Bayesian analyses question the role of climate in Chulmun demography.

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 C dates. We focus on testing whether a cooling climate, and its potential negative impact on millet productivity around the mid 5th-millennium cal.

Archaeological assessment reveals Earth's early transformation through land use.

Environmentally transformative human use of land accelerated with the emergence of agriculture, but the extent, trajectory, and implications of these early changes are not well understood. An empirical global assessment of land use from 10,000 years before the present (yr B.P.

Archaeological soybean (Glycine max) in East Asia: does size matter?

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.

Plants and people from the Early Neolithic to Shang periods in North China.

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.