Archaeobotany at Gabii: an Investigation of Macro Plant Remains in 6Th Century BCE Central Italy
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Archaeobotany at Gabii: an investigation of macro plant remains in 6th century BCE central Italy Phyllida J. Bailey Prof. Laura Sadori 1873884 Dr. Laura Motta ABSTRACT This paper is a consideration of carbonised carpological remains of mixed tertiary deposits from early Iron Age central Italy. The site in question is an elite stone settlement from Area D in the Latin city of Gabii. Twenty floatation sediment samples taken from Room 1, Room 2 and open areas of the complex were weighed, sieved and sorted for macro-remains. Carbon remains were set aside for future analysis and carpological remains were identified using an array of reference atlases, consultation and scholarship articles. Seeds and fragments were counted and considered in terms of formation processes and composition. While the formation process of the indoor deposits was the same, a significant difference in density, diversity and preservation was found in the open areas of the complex suggesting they stem from separate refuse sources and represent different assorted activities. In terms of composition, the deposits were found to be mostly rich in staple crops with little chaff and weeds present. It appears that the initial crop processing stages occurred elsewhere, attesting to an abundant availability of labour. The plant assemblage represents a range of crops typical of archaeobotanical studies from contemporary sites in the area with certain variations occurring due to cultural preferences. The plants of these deposits showed a limited range of crops usually associated with low status foods despite the wealth of the complex thus casting doubt on the concepts of “high” and “low” status crops. With archaeobotanical identification still pending in several areas of the complex, no definitive conclusions have been made on the exact location of initial processing, therefore a synchronisation of data will be needed in the future. i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The following thesis would not have been possible without the involvement of a great deal of people. First and foremost, I would like to thank my supervisor Professor Laura Sadori for the guidance and opportunities she has afforded me over the past few months. I would also like to thank my co-supervisor Dr. Laura Motta for all of the advice and instruction she has given me and for making this project possible in the first place. I would also like to extend this acknowledgement to the Gabii Project and the University of Michigan for providing the samples studied, and to everyone at the Environmental Biology Lab at La Sapienza University of Rome for the support and training they have given me. Last but certainly not least, I would like to thank my parents for all of the proof-reading and circular logic they talked me out of during the writing process and, above all, the emotional support they provided. ii Table of Contents ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................................................................i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................................... ii Chapter I: Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 THE DISCIPLINE OF ARCHAEOBOTANY ...................................................................................... 1 1.2 THE PRESERVATION OF MACRO PLANT REMAINS .................................................................. 2 1.3 CARPOLOGY .......................................................................................................................................... 4 Chapter II: Setting the Scene.............................................................................................................. 6 2.1 THE CITY OF GABII .............................................................................................................................. 6 2.2 THE GABII PROJECT ............................................................................................................................ 7 2.3 ARCHAEOBOTANY AT GABII......................................................................................................... 12 Chapter III: Materials and Methods ............................................................................................... 14 3.1 SAMPLE LIST ....................................................................................................................................... 14 3.2 SEPARATION METHODS .................................................................................................................. 15 3.3 IDENTIFICATION TECHNIQUES .................................................................................................... 17 Chapter IV: Results ........................................................................................................................... 20 4.1 STAPLE CROPS ................................................................................................................................... 22 4.2 ARBOREAL FRUITS AND NUTS ...................................................................................................... 28 4.3 ARABLE WEEDS .................................................................................................................................. 30 Chapter V: Discussion ...................................................................................................................... 34 5.1 SU FORMATION .................................................................................................................................. 35 5.2 SU COMPOSITION .............................................................................................................................. 39 Chapter VI: Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 43 Bibliography ...................................................................................................................................... 48 Appendix ............................................................................................................................................ 52 iii Chapter I: Introduction 1.1 THE DISCIPLINE OF ARCHAEOBOTANY Archaeobotany, or Palaeoethnobotany as it is known in North America, is a sub-discipline of archaeology which focuses on the recovery, identification and analysis of archaeological plant remains for the purpose of understanding past human-environment relationships. It covers a wide range of contexts from the investigation of subsistence strategies to funerary practices and any archaeological context which includes the survival of plant remains. Archaeobotany began, as sub-disciplines in the archaeological field often do, as an avocation of scientists. In Italy, the first recorded interest in archaeological plants occurred in the mid-18th century with an exhibition held in Portici of remains collected during the excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum (Mariotti Lippi et al, 2018). The first scientific studies are attributed to the late 19th century when Oswald Heer recorded plant remains from Swiss lake villages (Lodwick, 2019). Other contemporary studies involved the recovery of plant remains from Roman Silchester and Glastonbury Lake village in England by Reid and Lyell (Lodwick, 2016)1, and the recording of desiccated flora in Egyptian tombs by Schweinfurth (Mercuri et al, 2018)2. At this point, archaeobotany was not considered a field of study but rather a collector’s hobby. With no systematic sampling, evidence was recorded mostly on a descriptive basis and recovery only occurred in what were considered exceptional circumstances. In his article ‘Advances in archaeobotanical method and theory: charting trajectories to domestication, lost crops, and the organization of agricultural labour’ (2009), Fuller references three distinct phases of archaeobotany: an external consultant phase, a specialist stage, and a specialist-archaeologist stage. The first phase was from the late 19th to early 20th century as described above. The specialist stage in archaeobotany occurred in the mid-20th century when the discipline was honed to a more professional level. Coinciding with the emergence of Processualism or ‘New Archaeology’, scientists assumed a more dynamic approach to the recovery and interpretation of samples. Systematic sampling began and botanical data was integrated with archaeological research questions. Use was made of ethnographic models (Fuller, 2009), experimental charring (S. Boardman & Jones, 1990) and statistical analysis (Lodwick, 2019). The 1970s saw the introduction of habitual flotation3 and sieving in agricultural studies and a diversification in the investigation of taphonomic processes4 which allowed for abundant sampling resulting in much more significant data patterns (Lodwick, 2019). This set the course for the third phase of specialist-archaeologist archaeobotany. 1 Study conducted 1889 to 1909 2 Study conducted 1884 3 First flotation occurred on-site in Low.-Il.-Va, Illinois, USA (Struever, 1968) 4 Consider Francis J Green article ‘Phosphatic mineralization of seeds from archaeological sites’ (1979) 1 With the groundwork laid, archaeobotany has matured as a discipline. Research questions continue to grow in sophistication with more thought being given to site formation processes and reflection on anthropogenic involvement (Fuller,