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As a secondary setting of agricultural origins, prehistoric Korea may offer insights into the social interactions involved in crop acquisition and the human modification of local landscapes to accommodate a new agrarian way of life. Recent data may point to Korea as one of several areas where the local domestication of two crops, azuki and soybean, may have taken place. This paper explores various economic adaptations and transitions to resource production in several ecological and social settings, including the central west and southeast coasts, islands on the west coast, and the floodplains in central and southeastern Korea during the Chulmun period (7500–3400 BP). The paper reviews two popular explanations of the transition to food production, environmental impulse and migration, in the context of Korean archaeology and beyond.

We investigate the relationship between climatic and demographic events in Korea during the Chulmun period (10,000–3,500 cal. BP) by analyzing paleoenvironmental proxies and 14 C dates. We focus on testing whether a cooling climate, and its potential negative impact on millet productivity around the mid 5th-millennium cal. BP, triggered the population decline suggested by the archaeological record. We employ a Bayesian approach that estimates the temporal relationship between climatic events and change-points in the rate of growth in human population as inferred from radiocarbon time frequency data. Our results do not support the climate-induced population decline hypothesis for three reasons. First, our Bayesian analyses suggest that the cooling event occurred after the start of the population decline inferred from the radiocarbon time–frequency record. Second, we did not find evidence showing a significant reduction of millet-associated dates occurring during the cooling climate. Third, we detected different magnitudes of decline in the radiocarbon time–frequency data in the inland and coastal regions, indicating that the even if cooling episodes were ultimately responsible of these population ‘busts’, their impact was most likely distinct between these regions. We discuss our results highlighting the long tradition of mobility-based subsistence strategy in coastal regions as a potential factor contributing to the regional differences we were able to detect.

The recently acquired archaeological record for soybean from Japan, China and Korea is shedding light on the context in which this important economic plant became associated with people and was domesticated. This paper examines archaeological (charred) soybean seed size variation to determine what insight can be gained from a comprehensive comparison of 949 specimens from 22 sites. Seed length alone appears to represent seed size change through time, although the length × width × thickness product has the potential to provide better size change resolution. A widespread early association of small seeded soybean is as old as 9000-8600 cal BP in northern China and 7000 cal BP in Japan. Direct AMS radiocarbon dates on charred soybean seeds indicate selection resulted in large seed sizes in Japan by 5000 cal BP (Middle Jomon) and in Korea by 3000 cal BP (Early Mumun). Soybean seeds recovered in China from the Shang through Han periods are similar in length to the large Korean and Japanese specimens, but the overall size of the large Middle and Late Jomon, Early Mumun through Three Kingdom seeds is significantly larger than any of the Chinese specimens. The archaeological record appears to disconfirm the hypothesis of a single domestication of soybean and supports the view informed by recent phyologenetic research that soybean was domesticated in several locations in East Asia.

Shells from Neolithic shell midden sites have been routinely dated in Korea, but they have not been calibrated based on the correction values (ΔR) for the marine reservoir effect (MRE). A lack of proper calibration has left dates on shells incomparable to those on terrestrial samples, and thus unusable in building the chronological sequence of shell middens. Here, we report the two new ΔR values of a pre-bomb (pre-1950) blue mussel from the south coast. We applied the two new and the two previously reported ΔR values to the three dates on marine shells from the Bibongri shell midden in southeastern Korea. Our ΔR adjusted calibration and the comparison to dates on charcoal and bone remains clarify an ambiguity in the stratigraphy and the Early Neolithic chronology at Bibongri. Our contribution is to provide the ΔR values that can be further applied to other Neolithic shell middens along the south coast.

An assemblage of charred plant remains collected from 26 sites in the Yiluo valley of North China as part of an archaeological survey spans the period from the sixth millennium to 1300 calibrated calendrical years (cal) B.C. The plant remains document a long sequence of crops, weeds, and other plants in the country. The results also demonstrate the effectiveness of sediment sampling as part of an archaeological survey. Ten accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS) radiocarbon dates on crop remains inform an assessment of the sequence of agricultural development in the region. Foxtail millet (Setaria italica subsp. italica) was grown during the Early Neolithic period and was the principal crop for at least four millennia. Broomcorn millet (Panicum miliaceum) was significantly less important throughout the sequence. Rice (Oryza sativa) was introduced by 3000 cal B.C. but apparently was not an important local crop. Wheat became a significant crop between 1600 and 1300 cal B.C. The weed flora diversified through time and were dominated by annual grasses, some of which were probably fodder for domesticated animals. The North China farming tradition that emphasized dry crops (millets, wheat, and legumes) with some rice appears to have been established at the latest by the Early Shang (Erligang; 1600-1300 B.C.) period.

This paper is a response, both to Fuller et al.'s recent criticism of Chinese research on rice domestication, as lacking evidence, and to their argument for the beginning of rice domestication around 4000 BC in the lower Yangzi River. We first survey previous publications that discuss the process from wild rice collection to rice domestication in China, and then examine early rice remains from the perspectives of rice morphology and archaeological context. We focus on three aspects: the timing of the initial rice domestication in the Yangzi River region; the earliest presence of domesticated rice in the Lower Yangzi and Huai River regions; and the implications of changes in rice grain sizes in archaeological assemblages. We also discuss problems relating to the presence of immature rice remains in the archaeological record, grain size increase and overall grain shape, which are three of the criteria used by Fuller et al. for distinguishing domesticated from wild rice. Based on published data and our research on rice, we demonstrate that by the early Holocene (9000 cal. BP), Neolithic people in both north and south China may have been harvesting wild rice and initiating rice cultivation that eventually led to domestication.

Broomcorn and Foxtail millets were major crops in the Yellow River Valley region, Henan, China, during the Neolithic Yangshao period. Phytoliths and macro remains have been used to understand crop choices in this period. Distinguishing between phytoliths from millet crops and panicoid non cultigens can be challenging. We examine the effect of using only one or two identification criteria compared with a more stringent five or more with phytoliths from archaeological samples to examine crop ratios. We compare our results with the results from the macro remains. This demonstrates, firstly, that using more identification markers has a very definite effect on the results and secondly, phytoliths and macro remains are complementary proxies that when used together can produce more accurate results than used alone.

Recent archaeological findings provide a hint on domestication of azuki (Vigna angularis var. angularis) in East Asia. This preliminary study investigates archaeological collections from various regions in Korea, China, and Japan, representing the long-term evolution (5300–1450 BP) of azuki. Changes in seed shapes show that cultural manipulation of azuki began as early as 5300–4800 cal. BP. Azuki beans from Neolithic contexts in Korea and Japan show a possible sign of morphological response to human management, at least 2000 years prior to the appearance of fully domesticated forms. Yabutsuru-azuki (V. angularis var. nipponensis), a conspecific progenitor of domesticated azuki, has been a supplementary diet and seed reserve for lean years in East Asia, and this tradition may have a long root to the mid Holocene. Archaeological evidence indicates the possibility of multiple origins of azuki, supporting recent phylogenetic data. A unique contribution of this research is its interdisciplinary attempt to examine both the biological and cultural processes of this staple legume domestication.

Reports the first direct archaeobotanical data for the Korean peninsula, which are consistent with a time-transgressive model with the earliest barley, broomcorn and foxtail millet, rice, barley and wheat appearing first in China, then in Korea and then in Japan. The study confirms that the two varieties of millet were established no later than 3400 cal. BC in the southern Korean Peninsula and that Middle Chulman people had a mixed economy that included gathering plants, fishing, and hunting. (Quotes from original text)