Models and Archeological Predictions 137
3. Paleoclimate and Paleoenvironment on the Tibetan Plateau 139
4. The Chronology of Human Colonization 140
5. Archeological Characteristics of the Metapopulation 145
6. Archeological Characteristics of the Colonizers 146
7. Evaluating Colonization Models 150
8. Seasonal Exploitation or Year-Round Occupation? 153
9. Conclusions 154
Acknowledgments 154
References 154
Chapter 10 Modeling the Neolithic on the Tibetan Plateau 158
Abstract 158
1. Introduction 158
2. What and when is the Tibetan Neolithic? 158
3. Holocene paleoclimates on the Plateau 162
4. Current models of the Tibetan Neolithic 164
5. Alternative models of the Tibetan Neolithic 166
6. Conclusions 169
Acknowledgments 170
References 170
Chapter 11 Zooarcheological evidence for animal domestication in northwest China 174
Abstract 174
1. Introduction 174
2. Hexi Corridor 176
3. Upper Yellow River Valley (Southern Gansu and Qinghai) 188
4. Wei . River Valley (Gansu/Shaanxi) 189
5. Arid North China 194
6. Tibet 197
7. Xinjiang 198
8. Summary – Animal Domesticates in Arid China 198
9. Conclusion 201
Acknowledgements 203
References 203
Chapter 12 Yaks, yak dung and prehistoric human habitation of the Tibetan Plateau 212
Abstract 212
1. Introduction 212
2. The Yak (Bos [Poephagus] grunniens) 213
3. Importance of Yak Dung 215
4. Energy of Other Yak Products 220
5. Fuel Availability on the Tibetan Plateau 222
6. Yak Domestication and Yak Dung 224
7. Summary 228
Acknowledgments 228
References 228
Part V Summary and Integration 232
Chapter 13 Changing views of Late Quaternary human adaptation in arid China 234
Abstract 234
1. Introduction 234
2. Rapid Climate Change and Cultural Adaptation 234
3. Modeling Adaptive Shifts in Arid China 235
4. Concluding Remarks 238
References 239
Subject Index 240

Textauszug

Archeology at the margins: Exploring the Late Paleolithic to Neolithic transition in China’s arid west

David B. Madsen1, Chen Fa-Hu2, Gao Xing3

1 Texas Archeological Research Laboratory, University of Texas

2 Center for Arid Environment and Paleoclimate Research, Lanzhou University and Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Laboratory, Chinese Academy of Science

3 Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Abstract

The Holocene response to the dramatic climate change events in arid China during the Pleistocene/Holocene transition has not, until recently, been the subject of intensive study. This has been due to a continuing and long-standing split in Chinese archeology between the geo-chronological oriented study of the Paleolithic and the historiographic orientation of the Neolithic. This dichotomy has been reduced in the last few decades as Chinese and Western scholars have increasingly focused on the critical transition from the foragers of the Paleolithic to the farmers and pastoralists of the Neolithic. The chapters in this volume report the results of much of that recent work.

1 Introduction

The chapters in this volume revolve, for the most part, around the interplay between climatic and cultural change among the prehistoric foragers, early horticulturalists and initial pastoralists of China’s arid west. Chronologically they focus on the transitional period between the Paleolithic foragers of the Late Pleistocene and the Neolithic farmers and pastoralists of the Early-to-Middle Holocene. For reasons we discuss below, this period has, until recently, been poorly studied despite it being critical to understanding one of the world’s few areas where domesticated crops were independently invented (Smith, 1998). This situation is changing rapidly, and here we present a series of chapters that together provide a snapshot of current research on the human response to the Pleistocene/Holocene transition. While a number of similar collections are available for the Paleolithic period (e.g., Aigner, 1981; Wu and Olsen, 1985; Shen and Keates, 2003) and for the Later Neolithic and Bronze Age (e.g., Underhill, 1997; Liu, 2005), the lack of attention paid to the critical transitional period in these volumes is illustrative of a distinct gap in Chinese archeological research. Since a number of short histories on the development of archeology in China are available to English readers (e.g., Chang, 1981; Tong, 1995; Shi, 2001; Chang, 2002; Chen, 2003; Cao, 2005), we here explore only why and how that gap came to be, and how it is presently being reduced.

2 The Expedition Era

Archeology has deep roots in Chinese society in the form of material remains considered as part of cultural history. The collection and interpretation of bronze objects created by earlier dynasties was common during the Han Dynasty (from 206 BC to AD 220) and flowered during the later Song (AD 960–1279) and Qing (AD 1644–1911) dynasties, when ancient artifacts were primarily used as an aid in epigraphic studies (Shi, 2001; Cao, 2005). As a result, archeology in China, focused as it was on the study of inscriptions, started as an aspect of history, and it remained largely historical in focus even as it crystallized as an academic discipline during the twentieth century. Even as late as 1981 Chang noted “archeology remains a tool … of Chinese historiography” (Chang, 1981: 156).

Formal archeological research in China began during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries following China’s opening to the West. A number of foreign-led archeological expeditions, most notably those of Sven Hedin (e.g., Hedin, 1903) and Aurel Stein (e.g., Stein, 1903, 1912) produced dramatic interest in Chinese antiquities both worldwide and among the Chinese intellectual community. This antiquarian interest was not unlike that which laid the foundation for the growth of archeology as a discipline elsewhere, but differed from the growth of western archeology due to the extended Chinese historical record and the recovery of written records from archeological excavations beginning in 1899. The discovery of Buddhist writings in the Dunhuang Caves of western Gansu and the inscribed wooden tablets from the “lost city” of Lou-lan in the Taklimakan Desert of Xinjiang, for example, not only further stimulated an already focused epigraphic orientation in Chinese archeological studies, but also fostered a view of archeology as a nationalistic endeavor in response to what was little more than looting by some foreign explorers (e.g., von Le Coq, 1926).

After World War I, this nationalistic interest in China’s past, combined with renewed interest in Chinese prehistory by foreign scholars, led to a decade or more of what could be called the Expedition Phase of Chinese archeology. During the 1920s and early 1930s, extended multi-year expeditions such as those of the “Central Asiatic Expedition” of the American Museum of Natural History (Andrews, 1932) and the French “La Croisière Jaune” expedition (Le Fèvre, 1935). All of these expeditions included professional foreign archeologists, as well as Chinese scholars, who as part of their participation in these projects often received archeological training at foreign universities. Many of these scholars, such as Pei Wenzhong (W.C. Pei), educated in France, and Li Ji (Li Chi), educated in the United States, went on to become the leaders of China’s first archeological institutions.

In addition to these extended foreign expeditions, a number of expatriate foreign scholars working at China’s educational and governmental institutions also began to train their Chinese colleagues as archeologists. These included the Canadian Davidson Black at Peking Medical College, the Swede Johan Gunnar Andersson at the Chinese Geological Survey, and the French Jesuit scholars Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Emile Licent. While none of these men were professional archeologists, they were trained paleontologists, anatomists, and geological stratigraphers and helped define the initial descriptive classification systems for the Chinese prehistoric sequence. Many of these expatriate scholars assisted in the excavations of Zhoukoudian (Chou-k’ou-tien) in one way or another, and several, particularly Teilhard, linked what was in reality a relatively small, mixed community of Chinese and international scholars by serving on a number of different expedition projects.

3 Archeological Bureaucracy

The long-term Zhoukoudian excavations, oriented as they were to the recovery of the hominid fossils and cultural remains of “Peking Man”, also served to focus a segment of this research community on the fossils and associated artifacts of China’s Early-to-Middle Paleolithic period. This focus was formalized by the creation of the Cenozoic Research Laboratory in the Geological Survey of China in 1929. After the Communist Revolution, this office was reorganized in 1949 as part of the Institute of Paleontology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and reorganized again in 1957 as the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP; Gujizhuidongwu yu Gurenlei Yanjiusuo). Regardless of its formal organization, this research group, with what may be seen loosely as an “archeology as geology” theoretical orientation, has remained focused on the study of human evolution within China restricted to the Paleolithic period.

An “archeology as history” research group was also formalized in the 1920s with the creation of an archeological research office within the Institute of History and Philology (Lishi Yuyan Yanjiusuo) of the Chinese Research Academy. In addition, an archeological research office was established within Chinese Studies at Peking University at about the same time. In 1950, these two organizations were combined into the Institute of Archeology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Zhonggou Kexueyuan) and eventually separated out with other social sciences into the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (Zhongguo Shehui Kexueyuan). As the original name implies, this organization has always been oriented towards historiography and epigraphy and has limited its research almost exclusively to the Late Holocene period. Three sections of the institute are divided chronologically into pre-2000 BC archeology (but really limited to that after 10–12,000 14C yr BP), the archeology of the Xia through Zhou dynasties (~2000–221 BC), and the archeology of the Han and later dynasties (after 221 BC).

This basic split between Neolithic archeology oriented towards the descriptive classification systems of history and Paleolithic archeology oriented to equally descriptive geology based on chronology and stratigraphy is, as a result, deeply embedded in the organizational structure (xitong) of Chinese archeological research. This dichotomy has permeated Chinese archeological research for more than 80 years. Much of this continued split has been due to the centralized nature of governmental organization, and it was only in the last decades of the twentieth century that provincial level archeological institutes and museums began to conduct their...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 22.9.2011
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Archäologie
• Themenwelt: Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Vor- und Frühgeschichte
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Teilgebiete der Geschichte
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Biologie ► Ökologie / Naturschutz
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Geowissenschaften ► Geografie / Kartografie
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Geowissenschaften ► Geologie
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Geowissenschaften ► Meteorologie / Klimatologie
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Geowissenschaften ► Mineralogie / Paläontologie
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Politik / Verwaltung
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie ► Makrosoziologie
• Themenwelt: Technik
• Themenwelt: Weitere Fachgebiete ► Land- / Forstwirtschaft / Fischerei
• ISBN-10: 0-08-054431-2 / 0080544312
• ISBN-13: 978-0-08-054431-1 / 9780080544311