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What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China
The Siwa archaeological culture (ca. 3350 and 2650 cal yr BP) has often been associated with the tribes referenced in textual sources as Qiang and Rong: prized captives commonly sacrificed by the Shang and marauding hordes who toppled the Western Zhou dynasty. In early Chinese writings, food plays a...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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Public Library of Science
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8084173/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33914818 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0250819 |
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author | Taché, Karine Jaffe, Yitzchak Craig, Oliver E. Lucquin, Alexandre Zhou, Jing Wang, Hui Jiang, Shengpeng Standall, Edward Flad, Rowan K. |
author_facet | Taché, Karine Jaffe, Yitzchak Craig, Oliver E. Lucquin, Alexandre Zhou, Jing Wang, Hui Jiang, Shengpeng Standall, Edward Flad, Rowan K. |
author_sort | Taché, Karine |
collection | PubMed |
description | The Siwa archaeological culture (ca. 3350 and 2650 cal yr BP) has often been associated with the tribes referenced in textual sources as Qiang and Rong: prized captives commonly sacrificed by the Shang and marauding hordes who toppled the Western Zhou dynasty. In early Chinese writings, food plays a key role in accentuating the ‘sino-barbarian’ dichotomy believed to have taken root over 3000 years ago, with the Qiang and Rong described as nomadic pastoralists who consumed more meat than grain and knew little of proper dining etiquette. To date, however, little direct archaeological evidence has allowed us to reconstruct the diet and foodways of the groups who occupied the Loess Plateau during this pivotal period. Here we present the results of the first ceramic use-wear study performed on the Siwa ma’an jars from the site of Zhanqi, combined with the molecular and isotopic characterization of lipid residues from foodcrusts, and evidence from experimental cooking. We report molecular data indicating the preparation of meals composed of millet and ruminant dairy among the Siwa community of Zhanqi. Use-wear analysis shows that Zhanqi community members were sophisticated creators of ceramic equipment, the ma’an cooking pot, which allowed them to prepare a wide number of dishes with limited fuel. These findings support recent isotope studies at Zhanqi as well as nuance the centrality of meat in the Siwa period diet. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8084173 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-80841732021-05-06 What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China Taché, Karine Jaffe, Yitzchak Craig, Oliver E. Lucquin, Alexandre Zhou, Jing Wang, Hui Jiang, Shengpeng Standall, Edward Flad, Rowan K. PLoS One Research Article The Siwa archaeological culture (ca. 3350 and 2650 cal yr BP) has often been associated with the tribes referenced in textual sources as Qiang and Rong: prized captives commonly sacrificed by the Shang and marauding hordes who toppled the Western Zhou dynasty. In early Chinese writings, food plays a key role in accentuating the ‘sino-barbarian’ dichotomy believed to have taken root over 3000 years ago, with the Qiang and Rong described as nomadic pastoralists who consumed more meat than grain and knew little of proper dining etiquette. To date, however, little direct archaeological evidence has allowed us to reconstruct the diet and foodways of the groups who occupied the Loess Plateau during this pivotal period. Here we present the results of the first ceramic use-wear study performed on the Siwa ma’an jars from the site of Zhanqi, combined with the molecular and isotopic characterization of lipid residues from foodcrusts, and evidence from experimental cooking. We report molecular data indicating the preparation of meals composed of millet and ruminant dairy among the Siwa community of Zhanqi. Use-wear analysis shows that Zhanqi community members were sophisticated creators of ceramic equipment, the ma’an cooking pot, which allowed them to prepare a wide number of dishes with limited fuel. These findings support recent isotope studies at Zhanqi as well as nuance the centrality of meat in the Siwa period diet. Public Library of Science 2021-04-29 /pmc/articles/PMC8084173/ /pubmed/33914818 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0250819 Text en © 2021 Taché et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Taché, Karine Jaffe, Yitzchak Craig, Oliver E. Lucquin, Alexandre Zhou, Jing Wang, Hui Jiang, Shengpeng Standall, Edward Flad, Rowan K. What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China |
title | What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China |
title_full | What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China |
title_fullStr | What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China |
title_full_unstemmed | What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China |
title_short | What do “barbarians” eat? Integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of Bronze Age China |
title_sort | what do “barbarians” eat? integrating ceramic use-wear and residue analysis in the study of food and society at the margins of bronze age china |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8084173/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33914818 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0250819 |
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