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In this paper we study the relationships between plants and extinct megafauna by examining the characteristics of the vegetation in the central region of Argentina (i.e. Espinal, Monte, and Chaco phytogeographic regions). First, we study the size, shape, quantity, and characteristics of fruits and seeds. We also evaluate the presence of mechanical (spinescence and wood density) and chemical (secondary metabolic compounds) defenses against high rates of herbivory. Complementarily, we assess the importance these plants had for human populations, using archeological, ethnographic, and current data. A high percentage of the analyzed plants met the criteria proposed for fruits and seeds dispersed by megafauna, together with a high frequency of spinescence, high density woods, and secondary metabolites. We propose that these traits cannot be explained by the herbivory pressure of extant fauna in the area, but rather developed in interaction with currently extinct fauna. We suggest that Pleistocene megafaunal extinction had important consequences in the region due to their role as ecosystem engineers and to vegetation's characteristics, which were probably strongly shaped by megafauna activities. Among these consequences, we discuss the loss of certain interactions between these animals and vegetation, such as loss of seed dispersal mechanisms, shrub invasion, and increased susceptibility of vegetation to fire. Other effects for hunter-gatherer groups were the generation of highly regulated mobility patterns and the formation of barriers for the dispersal of prey. Finally, we also discuss the importance of these plants for human populations as food, construction material, medicines and firewood. Likewise, the role of humans as "heirs" of the megafauna in the propagation of tree and shrub species is highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber) was an important member of Early and Mid-Holocene landscapes and animal communities in Northern Europe. Previous zooarchaeological research has established the alimentary roles of beavers for Mesolithic societies and their importance for fur procurement. In this paper, we develop an integrated biocultural approach to human-beaver interactions, examining the position of humans and beavers in Mesolithic and Early Neolithic multispecies systems. We contextualize beaver landscape agency in hydroactive environments with human behaviour, synthesizing currently available data on mammalian assemblages, ichtyofauna and beaver-related material culture across Northern Europe. This cross-cultural, diachronic analysis reveals previously overlooked facilitations of human behaviour by beaver practices and ecological legacies. We show that long-term trajectories of human-beaver cohabitation differed between northern European regions. While in Southern Scandinavia, human-beaver intersections witnessed major re-organizations during the Mid-Holocene, beavers retained a key role for human societies across Northeastern Europe throughout much of the Holocene and played an important part at the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in the Dutch wetlands. Divergent pathways are also evidenced by Mesolithic beaver-related material culture, highlighting the cultural keystone status of Castor fiber in higher latitude European landscapes. We argue that this keystone status is grounded in the supply of human hunting, fishing, and gathering affordances by the animals, pointing to the generative commensality between Mesolithic foragers and their beaver neighbours. Taken together, our findings demonstrate the importance of the beaver in the making of Early and Mid-Holocene forager societies in Northern Europe and illustrate the fruitfulness of deploying an integrated multispecies approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humanity's relationship with the environment during the Holocene, and into the Anthropocene, is structured around our dependance on agricultural production, which has resulted in risk mitigation strategies that include intensive landscape modifications, among other tactics. However, to understand broader patterns of human resilience and the shifts in human/environment relationships, we need to look further back in time. Through this paper, we explore cultural strategies of risk management and resilience in pre-Holocene communities and how these practices allowed hunter-gatherer communities to adapt to a changing environment. For over 1000 years, the Epipalaeolithic site of Kharaneh IV was a focal point on the landscape for hunter-gatherer groups, acting as an aggregation site for Early and Middle Epipalaeolithic peoples. Located in the eastern desert of Jordan, at the time of occupation the site was a lush wetland surrounded by a rich grassland environment, providing abundant food and other resources for the site's occupants. However, over time the wetland began to dry up and by 18,600 cal BP Kharaneh IV was abandoned. In this paper, we discuss the final occupation of Kharaneh IV, linking the site's abandonment to the increasing aridification of eastern Jordan. Environmental change led to the eventual abandonment of Kharaneh IV and other nearby sites, as people relocated within the Azraq Basin in search of new water resources during the Holocene. Flexible technological strategies and knowledge of the landscape created resilient cultural practices that allowed these communities to use population movement as a risk management strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dryland regions are particularly challenging for human survival over the course of deep time. This is true for institutionally complex communities as well as small-scale societies that have existed in semi-arid regions throughout the Holocene. This paper examines some of the successful strategies employed by small-scale mobile communities which enhanced their ability to thrive in drylands over the course of thousands of years. Small-scale societies living in drylands must rely on the transmission of Traditional Ecological Knowledge across generations. Some of this knowledge relates to the availability and use of wetlands and other more ephemeral water sources, the exploitation of a diverse range of resources, and the potential for natural storage of food resources as a buffer against regularly occurring drought years in these regions. We compare this understanding with our environmental archeological findings at the Mid-Holocene site of Zaraa Uul in the eastern Gobi Desert of Mongolia. At the site of Zaraa Uul, we show how hunter-gatherer groups returned to a campsite near the edge of a wetland environment over the course of at least two phases during the Mid-Holocene. Here they took advantage of a greater diversity of animal species and plants, including small-grained-grasses and sedges, which could enhance their caloric intake and increase the potential for storable commodities which could be collected as needed from their natural habitat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper revises paleoenvironmental data from Patagonia (southern South America) to discuss the occurrence, characteristics, and human impact of the Medieval Climatic Anomaly (MCA). The analysis of continuous paleoenvironmental archives with multidecadal-to-centennial resolution is based on a quality assessment regarding data interpretation, chronological control, and time range adequacy within the MCA lapse. After applying this three-stepped quality filters on the total dataset (N = 48), 18 cases can accurately be ascribed to the MCA. Except for two sites indicating wetter conditions, these records show dry and/or warm conditions between ca. 750 and 1350 CE (core period at ca. 800–1200 CE). Even though MCA records come mostly from forests and forest-steppe ecotones, all previous archeological hypotheses about the MCA effects on past hunter-gatherers were proposed for the steppes, particularly in southern sectors, thus requiring an assessment of the source of the signal, their synchronicity and causality between human-environmental processes. In the southern steppe, paleoenvironmental records partially overlapping with the MCA time window actually show a predominance of wet conditions between 47° and 50° S, whereas a generalized aridity is recorded in southern tip of the continental Patagonia between 51° and 52° S. Thus, a complex scenario of landscape fragmentation can be supported in the southern steppes during the MCA, produced not only by enhanced aridity in dry environments, but also because of the presence of wet and more resilient areas. This landscape heterogeneity must be considered to deepen the understanding of behavioral changes contemporaneous to the MCA. However, a scenario of demographic growth suggested around 1000 CE for the entire Patagonia could have promoted human changes similar to those expected for the MCA. Finally, no-archeological discussions linked to the MCA were developed for forest regions, despite their robust paleoenvironmental records, implying that changes in proxy data might not have necessarily involved important environmental changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]