Search

Famous for Taklimakan, the world's second largest sandy desert, the Tarim Basin in Xinjiang has long attracted researchers from various fields to investigate its paleoenvironment and antiquity. The southern part of this basin is an ideal region in which to investigate the interactions between humans and the environment due to its fragile habitat and prosperous ancient civilizations. However, the lack of direct radiocarbon dating data has caused the chronologies of some of the archaeological sites to be debatable, which hinders our ability to reconstruct historical patterns of human activity and further understand, in a coherent manner, their interaction with the environment. This study reports 25 new radiocarbon dates acquired from ten undated archaeological sites in the southern Taklimakan Desert in order to refine their chronologies. Based on this, a radiocarbon dataset was established to reveal the trajectory of human activity with the support of Bayesian chronological modeling. The results indicate a two-millennium continuous flourishing of the local society since the beginning of the first millennium BCE, as well as a peak of human activity during the Tang Dynasty (618–907 CE). The distinct trajectory of human activity in the southern Tarim Basin revealed by this study provides a solid foundation for further assessments of human–environment interaction in the Tarim Basin and along the Silk Road. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cattle, sheep, and goats were first domesticated in West Asia, but the history of utilization of these livestock in China is controversial. The Hexi Corridor, located in the northwestern Gansu-Qinghai (GQ) region of northwest China, was a conduit of cultural exchange between East and West Eurasia. Based on the identification and radiocarbon dating of animal remains unearthed from two Xichengyi culture sites in the Hexi Corridor (Huoshiliang (火石梁) and Ganggangwa (缸缸洼), ranging from 4060 cal BP to 3650 cal BP), combined with other archaeological data published from the GQ region, this study aims to reveal the history of pastoralism and the timing for the emergence of the earliest domesticated cattle and caprines in the GQ region. Our results suggest that directly dated domestic sheep/goat bones (4060-3840 cal BP) and cattle bones (3970-3830 cal BP) unearthed from these two sites are the earliest yet reported for sites within GQ region, but are significantly later than those reported elsewhere in the temperate-grassland areas of northern China. Furthermore, the unearthed animal remains suggest that early pastoralism in the GQ region occurred at the beginning of the Qijia/Xichengyi culture period (∼4000 cal BP), significantly later than other previously reported evidence for the substantial increase of sedimental coprophilous fungal spores in this region since∼5600 cal BP. We argue that previously reported evidence for increased coprophilous fungal spores in the GQ region before 4000 cal BP may come from raising domestic pigs and/or wild animals rather than domestic cattle and sheep/goats, and should not be taken as evidence for the intensification of pastoralism of cattle and sheep/goats. • The earliest domesticated cattle and caprines in GQ region were raised about 4000 cal BP. • The early pastoralism in the GQ region expanded during the period of the Qijia/Xichengyi culture (∼4000 cal BP). • The increase of coprophilous fungal spores before 4000 cal BP in GQ region may not come from domestic cattle and sheep/goats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]