ABSTRACTPolitiko-Troullia has generated the largest radiocarbon (14C) dataset from a Prehistoric ... more ABSTRACTPolitiko-Troullia has generated the largest radiocarbon (14C) dataset from a Prehistoric Bronze Age settlement on Cyprus. We present Bayesian modeling of 25 calibrated AMS ages, which contributes to an emerging multi-site 14C chronology for Cyprus covering most of the Prehistoric Bronze Age. Our analysis places the six stratified phases of occupation at Troullia between about 2050 and 1850 cal BCE, in contrast to a longer estimated occupation inferred from pottery analysis. We provide a rare 14C determination for the transition from Prehistoric Bronze Age 1 to 2 just after 2000 cal BCE, associated with a major architectural dislocation at Politiko-Troullia in response to local landscape erosion, possibly due to increased regional precipitation. We present a regional 14C model for Prehistoric Bronze Age Cyprus combining the chronology for Politiko-Troullia with modeled 14C ages from Sotira Kaminoudhia and Marki Alonia, which is bolstered by individual ages from five other set...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2021
Significance The oral history for Amerindian migration through The Bahamas was lost after Columbu... more Significance The oral history for Amerindian migration through The Bahamas was lost after Columbus’s arrival in 1492 CE and Lucayan enslavement in the early sixteenth century. The Lucayans encountered unique prehuman reptile-dominated terrestrial food webs (i.e., tortoise and crocodile), with palm and hardwood forests that were resilient to regional oceanographic cooling and hurricane perturbations. New evidence indicates that Lucayans arrived in the northern Bahamas by about 830 CE after expanding rapidly throughout The Bahamas in less than 100 y. Following subsequent burning, reptiles were extirpated, and pyrogenic pine forests took over Great Abaco Island. Compounded perturbations, including forecasts of future hurricane intensification, may continue to alter Bahamian ecosystems, particularly pine forests, which are less resilient than precontact tropical hardwood ecosystems.
We propose a revised map of plant geographical regions for the Southern Levant (most of Israel, t... more We propose a revised map of plant geographical regions for the Southern Levant (most of Israel, the Palestinian Territories and Jordan). Since this region has been heavily impacted by human activity over millennia we have created a detailed natural vegetation map using GIS, remote sensing and a species distribution model (MAXENT). We created an extensive database of over 1800 historical and field observations for the region, incorporating plant species presence-only data, as well as environmental variables, including temperature and precipitation. Vegetation was modeled according to plant geographical regions and vegetation types. Our revised map generally agrees with previous vegetation maps done for the region, but provides more detail regarding the distribution of various forested communities that have been significantly disturbed by millennia of human activity. Given its digital format, this new map can be used for conservation and other applications that require a vegetation su...
We investigate ancient agricultural terraces and their associated social and economic activities ... more We investigate ancient agricultural terraces and their associated social and economic activities across the site complex consisting of the village at Politiko-Troullia and its more extensive associated taskscape. Surface artifact distributions mapped over 12 ha are integrated with evidence excavated from this Bronze Age settlement in central Cyprus. Contrary to expectations, artifact densities do not diminish with distance from the village architecture. In particular, concentrations of Prehistoric Bronze Age ceramics and ground stone artifacts are most pronounced on nearby terraced hillsides. These terraces were not utilized for domestic structures, but for extensive processing of agricultural crops and copper ore. Bronze Age excavated plant remains indicate cultivation of olives, grapes and figs, with wood resources dominated by olive and pine. Larger, non-portable ground stones and gaming stones are associated with communal social and economic activities in open courtyard settings in Politiko-Troullia. This category of ground stone also is particularly common on the terraced hillsides around Troullia, suggesting that similar behaviors occurred beyond village structures. The terraced landscape of Politiko-Troullia exemplifies a multi-faceted taskscape with a range of agricultural, metallurgical and social activities.
We integrate modern spatial distributions of plant geographical regions with paleoclimatic trends... more We integrate modern spatial distributions of plant geographical regions with paleoclimatic trends to model vegetation change in the Southern Levant over the course of the mid-Holocene. This timespan witnessed the rise, collapse and redevelopment of urbanized society and settlement during the Bronze Age. This study applies GIS and statistical modeling tools (MAXENT) to vegetation data from 1696 historical and modern observation points across the region to chart potential vegetation for the present and at 100-year intervals between 5500 and 3000 calibrated years BP. A macrophysical climate model is used to create vegetation maps based on regional temperature and precipitation data. Environmental dynamics tracked over this time period, including past vegetation, temperature and precipitation, are applied to the interpretation of Bronze Age settlement and social change. Our results reveal a general trend of Mediterranean forest contraction through the Bronze Age. The "4.2 event" (ca. 4200 calibrated years BP) potentially links regional desiccation and urban collapse, and constitutes the last element in a trajectory of reduced potential forest vegetation through the Early Bronze Age. Rapid woodland expansion correlates with abrupt cooling and reurbanization at the outset of the Middle Bronze Age. Modeled vegetation shows minimum forest and maximum desert coverage consistent with a Late Bronze Age "crisis" ca. 3000 calibrated years BP. In comparison to the Bronze Age, modern potential vegetation includes the broadest extent of steppe.
This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the a... more This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with colleagues. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or third party websites are prohibited. In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g. in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier's archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: http://www.elsevier.com/copyright
This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the a... more This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with colleagues. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or third party websites are prohibited. In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g. in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier's archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: http://www.elsevier.com/copyright
We present the first Bayesian 14C modeling based on AMS ages from stratified sediments representi... more We present the first Bayesian 14C modeling based on AMS ages from stratified sediments representing continuous occupation across the Early Bronze III/IV interface in the Southern Levant. This new high-precision modeling incorporates 12 calibrated AMS ages from Khirbat Iskandar Area C using OxCal 4.4.4 and the IntCal 20 calibration curve to specify the EB III/IV transition at or slightly before 2500 cal BCE. Our results contribute to the continuing emergence of a high chronology for the Levantine Early Bronze Age, which shifts the end of EB III 200–300 years earlier than the traditional time frame and increases the length of EB IV to about 500 years. Data from Khirbat Iskandar also help direct greater attention to the importance of sedentary communities through EB IV, in contrast to the traditional emphasis on non-sedentary pastoral encampments and cemeteries. Modeling of AMS data from Khirbat Iskandar bolsters the ongoing revision of Early Bronze Age Levantine chronology and its gro...
ABSTRACTWe present two new Bayesian 14C models using IntCal20 that incorporate 17 new calibrated ... more ABSTRACTWe present two new Bayesian 14C models using IntCal20 that incorporate 17 new calibrated AMS ages for Early Bronze IV Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj and Middle Bronze Age Tell el-Hayyat, located in the northern Jordan Valley, Jordan. These freshly augmented suites of carbonized seed dates now include 25 AMS dates from Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj and 31 AMS dates from Tell el-Hayyat. The modeled founding date for Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj strengthens an emerging high chronology for Early Bronze IV starting by 2500 cal BC, while the end of its habitation by 2200 cal BC may exemplify a regional pattern of increasingly pervasive abandonment among late Early Bronze IV settlements in the Southern Levant. In turn, our modeled date for the Early Bronze IV/Middle Bronze Age transition at Tell el-Hayyat around 1900 cal BC pushes this interface about a century later than surmised traditionally, and its abandonment in Middle Bronze III marks an unexpectedly early end date before 1600 cal BC. These inferences, which c...
The Eurasian (née European) Modern Pollen Database (EMPD) was established in 2013 to provide a pu... more The Eurasian (née European) Modern Pollen Database (EMPD) was established in 2013 to provide a public database of high-quality modern pollen surface samples to help support studies of past climate, land cover, and land use using fossil pollen. The EMPD is part of, and complementary to, the European Pollen Database (EPD) which contains data on fossil pollen found in Late Quaternary sedimentary archives throughout the Eurasian region. The EPD is in turn part of the rapidly growing Neotoma database, which is now the primary home for global palaeoecological data. This paper describes version 2 of the EMPD in which the number of samples held in the database has been increased by 60 % from 4826 to 8134. Much of the improvement in data coverage has come from northern Asia, and the database has consequently been renamed the Eurasian Modern Pollen Database to reflect this geographical enlargement. The EMPD can be viewed online using a dedicated map-based viewer at https://empd2.github.io and downloaded in a variety of file formats at
Charcoal and charred seeds at five Bronze Age archaeological sites discern ancient land use in th... more Charcoal and charred seeds at five Bronze Age archaeological sites discern ancient land use in the eastern Mediterranean. Seed frequencies of orchard crops, annual cereals and pulses, and wild or weedy plants are used to characterize plant utilization at different archaeological sites on the island of Cyprus, in the Rift Valley of Jordan, and in the Jabbul Plain and along
We compare carbonized seeds and charcoal excavated from four Bronze Age settlements in the easter... more We compare carbonized seeds and charcoal excavated from four Bronze Age settlements in the eastern Mediterranean to infer distinctions in fuel use and the exploitation of woody vegetation amid developing anthropogenic landscapes. Charcoal evidence generally implicates combustion of fuel wood, while burned seeds commonly result from dung fuel use. Varying fuel consumption profiles reflect the availability of woody vegetation and cultivation practices that reveal temporal and geographical dynamics on Bronze Age agrarian landscapes. In the farmlands of the northern Jordan Valley, villagers at Early Bronze Tell Abu en-Nia'j and subsequently at Middle Bronze Tell el-Hayyat relied heavily on dung for their fuel needs, supplemented by burning of orchard prunings and to a lesser extent wood from nearby riparian vegetation. In this agrarian setting, limited availability of forest resources engendered exploitation of the highest diversities of cultivated crops, weedy species and woody plants. The village of Zahrat adh-Dhra' 1 (contemporaneous with Tell el-Hayyat) on the arid, sparsely populated Dead Sea Plain relied less on dung fuel, and similarly harvested wood from orchards, while also utilizing the desert trees Acacia and Tamarix. Fuel use at Politiko-Troullia, Cyprus suggests ready access to Pinus and Quercus forests, and burning of Olea wood from nearby orchards, associated with little dung fuel use and the lowest taxonomic diversity of fuel sources among these four Bronze Age communities. The range of evidence for fuel use at these settlements reflects varying exploitation strategies based on plant resources and animal management in agrarian countrysides, as well as the larger influences of urbanized or non-urbanized society during the development of Bronze Age anthropogenic landscapes.
ABSTRACTPolitiko-Troullia has generated the largest radiocarbon (14C) dataset from a Prehistoric ... more ABSTRACTPolitiko-Troullia has generated the largest radiocarbon (14C) dataset from a Prehistoric Bronze Age settlement on Cyprus. We present Bayesian modeling of 25 calibrated AMS ages, which contributes to an emerging multi-site 14C chronology for Cyprus covering most of the Prehistoric Bronze Age. Our analysis places the six stratified phases of occupation at Troullia between about 2050 and 1850 cal BCE, in contrast to a longer estimated occupation inferred from pottery analysis. We provide a rare 14C determination for the transition from Prehistoric Bronze Age 1 to 2 just after 2000 cal BCE, associated with a major architectural dislocation at Politiko-Troullia in response to local landscape erosion, possibly due to increased regional precipitation. We present a regional 14C model for Prehistoric Bronze Age Cyprus combining the chronology for Politiko-Troullia with modeled 14C ages from Sotira Kaminoudhia and Marki Alonia, which is bolstered by individual ages from five other set...
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2021
Significance The oral history for Amerindian migration through The Bahamas was lost after Columbu... more Significance The oral history for Amerindian migration through The Bahamas was lost after Columbus’s arrival in 1492 CE and Lucayan enslavement in the early sixteenth century. The Lucayans encountered unique prehuman reptile-dominated terrestrial food webs (i.e., tortoise and crocodile), with palm and hardwood forests that were resilient to regional oceanographic cooling and hurricane perturbations. New evidence indicates that Lucayans arrived in the northern Bahamas by about 830 CE after expanding rapidly throughout The Bahamas in less than 100 y. Following subsequent burning, reptiles were extirpated, and pyrogenic pine forests took over Great Abaco Island. Compounded perturbations, including forecasts of future hurricane intensification, may continue to alter Bahamian ecosystems, particularly pine forests, which are less resilient than precontact tropical hardwood ecosystems.
We propose a revised map of plant geographical regions for the Southern Levant (most of Israel, t... more We propose a revised map of plant geographical regions for the Southern Levant (most of Israel, the Palestinian Territories and Jordan). Since this region has been heavily impacted by human activity over millennia we have created a detailed natural vegetation map using GIS, remote sensing and a species distribution model (MAXENT). We created an extensive database of over 1800 historical and field observations for the region, incorporating plant species presence-only data, as well as environmental variables, including temperature and precipitation. Vegetation was modeled according to plant geographical regions and vegetation types. Our revised map generally agrees with previous vegetation maps done for the region, but provides more detail regarding the distribution of various forested communities that have been significantly disturbed by millennia of human activity. Given its digital format, this new map can be used for conservation and other applications that require a vegetation su...
We investigate ancient agricultural terraces and their associated social and economic activities ... more We investigate ancient agricultural terraces and their associated social and economic activities across the site complex consisting of the village at Politiko-Troullia and its more extensive associated taskscape. Surface artifact distributions mapped over 12 ha are integrated with evidence excavated from this Bronze Age settlement in central Cyprus. Contrary to expectations, artifact densities do not diminish with distance from the village architecture. In particular, concentrations of Prehistoric Bronze Age ceramics and ground stone artifacts are most pronounced on nearby terraced hillsides. These terraces were not utilized for domestic structures, but for extensive processing of agricultural crops and copper ore. Bronze Age excavated plant remains indicate cultivation of olives, grapes and figs, with wood resources dominated by olive and pine. Larger, non-portable ground stones and gaming stones are associated with communal social and economic activities in open courtyard settings in Politiko-Troullia. This category of ground stone also is particularly common on the terraced hillsides around Troullia, suggesting that similar behaviors occurred beyond village structures. The terraced landscape of Politiko-Troullia exemplifies a multi-faceted taskscape with a range of agricultural, metallurgical and social activities.
We integrate modern spatial distributions of plant geographical regions with paleoclimatic trends... more We integrate modern spatial distributions of plant geographical regions with paleoclimatic trends to model vegetation change in the Southern Levant over the course of the mid-Holocene. This timespan witnessed the rise, collapse and redevelopment of urbanized society and settlement during the Bronze Age. This study applies GIS and statistical modeling tools (MAXENT) to vegetation data from 1696 historical and modern observation points across the region to chart potential vegetation for the present and at 100-year intervals between 5500 and 3000 calibrated years BP. A macrophysical climate model is used to create vegetation maps based on regional temperature and precipitation data. Environmental dynamics tracked over this time period, including past vegetation, temperature and precipitation, are applied to the interpretation of Bronze Age settlement and social change. Our results reveal a general trend of Mediterranean forest contraction through the Bronze Age. The "4.2 event" (ca. 4200 calibrated years BP) potentially links regional desiccation and urban collapse, and constitutes the last element in a trajectory of reduced potential forest vegetation through the Early Bronze Age. Rapid woodland expansion correlates with abrupt cooling and reurbanization at the outset of the Middle Bronze Age. Modeled vegetation shows minimum forest and maximum desert coverage consistent with a Late Bronze Age "crisis" ca. 3000 calibrated years BP. In comparison to the Bronze Age, modern potential vegetation includes the broadest extent of steppe.
This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the a... more This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with colleagues. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or third party websites are prohibited. In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g. in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier's archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: http://www.elsevier.com/copyright
This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the a... more This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with colleagues. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or third party websites are prohibited. In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g. in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier's archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: http://www.elsevier.com/copyright
We present the first Bayesian 14C modeling based on AMS ages from stratified sediments representi... more We present the first Bayesian 14C modeling based on AMS ages from stratified sediments representing continuous occupation across the Early Bronze III/IV interface in the Southern Levant. This new high-precision modeling incorporates 12 calibrated AMS ages from Khirbat Iskandar Area C using OxCal 4.4.4 and the IntCal 20 calibration curve to specify the EB III/IV transition at or slightly before 2500 cal BCE. Our results contribute to the continuing emergence of a high chronology for the Levantine Early Bronze Age, which shifts the end of EB III 200–300 years earlier than the traditional time frame and increases the length of EB IV to about 500 years. Data from Khirbat Iskandar also help direct greater attention to the importance of sedentary communities through EB IV, in contrast to the traditional emphasis on non-sedentary pastoral encampments and cemeteries. Modeling of AMS data from Khirbat Iskandar bolsters the ongoing revision of Early Bronze Age Levantine chronology and its gro...
ABSTRACTWe present two new Bayesian 14C models using IntCal20 that incorporate 17 new calibrated ... more ABSTRACTWe present two new Bayesian 14C models using IntCal20 that incorporate 17 new calibrated AMS ages for Early Bronze IV Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj and Middle Bronze Age Tell el-Hayyat, located in the northern Jordan Valley, Jordan. These freshly augmented suites of carbonized seed dates now include 25 AMS dates from Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj and 31 AMS dates from Tell el-Hayyat. The modeled founding date for Tell Abu en-Ni‘aj strengthens an emerging high chronology for Early Bronze IV starting by 2500 cal BC, while the end of its habitation by 2200 cal BC may exemplify a regional pattern of increasingly pervasive abandonment among late Early Bronze IV settlements in the Southern Levant. In turn, our modeled date for the Early Bronze IV/Middle Bronze Age transition at Tell el-Hayyat around 1900 cal BC pushes this interface about a century later than surmised traditionally, and its abandonment in Middle Bronze III marks an unexpectedly early end date before 1600 cal BC. These inferences, which c...
The Eurasian (née European) Modern Pollen Database (EMPD) was established in 2013 to provide a pu... more The Eurasian (née European) Modern Pollen Database (EMPD) was established in 2013 to provide a public database of high-quality modern pollen surface samples to help support studies of past climate, land cover, and land use using fossil pollen. The EMPD is part of, and complementary to, the European Pollen Database (EPD) which contains data on fossil pollen found in Late Quaternary sedimentary archives throughout the Eurasian region. The EPD is in turn part of the rapidly growing Neotoma database, which is now the primary home for global palaeoecological data. This paper describes version 2 of the EMPD in which the number of samples held in the database has been increased by 60 % from 4826 to 8134. Much of the improvement in data coverage has come from northern Asia, and the database has consequently been renamed the Eurasian Modern Pollen Database to reflect this geographical enlargement. The EMPD can be viewed online using a dedicated map-based viewer at https://empd2.github.io and downloaded in a variety of file formats at
Charcoal and charred seeds at five Bronze Age archaeological sites discern ancient land use in th... more Charcoal and charred seeds at five Bronze Age archaeological sites discern ancient land use in the eastern Mediterranean. Seed frequencies of orchard crops, annual cereals and pulses, and wild or weedy plants are used to characterize plant utilization at different archaeological sites on the island of Cyprus, in the Rift Valley of Jordan, and in the Jabbul Plain and along
We compare carbonized seeds and charcoal excavated from four Bronze Age settlements in the easter... more We compare carbonized seeds and charcoal excavated from four Bronze Age settlements in the eastern Mediterranean to infer distinctions in fuel use and the exploitation of woody vegetation amid developing anthropogenic landscapes. Charcoal evidence generally implicates combustion of fuel wood, while burned seeds commonly result from dung fuel use. Varying fuel consumption profiles reflect the availability of woody vegetation and cultivation practices that reveal temporal and geographical dynamics on Bronze Age agrarian landscapes. In the farmlands of the northern Jordan Valley, villagers at Early Bronze Tell Abu en-Nia'j and subsequently at Middle Bronze Tell el-Hayyat relied heavily on dung for their fuel needs, supplemented by burning of orchard prunings and to a lesser extent wood from nearby riparian vegetation. In this agrarian setting, limited availability of forest resources engendered exploitation of the highest diversities of cultivated crops, weedy species and woody plants. The village of Zahrat adh-Dhra' 1 (contemporaneous with Tell el-Hayyat) on the arid, sparsely populated Dead Sea Plain relied less on dung fuel, and similarly harvested wood from orchards, while also utilizing the desert trees Acacia and Tamarix. Fuel use at Politiko-Troullia, Cyprus suggests ready access to Pinus and Quercus forests, and burning of Olea wood from nearby orchards, associated with little dung fuel use and the lowest taxonomic diversity of fuel sources among these four Bronze Age communities. The range of evidence for fuel use at these settlements reflects varying exploitation strategies based on plant resources and animal management in agrarian countrysides, as well as the larger influences of urbanized or non-urbanized society during the development of Bronze Age anthropogenic landscapes.
The presence of two species of Agave growing on trash deposits downslope from the site, and charr... more The presence of two species of Agave growing on trash deposits downslope from the site, and charred agave remains (stems, fibers, and heart fragments) in several features, should have been a clue to the agave cultivation hypothesis which started to come together about a year after this paper was written. Since the two agaves weren't far outside their natural range, I didn't think it was too unusual. I visited the site in the summer of 1979, completed the analysis and sent off the report in the summer of 1980. The chronology continued to be refined over the next few years, and after Charles Di Peso passed away in 1982, Anne Woosley took over the project. I am not sure how closely the chronology I was working with in 1980 resembled the final sequence published in this volume. This is a more complete version of the 1980 Mogollon Conference Paper.
Complete reference:
Miksicek, Charles H. and Patricia L. Fall 1996 Wind Mountain Macrobotanical Plant Remains. in Mimbres Mogollon Archaeology by Anne I. Woosley and Allan J. McIntyre, Appendix 1, pp. 295 - 306. An Amerind Foundation Publication, Dragoon, AZ; University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM.
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Papers by Patricia Fall
Complete reference:
Miksicek, Charles H. and Patricia L. Fall
1996 Wind Mountain Macrobotanical Plant Remains. in Mimbres Mogollon Archaeology by Anne I. Woosley and Allan J. McIntyre, Appendix 1, pp. 295 - 306. An Amerind Foundation Publication, Dragoon, AZ; University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, NM.