TY - JOUR
T1 - Epipaleolithic/early Neolithic settlements at Qinghai Lake, western China
AU - Rhode, David
AU - Haiying, Zhang
AU - Madsen, David B.
AU - Xing, Gao
AU - Jeffrey Brantingham, P.
AU - Haizhou, Ma
AU - Olsen, John W.
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by the US National Science Foundation (INT-0214870), the Wenner-Gren Foundation, Sante Fe Institute, University of California Los Angeles, Desert Research Institute, University of Arizona, Merchyhurst Archaeological Institute, and A. Richard Diebold, Jr. USA, and by the Qinghai Institute of Salt Lakes and the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, PR China. We thank Jim Feathers (University of Washington) for assistance with luminescence dating; Melinda Zeder (Smithsonian Institution) and Donald Grayson (University of Washington) for help with faunal identifications; Ding Lin (Institute for Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Acadamy of Sciences) and Richard Hughes for information about obsidian sourcing; and Chen Gongbi, Leisa Meitl, Evelyn Seelinger, and Zhang Xiaoling for assistance in the field.
PY - 2007/4
Y1 - 2007/4
N2 - Transitions from terminal Pleistocene Upper Paleolithic foraging to Holocene Neolithic farming and pastoralist economic orientations in the northern Tibetan Plateau are examined from the perspective of Epipaleolithic sites located near Qinghai Lake, Qinghai Province, western China. Jiangxigou 2 is an artifact-rich, multicomponent midden site with the main period of occupation dating ca. 9000-5000 cal yr BP, containing abundant flaked stone artifacts including a substantial proportion of microlithic tools, abundant faunal remains including gazelle, deer, and sheep, and a small number of ceramics, including the oldest known on the Tibetan Plateau. Heimahe 3, on the other hand, is a brief hunter's camp dating ca. 8450 cal yr BP, with evident affinities to late Upper Paleolithic camps in the same region that date several thousand years older. The two distinctively different sites are probably nodes within a single Epipaleolithic foraging system that developed on the margins of the high Tibetan Plateau during the early Holocene, and that served as a basis for colonization of the high-altitude Plateau at that time. Jiangxigou 2 appears to be connected to early Neolithic agricultural settlements along the upper Yellow River (Huang He) drainage during the middle Holocene, and may provide insights into forager-agriculturalist interactions that lead to the development of pastoralist systems in the region.
AB - Transitions from terminal Pleistocene Upper Paleolithic foraging to Holocene Neolithic farming and pastoralist economic orientations in the northern Tibetan Plateau are examined from the perspective of Epipaleolithic sites located near Qinghai Lake, Qinghai Province, western China. Jiangxigou 2 is an artifact-rich, multicomponent midden site with the main period of occupation dating ca. 9000-5000 cal yr BP, containing abundant flaked stone artifacts including a substantial proportion of microlithic tools, abundant faunal remains including gazelle, deer, and sheep, and a small number of ceramics, including the oldest known on the Tibetan Plateau. Heimahe 3, on the other hand, is a brief hunter's camp dating ca. 8450 cal yr BP, with evident affinities to late Upper Paleolithic camps in the same region that date several thousand years older. The two distinctively different sites are probably nodes within a single Epipaleolithic foraging system that developed on the margins of the high Tibetan Plateau during the early Holocene, and that served as a basis for colonization of the high-altitude Plateau at that time. Jiangxigou 2 appears to be connected to early Neolithic agricultural settlements along the upper Yellow River (Huang He) drainage during the middle Holocene, and may provide insights into forager-agriculturalist interactions that lead to the development of pastoralist systems in the region.
KW - Epipaleolithic
KW - Forager-farmer interactions
KW - Neolithic
KW - Tibetan Plateau
KW - Western China
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U2 - 10.1016/j.jas.2006.06.016
DO - 10.1016/j.jas.2006.06.016
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:33845504075
SN - 0305-4403
VL - 34
SP - 600
EP - 612
JO - Journal of Archaeological Science
JF - Journal of Archaeological Science
IS - 4
ER -