Genome-wide analysis of 67 ancient Near Eastern cattle,
remains reveals regional variation that has since been obscured by admixture in modern populations. Comparisons of genomes of early domestic ...cattle to their aurochs progenitors identify diverse origins with separate introgressions of wild stock. A later region-wide Bronze Age shift indicates rapid and widespread introgression of zebu,
from the Indus Valley. This process was likely stimulated at the onset of the current geological age, ~4.2 thousand years ago, by a widespread multicentury drought. In contrast to genome-wide admixture, mitochondrial DNA stasis supports that this introgression was male-driven, suggesting that selection of arid-adapted zebu bulls enhanced herd survival. This human-mediated migration of zebu-derived genetics has continued through millennia, altering tropical herding on each continent.
Significance
Goats were among the first domestic animals and today are an important livestock species; archaeozoological evidence from the Zagros Mountains of western Iran indicates that goats were ...managed by the late ninth/early eighth millennium. We assess goat assemblages from Ganj Dareh and Tepe Abdul Hosein, two Aceramic Neolithic Zagros sites, using complementary archaeozoological and archaeogenomic approaches. Nuclear and mitochondrial genomes indicate that these goats were genetically diverse and ancestral to later domestic goats and already distinct from wild goats. Demographic profiles from bone remains, differential diversity patterns of uniparental markers, and presence of long runs of homozygosity reveal the practicing and consequences of management, thus expanding our understanding of the beginnings of animal husbandry.
The Aceramic Neolithic (∼9600 to 7000 cal BC) period in the Zagros Mountains, western Iran, provides some of the earliest archaeological evidence of goat (
Capra hircus
) management and husbandry by circa 8200 cal BC, with detectable morphological change appearing ∼1,000 y later. To examine the genomic imprint of initial management and its implications for the goat domestication process, we analyzed 14 novel nuclear genomes (mean coverage 1.13X) and 32 mitochondrial (mtDNA) genomes (mean coverage 143X) from two such sites, Ganj Dareh and Tepe Abdul Hosein. These genomes show two distinct clusters: those with domestic affinity and a minority group with stronger wild affinity, indicating that managed goats were genetically distinct from wild goats at this early horizon. This genetic duality, the presence of long runs of homozygosity, shared ancestry with later Neolithic populations, a sex bias in archaeozoological remains, and demographic profiles from across all layers of Ganj Dareh support management of genetically domestic goat by circa 8200 cal BC, and represent the oldest to-this-date reported livestock genomes. In these sites a combination of high autosomal and mtDNA diversity, contrasting limited Y chromosomal lineage diversity, an absence of reported selection signatures for pigmentation, and the wild morphology of bone remains illustrates domestication as an extended process lacking a strong initial bottleneck, beginning with spatial control, demographic manipulation via biased male culling, captive breeding, and subsequently phenotypic and genomic selection.
The Iranian Zagros is a remarkable zone to study Middle and Upper Palaeolithic human occupations and Tang-e Shikan (Arsanjan) is a strategic cave site which archaeological evidence can be taken as a ...proxy for the southeast portion. Micromammals have been extensively used as palaeoecological indicators and here we use the assemblage from Tang-e Shikan to infer the landscape and environment that framed and arguably triggered cultural change. A thorough taphonomic analysis was undertaken prior to any interpretation. Fourteen taxa have been identified: two “insectivores” s.l., nine rodents, two lagomorphs, and unidentified chiropterans. The remains would be the digestion by-products of a category 5 opportunistic predator: either an avian raptor or a mammalian carnivore. Our results show that shrubland and grassland dominated the distribution of habitats in the area during the Middle Palaeolithic (MP), followed by moderate rocky, desert, and steppe components, and sparse patches of woodland. The younger period of the MP occupation (NMP: ∼55-45 ka BP) would be somewhat wetter than the older period (OMP: ∼70-55 ka BP). Within a general environmental stability, slight changes between OMP and NMP are reasonably correlated with a shift in certain cultural patterns, as the use of a water reservoir and a stone drainage system during the OMP or the increase of hunting and moderate change in lithic technology and raw material acquisition during the NMP. Our environmental inferences are further supported by palynological data and match a regional trend towards wetter habitats in moving from the MP to the present.
•Micromammals used as palaeoecological proxies of Tang-e Shikan Cave in Iranian Zagros.•Taphonomic analyses show remains are digestion by-products of a category 5 predator.•Shrubland and grassland dominated the habitats during the Middle Palaeolithic.•Slight landscape and environmental changes arguably triggered cultural change.•Palynological data supports our small-mammal-based environmental inferences.
The paper presents the first results of an ongoing study on the characterisation of the technological and socioeconomic aspects of bone objects from the Iranian Early Neolithic period. The systematic ...study of hard animal material products on large collections from the Iranian Plateau is lacking while larges series exist for iconic Early Neolithic sites of Tappeh Sang-e Chakhmaq and Tepe Abdul Hosein, stored at the National Museum of Iran. The advent of a new way of life with the domestication of plants and animals has undoubtedly introduced new transformation sequences (chaîne opératoire) in the exploitation of raw material, namely bone and shells. We present here case studies, on osseous materials from these two sites, and highlight the technological characterisation of the Early Neolithic industries based on the exploitation of animal resources, wild and domestic. Some technical peculiarities of the Early Neolithic industries are illustrated (debitage schemes by bipartitioning and fracturation) that indicate adaptability of techniques to the morphological features of raw material blocks for the production of certain tool classes (awls, smoothers, intermediate objects etc.). These preliminary results are important to establish the state of technical knowledge of prehistoric communities of Iran and to initiate a debate on the technological evolution for the hard animal mater (bone and shell) during the Early Holocene of the Iranian Plateau.
This chapter is based on our recent investigations into the subsistence economy at a military fort in the northern Caucasus (in modern Georgia), in comparison with sites along the Gorgan Wall in the ...north-east of Iran. The latter include forts and settlements in the hinterland. These studies highlight the diversity of animal consumption during the Sasanian era, influenced by the environmental setting of the sites, general agro-pastoral practices in the study regions and different cultural traditions. In all cases, however, herded animals (sheep/goats and cattle) provided most of the animal protein, complemented by the exploitation of other resources such as
During the excavation in 1962 in Yanik Tepe in eastern Azerbaijan, Iran, a small bone object from the Neolithic deposits was found. In his brief report, Charles Burney identified this object as a ...pendant. The similarity of this object with today's glasses has caused some misinterpretation about the function of this object in recent years. In this article, with a detailed microscopic study of this object from an interdisciplinary perspective (archaeology and paleozoology) and comparing it with other known examples in other parts of the world, a more detailed examination of this object is carried out. Furthermore, we proposed possible functions of this object based on our comparisons and the characteristics of the object itself. The results of this research demonstrate that this bone object probably had a decorative function.
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