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Re-examining millet impressions in Usatovo clay materials from NW Black Sea region, Ukraine

Re-examining millet impressions in Usatovo clay materials from NW Black Sea region, Ukraine The past decade has witnessed debates on the coherence of trans-Eurasian interaction into a particular episode, either the movement of ‘cultural package’ circulating around the 2nd millennium BC or a process more dispersed in time and space. Of particular are the very early published records of broomcorn and foxtail millet in Western Eurasia. Records of charred millet in Europe pre-dating the fifth millennium BC have been called into question using direct radiocarbon dating. The other component of the early millet evidence, impressions in ceramics, consequently becomes critical. In this article, we re-examine a key sub- assemblage of early millet impressions in Europe, specifically those found in Usatovo materials from NW Black Sea Region (Ukraine) as a case study to assess the authenticity of such identifications. We conclude that SEM examination of Usatovo samples reveals insufficient evidence for a secure identification of Panicum miliaceum although the void dimensions may be plausible. We also draw attention to features that could usefully be sought when examining impressions in the future. . . . Keywords Usatovo Millet impression Casting SEM examination Introduction BC sites in Europe (Hunt et al. 2008). Such early dates have been called into question by direct dating evidence of charred West and East Eurasia have interacted since prehistoric times. broomcorn millets found in Europe, which demonstrates By the first millennium BC, the evidence of trans-Eurasian grains as small as the millets could move downwards into exchange includes material culture and texts (the historical earlier stratigraphic levels (Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute et al. Silk Road). Archaeologists through time have been looking 2013). Beyond charred grain, early European millet dates also for traces before the first millennium BC, for example through come from grain impressions in ceramics, which are the focus studies of metallurgy, and have managed to take the interac- of this paper. Here, we assess the robustness of the evidence tion into the second millennium BC. However, if we go earli- from grain impressions for a pre second millennium BC er, there are many other claims of substantially early interac- spread of millet from China to Europe. tion between communities to the west of Altai and those to the Essentially, the current paper seeks to contribute to the east of Altai. Some claims are contentious while others are debate over whether there was an even horizon where crops not. Among all claims, of particular interest is the spread of and metallurgy circulated together during the second millen- broomcorn and foxtail millet across Eurasia. A significant nium BC, or rather, if the spread of crops significantly number of Panicum miliaceum records are from pre-5000 predated metallurgy interchange by several millennia, in the case of millet taxa. The significance of it is not only about chronology, but moreover relates to the larger debate on the driving force of prehistoric Eurasian exchange, whether it is * Ting An anting0508@gmail.com ‘bottom-up’ (arising among farmers and initially traced by crop movement) or ‘top-down’ (elite-led, and initially traced by high status material culture). School of Humanities, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China 2 Our approach to re-identification addresses the following Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge, two questions: Cambridge, UK First, how confidently can impressions that fall in a select- Retired from Institute of Geological Sciences, National Academy of ed size range and formed in a certain shape be categorised as Sciences of Ukraine, Kiev, Ukraine 3202 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 millet impressions? Second, can we observe the surface fea- reported to have found millet impressions (Kuzminova and tures on the impressions that may be regarded as taxonomi- Petrenko 1989), but the particular series of storage units she cally diagnostic? worked on are available to us for re-examination. According to two comprehensive reviews of early millet Consequently, among all Usatovo materials at Odessa impressions from Europe (Hunt et al. 2008;An 2018), all Archaeological Museum, we chose 20 storage units including findings, with one exception from Bulgaria, are concentrated all of those examined by Kuzminova in the 1980s on which in Moldova and Ukraine. Millet impressions and/or macrofos- she reportedtohavefound Panicum miliaceum impressions. sils are reported from nearly 100 settlements in Moldova and Dr. Petrenko, who co-authored the article with Kuzminova, Ukraine (e.g. Kuzminova 1990, 1991; Kuzminova and assisted with our reassessment in this paper. Petrenko 1989; Yanushevich 1978, 1989). According to Usatovo is often considered to be a local variant of the CII Yanushevich (1989), Panicum sp. first appeared in an early phase of Tripolye Culture (Mallory and Adams 1997;Ivanova Neolithic site of Bug-Dniester Culture, though the identifica- 2013; Weninger and Harper 2015; Diachenko and Harper tion is marked as tentative. By the middle Neolithic period, 2016), while Petrenko and Kaiser (2011) treat it as a distinct particularly on the site of Dantcheny I (LBK Culture) in culture in its own right. The main distribution of Usatovo sites Dniester-Prut Region, as many as 59 impressions of (seen in Fig. 1) is concentrated in the northwest area of the Panicum miliaceum are reported (Yanushevich 1989). By Black Sea. the Eneolithic (the period of Tripolye Culture and Material culture finds in Usatovo culture are mostly from Gumelnitsa Culture), there are individual findings of both im- burial mounds (kurgans). They comprise painted ceramics (5– pressions and grains of Panicum miliaceum (ibid). 10%) (Ivanova 2013), shell-tempered coarse wares, figurines In the Early Bronze Age, Usatovo Culture is commonly and arsenical bronze etc. (Mallory and Adams 1997). associated with millet agriculture. Kuzminova reports numer- In terms of the absolute chronology of Usatovo Culture, all ous millet impressions on 70 fired clay figurines in Usatovo 42 radiocarbon dates from Usatovo sites are summarised by Culture assemblages from sites of Usatovo-Bolsoy Kuyalnik Petrenko and Kaiser (2011). These authors place Usatovo (also called as ‘Usatovo’) and Mayaki (Kuzminova and Culture between the second half of fourth and the beginning Petrenko 1989). The authors argue that Panicum miliaceum of third millennium BC, around 3500–2900 BC. However, 13 was the main cultivated plant in Usatovo agriculture, suggest- of the 42 dates fall in the subsequent millennium (as late as ing that millet became prevalent during the Tripolye CII peri- 1760 BC). These later dates are regarded to be ‘most doubtful od (ibid. p.119). Elsewhere (Kuzminova 1990), Kuzminova and unverified’ (original text in Russian) (ibid) and have been reports that ‘in a tableware vessel from a burial context, soil excluded and attributed to the reservoir effect (ibid). was found with some remains of charred millet porridge’ (ibid. p.260). In the original Russian text, it is unclear whether the author refers to Panicum sp. or the specific species of Methodology Panicum miliaceum.Whether it is Panicum miliaceum or Panicum miliaceum subsp. ruderale is not addressed. Crop impressions are often studied using the casts of them Impressions identified as Panicum sp. clearly recur in Ukraine examined under optical microscope, and then, if necessary, and Moldova. However, there are few images of them in earlier further analysed with SEM. publications. A number of authors draw attention to the possible For impression casting materials, the two most popular confusion between impressions of Panicum miliaceum and those current methods use plasticine and silicone compound. of, for example, Setaria sp., Echinochloa sp. and wild Panicum Plasticine casting is more straightforward. However, silicone (Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute et al. 2013; Stevens et al. 2016). A casts are more durable, lending themselves to transport be- concern is shared among these authors that the identification tween institutions. The silicone compound casting agent con- criteria in previous studies are limited to the shape and size of sists of two parts, a base and a catalyst (Fuller and Macdonald the ‘voids’ such as in (Yanushevich 1976: 153). Because of the 2007). These are mixed together and then quickly applied to great variation in size, Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute et al. (2013) the voids using a brush. suggests also using scutellum details. However, this would only In the current project, we first made two copies using both assist in the case of dehusked grains. plasticine and silicone compound (brand name, Speedex)to It is often difficult to track down previous published re- establish which compound captured surface details with great- cords for re-examination, as previous authors have rarely sep- er precision. We found that plasticine was capable of picking arated out the particular pieces with millet impressions from up surface detail, even from a dirty impression. However, the large quantities of materials where these were selected. silicone only formed a viable cast when the dirt had been Here, we conduct fresh examination of Usatovo materials in removed a few times, and even then, it often missed some of order to re-assess previous identifications. Kuzminova did not the surface detail acquired by plasticine. We ended up with separate out the 70 pieces of figurine fragments on which she multiple silicone casts of the same void, yet still found it Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3203 Fig. 1 Location of Usatovo group/culture in the northwest of Black Sea difficult to obtain a complete cast as many of them broke We compared the SEM images of our casts of Panicum down when removed from the ceramic. Having compared miliaceum impressions from Usatovo materials with refer- our casts of plasticine and silicone, we concluded that plasti- ences of Panicum miliaceum impressions. We refer to SEM cine casts were capable of capturing greater detail. We there- images of millet impressions of both husked and dehusked fore made casts of all voids using plasticine instead of silicone grain from a simulation exercise (An 2018). The simulated compound. impressions are made on fine clay, fired at modern kiln and East cast was first examined with the naked eye. Then, cast using silicone compound. casts of the right dimensions were examined by optical micro- In the case of impressions of husked millet, the specific scope in Ukraine for best matches of shape and size. Grain features that are compared comprise shape, size, lemma, impressions correspond to the size and shape of the respective palea and husk surface patterns. In the case of dehusked soaked and inflated grains due to moist clay, which would grain, the identifying features comprise size, shape and later shrink again by approximately 5–8% during the firing scutellum details. The husk surface of Panicum miliaceum and sunbake process (Renfrew 1973;Magid 1989). By grain is smooth and glossy, which is distinctive from that measuring and comparing the sizes of Panicum miliaceum of Setaria sp. and Echinochloa sp. (Fuller 2006,Nesbitt grains in two different forms, Renfrew (1973) reports that and Summers 1988). Hence, it is considered as an addi- grain impressions are slightly longer than the equivalent grain tional identification criterion beyond the size and shape of in carbonised form. However, both fall within the overall size the millet grain. variation of Panicum miliaceum (Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute Theformofimpressionsmaybealtered by varying 2012). Specifically, the breadth range of millet grain can be firing and clay conditions. Another factor which may as much as 1.0–2.0 mm and the range in length is 1.2–3.0 mm have affected the result is different casting materials, (ibid). In other words, grain size can vary by an order of i.e., Usatovo samples cast with plasticine, while the magnitude. simulated ones with silicone compound. Also, Usatovo Turning to grain shape, the identification criteria for samples are in coarse clay while simulated impressions Panicum miliaceum grain include one end being acute and aremadeinfineclay. Theseissuesarenot explored in the current study. the other blunt (Fuller 2006;Nesbitt andSummers 1988). 3204 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 Table 1 Context information of Usatovo records of plants impressions which formally might be applied to all records. On the left column, the in the current study. The best matches in terms of shape and dimension are letters of a, b, c etc. are used to differentiate findings from the same observed by a combination of naked eye and low power optical sample unit (i.e. box/bag). The ‘unidentified grass’ here includes but is microscope. As these are the best matches, rather than proposed not limited to Poa, Digitaria, Nardus and Phleum sp. definitive identifications, we have dispensed with the ‘cf.’ notation, Sample Nature of materials Site name Information on the label Best fit Location of Number of unit identification impressions impressions 1 Anthropomorphic figurines Burial context of Usatovo site 2a Clay daub Ditch at hillfort 1986 Hordeum 5 Mayaki vulgare 2b Triticum 2 dicoccon 2c Panicum 1 miliaceum 2d Poa sp 1 3 67 ceramic fragments Hillfort and burial Fragment from square no. 20, Prunus sp. 1 context of Usatovo excavation И 4a 195 fragments of painted ceramics. Hillfort of Usatovo Fragment from square no. 4 Hordeum 1 vulgare var. coeleste 4b Fragment No. 4048 Unidentified 1 grass 5 135 sherds of vessel walls, 39 sherds of Tombs No.1–8; no Fragment А-10270, square 2, Triticum 1 painted ceramic and 14 sherds of vessel other site info 1929 year. dicoccon bottoms 6 217 sherds of vessel walls. Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 69 from square Panicum 1 29, excavation И, 1940 year miliaceum 7 116 sherds of vessel bottoms Hillfort Usatovo 8a 87 sherds of painted pottery Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 1767, excavation Q, Hordeum 1 1929 year vulgare 8b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 3521, excavation И, Hordeum 1 1940 year vulgare 8c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 5020, 1932 year Cannabis sp. 1 8d Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 8939, 1940 year, Cannabis sp. 1 excavation B 8e Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 8288, 1929 year, Unidentified 1 corridor B grass 9a 80 sherds of vessel bottoms Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 7199, excavation Hordeum Outside 1 1927, 1932–1933 vulgare surface 9b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 7224, excavation Т, Hordeum Outside 1 square 35 vulgare surface 9c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 9896, 1927 Panicum Outside 1 miliaceum surface 10 328 sherds of painted bowls Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 4654, 1932 and 1933 Hordeum Inside 1 vulgare surface 11a 15 packages of clay daub ditch in the settlement Hordeum 12 context of Mayaki vulgare site 11b ditch in the settlement Triticum 1 context of Mayaki dicoccon site 11c ditch in the settlement Tricicum 1 context of Mayaki aestivums. L site 11d ditch in the settlement Bromus sp. 1 context of Mayaki site 11e ditch in the settlement Poa sp. 1 context of Mayaki site 11f ditch in the settlement Unidentified 2 context of Mayaki grass site 12a 456 pottery sherds Hillfort Mayaki Excavation (2005, 2006 and Triticum sp 1 2013) 12b Hillfort Mayaki 1 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3205 Table 1 (continued) Sample Nature of materials Site name Information on the label Best fit Location of Number of unit identification impressions impressions Excavation (2005, 2006 and Panicum 2013) miliaceum 13a 132 sherds of vessel bottoms Hillfort Usatovo Hordeum Inner 1 vulgare surface 13b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 11,543 Unidentified Inner 1 grass surface 13c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment б/no., р. И, square 36 Hordeum Inner 1 vulgare surface 14a 334 sherds of vessel walls Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 3862, 1932–1933 ear of Broken part Hordeumvulg- are 14b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 3862, 1932–1933 Hordeum 2 vulgare 14c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 5656, 1933, Panicum Outside 1 excavation Т,square 36 miliaceum surface 14d Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 10,103. 1956 Panicum 1 miliaceum 14e Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 5615 Panicum Outside 1 miliaceum surface 14f Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 5641, 1933, Outside 1 Squares 35–36 surface 15 91 sherds Hillfort Usatovo 16a 167 sherds of thin vessel walls Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 10,770 Unidentified 1 grass 16b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2656, excavation Unidentified 1 S, square 116, 1932 grass 17a 243 sherds of large thick walled vessels Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 731(?) Unidentified 1 bottoms grass 17b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 6183, excavation Hordeum 1 1, square 29, loam horizon, vulgare 17c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 9360, excavation Panicum Outside 1 И, 1940 miliaceum surface (?) 18a 327 sherds of large undecorated vessels Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2179, excavation Triticum 1 8, square 120, 1932 dicoccon 18b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2171 ‘Spikelet fork’ of 1 Triticum dicoccon 18c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2122, excavation Panicum 1 S, 1932 miliaceum 18d Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2026, 1932–1933 Triticum 1 aestivums.l. 18e Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 9120, excavation Hordeum 1 S, 1932 vulgare 18f Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8806 Panicum 1 miliaceum 18 g Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8233, squares Triticum 1 35–36, 1933 monococcum 18 h Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8710, excavation Panicum 1 И, 1940 miliaceum 18i Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8860 Pisum sp. 1 19a 106 sherds Unspecified Fragment no. 9627, excavation Hordeum 1 Т, squares 29–35, 1933 vulgare 19b Fragment no. 8410, excavation Panicum Vessel 1 Т, 1933 miliaceum bottom 19c Fragment no. 8409 Pisum sp. 1 19d Fragment no. 5145, excavation Cannabis sp. 1 Т, square 29, 1933 19e Fragment no. 7869, excavation Panicum 1 В, square 12, 1940 miliaceum 19f Fragment no. 6432, excavation Panicum 1 S, square 39, 1932 miliaceum 20a 122 sherds of vessel walls Hillfort Usatovo Cornus mas 1 3206 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 Table 1 (continued) Sample Nature of materials Site name Information on the label Best fit Location of Number of unit identification impressions impressions Fragment no. 4463, excavation Т,square 35 20b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 1813, excavation Prunus sp. 1 Qw1, 1929 Results of optical microscope examination figurinessuchasthosein Fig. 2 might be more plausibly explained by impressions of hollow stems rather than of We examined approximately 2720 ceramic sherds from cereal grains. No crop impressions have been found in the hillfort and burial contexts and 21 anthropomorphic figurines current study on the anthropomorphic figurines. (or fragments of them) from burial context of Usatovo site; 456 ceramic fragments and 2 boxes of clay daub from hillfort context of Mayaki site. Result of SEM examination The findings of crop impressions, organised by archival storage unit, are recorded in Tables 1 and 2. Some of the Casts were prepared from the 14 pieces of potential millet impressions were found on the same fragments. In most cases, impressions (multiple casts were often made of the same im- the findings on pottery fragments are individual impressions, pressions in case of insufficient capture or damage during whereas the multiple impressions tend to be found on clay transportation). These casts were sent from Ukraine to daubs. They retain a significant amount of morphological de- Cambridge. Since many of the casts lost details during their tails including scales and glumes, fragments of culms, parts of transportation, the seven best plasticine casts were further ex- leaves, grains, seeds, nuts, Btriplets^ of naked barley amined and photographed using SEM. They were then com- (Hordeum vulgare var.nudum), and also Bspikelet forks^ (the pared to SEM images of simulated impressions of Panicum internode fragments with attached glume bases) of einkorn miliaceum. and emmer wheat (Triticum monococcum and Triticum In simulated Panicum miliaceum impressions, we are able dicoccum). to observe such characteristics as grain size, the two ends Among the 14 pieces of millet impressions, 9 come being distinctly shaped, rachises attached to the grain and from hillfort Usatovo, 2 from hillfort Mayaki and another moreover, the absence of surface patterns on lemma and palea 3 from unspecified sites. Thirteen pieces of them are (Fig. 3). In particular, the latter feature is most distinctive from found in pottery sherds and one piece in clay daubs. that of Setaria italica (Fig. 4). In the case of dehusked grain The impressions that were often found on Usatovo impressions (Fig. 3), instead of husk features, details of the hilum are clearly visible, implying that if the dorsal side is Table 2 Summaries of plant impression records in Usatovo materials impressed, then we can expect to see the shape and length of embryo as well. Best fit taxa Number of findings of each species The SEM images of our casts from Ukraine (Figs. 5 and 6) show that the sizes are slightly larger than those Hordeum vulgare 28 of simulated impressions but are still within the size Hordeum vulgarevar.coeleste 1 Panicum miliaceum 14 Triticum dicoccon 5 Cannabis sp. 3 Triticum aestivum 2 Triticum monococcum 1 Pisum sativum 2 Cornus mas 1 Prunus sp. 2 Poa sp. 2 Bromus sp. 1 Unidentified 1 Unidentified grass 9 Fig. 2 Impressions of hollow stems in Usatovo figurines Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3207 Fig. 3 SEM images of silicone casts of simulated impressions of Panicum miliaceum grain (2018) range of Panicum miliaceum grain. Measurements of Discussion simulated millet impressions and our Usatovo samples aresummarisedinTable 3. Our visual identification results (Table 1) would suggest that Meanwhile, surface patterns are absent. Rachises are not the three predominant cereals in Usatovo materials consist of seen in any of the images. The indicative acute end of hulled wheat (both emmer wheat and einkorn wheat), hulled Panicum miliaceum grain is not always seen either. Instead, barley and broomcorn millet. Meanwhile, there are also find- our samples in images A, C, D, F, and G have a more or less ings of naked wheat, naked barley, peas and nutlets of hemp, blunt or roundish shape. etc. Our results are consistent with those of Kuzminova and Fig. 4 SEM images of silicone casts of simulated impressions of Setaria italica grain (2018) 3208 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 Fig. 5 SEM images of plasticine casts of our Usatovo samples. A is hillfort Usatovo (9c in Table 1), no identification suggested. d is found in found in clay daub from ditch at hillfort Mayaki (2c in Table 1), no vessel wall from hillfort Usatovo (14e in Table 1), identified as cf. identification suggested. b is found in vessel wall from hillfort Usatovo Panicum miliaceum (6 in Table 1), no identification suggested. c is found in sherd bottom from Petrenko (1989). However, contra the latter (ibid. p.119), few In the case of dehusked grain impression, the identifying of these impressions are found on anthropomorphic figurines features: shape of grain, shape and location of hilum and shape but instead on pottery sherds and clay daubs. Given the small and length of embryo. Hilum and embryo can be clearly number of crop impressions encountered, we infer that crops discerned in the impression, although one may expect to see were added along with straws and weedy species as vegetative only one of the two in each case. additives. From our visual re-examination of Usatovo materials (around 3500–2950 BC), we have been able to confirm that one of the commonest forms of impression void matches the Robustness of millet impression identification dimensions of Panicum miliaceum grain. The SEM examina- tion of our Usatovo casts offers more details about the voids. Among all crop impressions, the findings of potential millet Apart from a slightly larger dimension than those of simulated imprints are of particular interest. millet impressions, we can also see that some voids are round- There are different identification features for millet impres- ish while others are elliptical. The acute end of Panicum sions of untreated and dehusked grain. On the one hand, in miliaceum is not always seen. The absence of distinctive scu- simulated impressions of husked millet grain, this includes tellum details would indicate that most of the impressions had size, the shape of grain end (one is acute and the other blunt) been made from husked grain. The one exception is the one in and absence of surface patterns on lemma and palea. The Image D (Fig. 5), on which the shape of an embryo may absence of husk surface pattern is significant in distinguishing possibly be discerned. Surface patterns is absent from all spec- from other millet species such as Setaria italica. Meanwhile, imens, which may not necessarily confirm Panicum rachises are seen in two images of our simulated millet im- miliaceum grain but helps to exclude Setaria sp. and also pressions. This is consistent with Bakels’ findings of broom- Echinochloa sp., whose husks carry distinctive patterns (An corn millet impressions with rachises on Bronze Age vessels 2018). Moreover, rachises are not seen in any of the images dating to around 2000 BC (Bakels 2003). Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3209 Fig. 6 SEM images of plasticine casts of our Usatovo samples. e is found (18c in Table 1), no identification suggested. g is also found in large in vessel bottom from hillfort Usatovo (17c in Table 1), identified as cf. undecorated vessels from hill fort Usatovo (18f in Table 1), identified Lathyrus sp. f is found in large undecorated vessels from hillfort Usatovo as cf. Trifolium sp. while spikelets are visible in most images, which might indi- of the chronology of Usatovo culture. As indicated above, cate that the impressions are made from brittle rachis forms. In the conventionally accepted date range for Usatovo cul- the case of dehusked grain impression in Image D, if the ture is 3500–2900 BC. If both this date range, and the embryo details are substantiated, then it does not eliminate identification of any of the millet impressions proved to the possibility of dehusked Panicum miliaceum grain. There be secure, then that would favour a significantly early is insufficient evidence of shape to clarify the species. date for Asian millet movement across Eurasia, unparal- leled by other evidence. If, however, the later carbon dates which had been excluded as outliers by Petrenko and Reliability of Usatovo chronology Kaiser (2011) proved instead to be robust and indicated a much longer duration for Usatovo culture, then the mille As our findings leave open the possibility that some im- pressions may be millet, it is relevant to return to the issue impressions might theoretically fall into the second Table 3 Measurements (in centimetres) of both simulated millet impressions and our usatovo samples Modern simulated Panicum miliaceum Usatovo cf. millet impression (Figs. 5 and 6) impression (Fig. 3) Husked grain Grain A: length 2.2, width 1.5 Grain A: length 2.9 (incomplete), width 2.6 (incomplete) Grain B: length 2.3, width 1.9 Grain B: length 2.7 (incomplete), width 2.5 Grain C: length 2.5, width 1.7 Grain C: length 2.7, Width: 2.5 Grain E: length 2.8 (incomplete), width 2.6 Grain F: length 2.7 (incomplete), width 2.2 Grain G: length 2.5 (incomplete), width 2.0 Dehusked grain Grain D: length 1.7, width 1.4 Grain D: length 2.5 (incomplete), width 2.3 (incomplete) 3210 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 millennium BC, in line with a larger body of trans- 4. The hilum is round and is located close (but not attached) Eurasian evidence. to the basal end Whatever the resolution of the very early millet-shaped Conclusion impressions from the west of the Altai, that resolution will have important implications for understanding of the prehis- Our re-examination of Usatovo millet impressions contributes tory of trans-Eurasian contact. Meanwhile, flotation should be to the ongoing debate on the robustness of pre-2000 BC millet encouraged in sites with early millet-shaped impression find- findings in Europe. The current study shows that one of the ings so as to answer the question once and for all. commonest forms of impression void matches the dimensions Acknowledgements The paper is part of TA’s doctoral thesis carried out of Panicum miliaceum grains. While sufficient recorded sur- under the supervision of MJ at Department of Archaeology, University of face feature to allow a secure identification remain elusive, Cambridge. We are grateful to Dr. Giedrė Motuzaitė-Matuzevičiūtė for plausible voids have been confirmed in ceramics from the putting the co-authors into contact. We thank Dr. Vlad Petrenko, Usatovo west assumed to predate the second millennium BC. specialist from Odessa Archaeological Museum for permission and facil- ities to work there. We thank Mr. Dmitriy Yanov from Odessa Turning from archaeological evidence to simulated impres- Archaeological Museum for the incredible amount of interpretation and sions, we have demonstrated that all diagnostic features of translation work. We thank Dr. Emma Lightfoot and Miss Huiru Lian for millet taxa are in principle observable through SEM in the helping prepare the figures. TA is grateful to McDonald institute for case of actual millet impressions. These features include one Archaeological Research (Cambridge) and also 2016 Andrew Sherratt Grant (from Department of Archaeology, University of Sheffield) for acute end, the other blunt, and absence of surface patterns on travel support. lemma and palea, or in the case of dehusked grain, the shape and length of embryo and the shape and location of hilum. In Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative the SEM images of our Ukraine samples, apart from dimen- Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http:// sions, we were only able to observe the absence of surface creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, patterns in impressions of possible husked grain and potential distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appro- embryo details in one impression of dehusked grain. Whether priate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. or not any of these do relate to Panicum miliaceum, the ab- sence of patterning allows us to exclude both Setaria sp. and Echinochloa sp. Publisher’sNote Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdic- tional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Our re-examination of Usatovo millet impressions and Usatovo chronology permits more than one narrative. If both Usatovo millet impressions and Usatovo chronology are sub- stantiated, this might indicate either a very early contact be- tween Eurasian communities, or alternatively a domestication References event in the west, although the latter is not supported by ge- An T (2018) Re-visiting the co-relation of movement of Chinese millet netic evidence (Hunt et al. 2018). If millet impressions are and painted pottery before the 2nd millennium BC. Unpublished substantiated while Usatovo chronology is adjusted to accom- PhD thesis, University of Cambridge modate the later dates excluded by Petrenko and Kaiser Bakels C (2003) Report concerning the contents of a ceramic vessel (2011), the time gap between Usatovo millet impressions found in the ‘white room’ of the Gonur Temenos, Merv Oasis, Turkmenistan. Electron J Vedic Stud 9(1c) and other early direct dated millet findings in the west of Diachenko A, Harper TK (2016) The absolute chronology of late Altai might disappear. There remains the third possibility, that Tripolye sites: a regional approach. Sprawozdania Archeologiczne some common but hitherto unidentified item of broadly sim- 68:81–105 ilar dimensions is responsible for the ‘millet’ impressions. Fuller DQ (2006) A millet atlas: some identification guidance. In future studies, we would urge researchers to be explicit Unpublished teaching materials, University College London about the range of features they observe during their exami- Fuller DQ, Macdonald K (2007) Early domesticated pearl millet in Dhar Nema (Mauritania): evidence of crop processing waste as ceramic nation of potential millet impressions. Visible features one can temper. In: Cappers R (ed) Fields of change: progress in African expect include Archaeobotany. Barkhuis Publishing & Groningen University, Groningen 1. Shape of caryopsis: one end is acute while the other is Hunt HV, Vander LM, Liu XY, Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute G, Colledge S, Jones MK (2008) Millets across Eurasia: chronology and context of blunt early records of the genera Panicum and Setaria from archaeological 2. Surface pattern is absent on both lemma and palea sites in the Old World. Veget Hist Archaeobot 17:S5–S18 3. 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Re-examining millet impressions in Usatovo clay materials from NW Black Sea region, Ukraine

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Springer Journals
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Copyright © 2018 by The Author(s)
Subject
Earth Sciences; Earth Sciences, general; Archaeology; Chemistry/Food Science, general; Geography, general; Life Sciences, general; Anthropology
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1866-9557
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1866-9565
DOI
10.1007/s12520-018-0718-3
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Abstract

The past decade has witnessed debates on the coherence of trans-Eurasian interaction into a particular episode, either the movement of ‘cultural package’ circulating around the 2nd millennium BC or a process more dispersed in time and space. Of particular are the very early published records of broomcorn and foxtail millet in Western Eurasia. Records of charred millet in Europe pre-dating the fifth millennium BC have been called into question using direct radiocarbon dating. The other component of the early millet evidence, impressions in ceramics, consequently becomes critical. In this article, we re-examine a key sub- assemblage of early millet impressions in Europe, specifically those found in Usatovo materials from NW Black Sea Region (Ukraine) as a case study to assess the authenticity of such identifications. We conclude that SEM examination of Usatovo samples reveals insufficient evidence for a secure identification of Panicum miliaceum although the void dimensions may be plausible. We also draw attention to features that could usefully be sought when examining impressions in the future. . . . Keywords Usatovo Millet impression Casting SEM examination Introduction BC sites in Europe (Hunt et al. 2008). Such early dates have been called into question by direct dating evidence of charred West and East Eurasia have interacted since prehistoric times. broomcorn millets found in Europe, which demonstrates By the first millennium BC, the evidence of trans-Eurasian grains as small as the millets could move downwards into exchange includes material culture and texts (the historical earlier stratigraphic levels (Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute et al. Silk Road). Archaeologists through time have been looking 2013). Beyond charred grain, early European millet dates also for traces before the first millennium BC, for example through come from grain impressions in ceramics, which are the focus studies of metallurgy, and have managed to take the interac- of this paper. Here, we assess the robustness of the evidence tion into the second millennium BC. However, if we go earli- from grain impressions for a pre second millennium BC er, there are many other claims of substantially early interac- spread of millet from China to Europe. tion between communities to the west of Altai and those to the Essentially, the current paper seeks to contribute to the east of Altai. Some claims are contentious while others are debate over whether there was an even horizon where crops not. Among all claims, of particular interest is the spread of and metallurgy circulated together during the second millen- broomcorn and foxtail millet across Eurasia. A significant nium BC, or rather, if the spread of crops significantly number of Panicum miliaceum records are from pre-5000 predated metallurgy interchange by several millennia, in the case of millet taxa. The significance of it is not only about chronology, but moreover relates to the larger debate on the driving force of prehistoric Eurasian exchange, whether it is * Ting An anting0508@gmail.com ‘bottom-up’ (arising among farmers and initially traced by crop movement) or ‘top-down’ (elite-led, and initially traced by high status material culture). School of Humanities, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China 2 Our approach to re-identification addresses the following Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge, two questions: Cambridge, UK First, how confidently can impressions that fall in a select- Retired from Institute of Geological Sciences, National Academy of ed size range and formed in a certain shape be categorised as Sciences of Ukraine, Kiev, Ukraine 3202 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 millet impressions? Second, can we observe the surface fea- reported to have found millet impressions (Kuzminova and tures on the impressions that may be regarded as taxonomi- Petrenko 1989), but the particular series of storage units she cally diagnostic? worked on are available to us for re-examination. According to two comprehensive reviews of early millet Consequently, among all Usatovo materials at Odessa impressions from Europe (Hunt et al. 2008;An 2018), all Archaeological Museum, we chose 20 storage units including findings, with one exception from Bulgaria, are concentrated all of those examined by Kuzminova in the 1980s on which in Moldova and Ukraine. Millet impressions and/or macrofos- she reportedtohavefound Panicum miliaceum impressions. sils are reported from nearly 100 settlements in Moldova and Dr. Petrenko, who co-authored the article with Kuzminova, Ukraine (e.g. Kuzminova 1990, 1991; Kuzminova and assisted with our reassessment in this paper. Petrenko 1989; Yanushevich 1978, 1989). According to Usatovo is often considered to be a local variant of the CII Yanushevich (1989), Panicum sp. first appeared in an early phase of Tripolye Culture (Mallory and Adams 1997;Ivanova Neolithic site of Bug-Dniester Culture, though the identifica- 2013; Weninger and Harper 2015; Diachenko and Harper tion is marked as tentative. By the middle Neolithic period, 2016), while Petrenko and Kaiser (2011) treat it as a distinct particularly on the site of Dantcheny I (LBK Culture) in culture in its own right. The main distribution of Usatovo sites Dniester-Prut Region, as many as 59 impressions of (seen in Fig. 1) is concentrated in the northwest area of the Panicum miliaceum are reported (Yanushevich 1989). By Black Sea. the Eneolithic (the period of Tripolye Culture and Material culture finds in Usatovo culture are mostly from Gumelnitsa Culture), there are individual findings of both im- burial mounds (kurgans). They comprise painted ceramics (5– pressions and grains of Panicum miliaceum (ibid). 10%) (Ivanova 2013), shell-tempered coarse wares, figurines In the Early Bronze Age, Usatovo Culture is commonly and arsenical bronze etc. (Mallory and Adams 1997). associated with millet agriculture. Kuzminova reports numer- In terms of the absolute chronology of Usatovo Culture, all ous millet impressions on 70 fired clay figurines in Usatovo 42 radiocarbon dates from Usatovo sites are summarised by Culture assemblages from sites of Usatovo-Bolsoy Kuyalnik Petrenko and Kaiser (2011). These authors place Usatovo (also called as ‘Usatovo’) and Mayaki (Kuzminova and Culture between the second half of fourth and the beginning Petrenko 1989). The authors argue that Panicum miliaceum of third millennium BC, around 3500–2900 BC. However, 13 was the main cultivated plant in Usatovo agriculture, suggest- of the 42 dates fall in the subsequent millennium (as late as ing that millet became prevalent during the Tripolye CII peri- 1760 BC). These later dates are regarded to be ‘most doubtful od (ibid. p.119). Elsewhere (Kuzminova 1990), Kuzminova and unverified’ (original text in Russian) (ibid) and have been reports that ‘in a tableware vessel from a burial context, soil excluded and attributed to the reservoir effect (ibid). was found with some remains of charred millet porridge’ (ibid. p.260). In the original Russian text, it is unclear whether the author refers to Panicum sp. or the specific species of Methodology Panicum miliaceum.Whether it is Panicum miliaceum or Panicum miliaceum subsp. ruderale is not addressed. Crop impressions are often studied using the casts of them Impressions identified as Panicum sp. clearly recur in Ukraine examined under optical microscope, and then, if necessary, and Moldova. However, there are few images of them in earlier further analysed with SEM. publications. A number of authors draw attention to the possible For impression casting materials, the two most popular confusion between impressions of Panicum miliaceum and those current methods use plasticine and silicone compound. of, for example, Setaria sp., Echinochloa sp. and wild Panicum Plasticine casting is more straightforward. However, silicone (Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute et al. 2013; Stevens et al. 2016). A casts are more durable, lending themselves to transport be- concern is shared among these authors that the identification tween institutions. The silicone compound casting agent con- criteria in previous studies are limited to the shape and size of sists of two parts, a base and a catalyst (Fuller and Macdonald the ‘voids’ such as in (Yanushevich 1976: 153). Because of the 2007). These are mixed together and then quickly applied to great variation in size, Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute et al. (2013) the voids using a brush. suggests also using scutellum details. However, this would only In the current project, we first made two copies using both assist in the case of dehusked grains. plasticine and silicone compound (brand name, Speedex)to It is often difficult to track down previous published re- establish which compound captured surface details with great- cords for re-examination, as previous authors have rarely sep- er precision. We found that plasticine was capable of picking arated out the particular pieces with millet impressions from up surface detail, even from a dirty impression. However, the large quantities of materials where these were selected. silicone only formed a viable cast when the dirt had been Here, we conduct fresh examination of Usatovo materials in removed a few times, and even then, it often missed some of order to re-assess previous identifications. Kuzminova did not the surface detail acquired by plasticine. We ended up with separate out the 70 pieces of figurine fragments on which she multiple silicone casts of the same void, yet still found it Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3203 Fig. 1 Location of Usatovo group/culture in the northwest of Black Sea difficult to obtain a complete cast as many of them broke We compared the SEM images of our casts of Panicum down when removed from the ceramic. Having compared miliaceum impressions from Usatovo materials with refer- our casts of plasticine and silicone, we concluded that plasti- ences of Panicum miliaceum impressions. We refer to SEM cine casts were capable of capturing greater detail. We there- images of millet impressions of both husked and dehusked fore made casts of all voids using plasticine instead of silicone grain from a simulation exercise (An 2018). The simulated compound. impressions are made on fine clay, fired at modern kiln and East cast was first examined with the naked eye. Then, cast using silicone compound. casts of the right dimensions were examined by optical micro- In the case of impressions of husked millet, the specific scope in Ukraine for best matches of shape and size. Grain features that are compared comprise shape, size, lemma, impressions correspond to the size and shape of the respective palea and husk surface patterns. In the case of dehusked soaked and inflated grains due to moist clay, which would grain, the identifying features comprise size, shape and later shrink again by approximately 5–8% during the firing scutellum details. The husk surface of Panicum miliaceum and sunbake process (Renfrew 1973;Magid 1989). By grain is smooth and glossy, which is distinctive from that measuring and comparing the sizes of Panicum miliaceum of Setaria sp. and Echinochloa sp. (Fuller 2006,Nesbitt grains in two different forms, Renfrew (1973) reports that and Summers 1988). Hence, it is considered as an addi- grain impressions are slightly longer than the equivalent grain tional identification criterion beyond the size and shape of in carbonised form. However, both fall within the overall size the millet grain. variation of Panicum miliaceum (Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute Theformofimpressionsmaybealtered by varying 2012). Specifically, the breadth range of millet grain can be firing and clay conditions. Another factor which may as much as 1.0–2.0 mm and the range in length is 1.2–3.0 mm have affected the result is different casting materials, (ibid). In other words, grain size can vary by an order of i.e., Usatovo samples cast with plasticine, while the magnitude. simulated ones with silicone compound. Also, Usatovo Turning to grain shape, the identification criteria for samples are in coarse clay while simulated impressions Panicum miliaceum grain include one end being acute and aremadeinfineclay. Theseissuesarenot explored in the current study. the other blunt (Fuller 2006;Nesbitt andSummers 1988). 3204 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 Table 1 Context information of Usatovo records of plants impressions which formally might be applied to all records. On the left column, the in the current study. The best matches in terms of shape and dimension are letters of a, b, c etc. are used to differentiate findings from the same observed by a combination of naked eye and low power optical sample unit (i.e. box/bag). The ‘unidentified grass’ here includes but is microscope. As these are the best matches, rather than proposed not limited to Poa, Digitaria, Nardus and Phleum sp. definitive identifications, we have dispensed with the ‘cf.’ notation, Sample Nature of materials Site name Information on the label Best fit Location of Number of unit identification impressions impressions 1 Anthropomorphic figurines Burial context of Usatovo site 2a Clay daub Ditch at hillfort 1986 Hordeum 5 Mayaki vulgare 2b Triticum 2 dicoccon 2c Panicum 1 miliaceum 2d Poa sp 1 3 67 ceramic fragments Hillfort and burial Fragment from square no. 20, Prunus sp. 1 context of Usatovo excavation И 4a 195 fragments of painted ceramics. Hillfort of Usatovo Fragment from square no. 4 Hordeum 1 vulgare var. coeleste 4b Fragment No. 4048 Unidentified 1 grass 5 135 sherds of vessel walls, 39 sherds of Tombs No.1–8; no Fragment А-10270, square 2, Triticum 1 painted ceramic and 14 sherds of vessel other site info 1929 year. dicoccon bottoms 6 217 sherds of vessel walls. Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 69 from square Panicum 1 29, excavation И, 1940 year miliaceum 7 116 sherds of vessel bottoms Hillfort Usatovo 8a 87 sherds of painted pottery Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 1767, excavation Q, Hordeum 1 1929 year vulgare 8b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 3521, excavation И, Hordeum 1 1940 year vulgare 8c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 5020, 1932 year Cannabis sp. 1 8d Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 8939, 1940 year, Cannabis sp. 1 excavation B 8e Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 8288, 1929 year, Unidentified 1 corridor B grass 9a 80 sherds of vessel bottoms Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 7199, excavation Hordeum Outside 1 1927, 1932–1933 vulgare surface 9b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 7224, excavation Т, Hordeum Outside 1 square 35 vulgare surface 9c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 9896, 1927 Panicum Outside 1 miliaceum surface 10 328 sherds of painted bowls Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 4654, 1932 and 1933 Hordeum Inside 1 vulgare surface 11a 15 packages of clay daub ditch in the settlement Hordeum 12 context of Mayaki vulgare site 11b ditch in the settlement Triticum 1 context of Mayaki dicoccon site 11c ditch in the settlement Tricicum 1 context of Mayaki aestivums. L site 11d ditch in the settlement Bromus sp. 1 context of Mayaki site 11e ditch in the settlement Poa sp. 1 context of Mayaki site 11f ditch in the settlement Unidentified 2 context of Mayaki grass site 12a 456 pottery sherds Hillfort Mayaki Excavation (2005, 2006 and Triticum sp 1 2013) 12b Hillfort Mayaki 1 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3205 Table 1 (continued) Sample Nature of materials Site name Information on the label Best fit Location of Number of unit identification impressions impressions Excavation (2005, 2006 and Panicum 2013) miliaceum 13a 132 sherds of vessel bottoms Hillfort Usatovo Hordeum Inner 1 vulgare surface 13b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 11,543 Unidentified Inner 1 grass surface 13c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment б/no., р. И, square 36 Hordeum Inner 1 vulgare surface 14a 334 sherds of vessel walls Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 3862, 1932–1933 ear of Broken part Hordeumvulg- are 14b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 3862, 1932–1933 Hordeum 2 vulgare 14c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment 5656, 1933, Panicum Outside 1 excavation Т,square 36 miliaceum surface 14d Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 10,103. 1956 Panicum 1 miliaceum 14e Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 5615 Panicum Outside 1 miliaceum surface 14f Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 5641, 1933, Outside 1 Squares 35–36 surface 15 91 sherds Hillfort Usatovo 16a 167 sherds of thin vessel walls Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 10,770 Unidentified 1 grass 16b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2656, excavation Unidentified 1 S, square 116, 1932 grass 17a 243 sherds of large thick walled vessels Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 731(?) Unidentified 1 bottoms grass 17b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 6183, excavation Hordeum 1 1, square 29, loam horizon, vulgare 17c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 9360, excavation Panicum Outside 1 И, 1940 miliaceum surface (?) 18a 327 sherds of large undecorated vessels Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2179, excavation Triticum 1 8, square 120, 1932 dicoccon 18b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2171 ‘Spikelet fork’ of 1 Triticum dicoccon 18c Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2122, excavation Panicum 1 S, 1932 miliaceum 18d Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 2026, 1932–1933 Triticum 1 aestivums.l. 18e Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 9120, excavation Hordeum 1 S, 1932 vulgare 18f Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8806 Panicum 1 miliaceum 18 g Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8233, squares Triticum 1 35–36, 1933 monococcum 18 h Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8710, excavation Panicum 1 И, 1940 miliaceum 18i Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 8860 Pisum sp. 1 19a 106 sherds Unspecified Fragment no. 9627, excavation Hordeum 1 Т, squares 29–35, 1933 vulgare 19b Fragment no. 8410, excavation Panicum Vessel 1 Т, 1933 miliaceum bottom 19c Fragment no. 8409 Pisum sp. 1 19d Fragment no. 5145, excavation Cannabis sp. 1 Т, square 29, 1933 19e Fragment no. 7869, excavation Panicum 1 В, square 12, 1940 miliaceum 19f Fragment no. 6432, excavation Panicum 1 S, square 39, 1932 miliaceum 20a 122 sherds of vessel walls Hillfort Usatovo Cornus mas 1 3206 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 Table 1 (continued) Sample Nature of materials Site name Information on the label Best fit Location of Number of unit identification impressions impressions Fragment no. 4463, excavation Т,square 35 20b Hillfort Usatovo Fragment no. 1813, excavation Prunus sp. 1 Qw1, 1929 Results of optical microscope examination figurinessuchasthosein Fig. 2 might be more plausibly explained by impressions of hollow stems rather than of We examined approximately 2720 ceramic sherds from cereal grains. No crop impressions have been found in the hillfort and burial contexts and 21 anthropomorphic figurines current study on the anthropomorphic figurines. (or fragments of them) from burial context of Usatovo site; 456 ceramic fragments and 2 boxes of clay daub from hillfort context of Mayaki site. Result of SEM examination The findings of crop impressions, organised by archival storage unit, are recorded in Tables 1 and 2. Some of the Casts were prepared from the 14 pieces of potential millet impressions were found on the same fragments. In most cases, impressions (multiple casts were often made of the same im- the findings on pottery fragments are individual impressions, pressions in case of insufficient capture or damage during whereas the multiple impressions tend to be found on clay transportation). These casts were sent from Ukraine to daubs. They retain a significant amount of morphological de- Cambridge. Since many of the casts lost details during their tails including scales and glumes, fragments of culms, parts of transportation, the seven best plasticine casts were further ex- leaves, grains, seeds, nuts, Btriplets^ of naked barley amined and photographed using SEM. They were then com- (Hordeum vulgare var.nudum), and also Bspikelet forks^ (the pared to SEM images of simulated impressions of Panicum internode fragments with attached glume bases) of einkorn miliaceum. and emmer wheat (Triticum monococcum and Triticum In simulated Panicum miliaceum impressions, we are able dicoccum). to observe such characteristics as grain size, the two ends Among the 14 pieces of millet impressions, 9 come being distinctly shaped, rachises attached to the grain and from hillfort Usatovo, 2 from hillfort Mayaki and another moreover, the absence of surface patterns on lemma and palea 3 from unspecified sites. Thirteen pieces of them are (Fig. 3). In particular, the latter feature is most distinctive from found in pottery sherds and one piece in clay daubs. that of Setaria italica (Fig. 4). In the case of dehusked grain The impressions that were often found on Usatovo impressions (Fig. 3), instead of husk features, details of the hilum are clearly visible, implying that if the dorsal side is Table 2 Summaries of plant impression records in Usatovo materials impressed, then we can expect to see the shape and length of embryo as well. Best fit taxa Number of findings of each species The SEM images of our casts from Ukraine (Figs. 5 and 6) show that the sizes are slightly larger than those Hordeum vulgare 28 of simulated impressions but are still within the size Hordeum vulgarevar.coeleste 1 Panicum miliaceum 14 Triticum dicoccon 5 Cannabis sp. 3 Triticum aestivum 2 Triticum monococcum 1 Pisum sativum 2 Cornus mas 1 Prunus sp. 2 Poa sp. 2 Bromus sp. 1 Unidentified 1 Unidentified grass 9 Fig. 2 Impressions of hollow stems in Usatovo figurines Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3207 Fig. 3 SEM images of silicone casts of simulated impressions of Panicum miliaceum grain (2018) range of Panicum miliaceum grain. Measurements of Discussion simulated millet impressions and our Usatovo samples aresummarisedinTable 3. Our visual identification results (Table 1) would suggest that Meanwhile, surface patterns are absent. Rachises are not the three predominant cereals in Usatovo materials consist of seen in any of the images. The indicative acute end of hulled wheat (both emmer wheat and einkorn wheat), hulled Panicum miliaceum grain is not always seen either. Instead, barley and broomcorn millet. Meanwhile, there are also find- our samples in images A, C, D, F, and G have a more or less ings of naked wheat, naked barley, peas and nutlets of hemp, blunt or roundish shape. etc. Our results are consistent with those of Kuzminova and Fig. 4 SEM images of silicone casts of simulated impressions of Setaria italica grain (2018) 3208 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 Fig. 5 SEM images of plasticine casts of our Usatovo samples. A is hillfort Usatovo (9c in Table 1), no identification suggested. d is found in found in clay daub from ditch at hillfort Mayaki (2c in Table 1), no vessel wall from hillfort Usatovo (14e in Table 1), identified as cf. identification suggested. b is found in vessel wall from hillfort Usatovo Panicum miliaceum (6 in Table 1), no identification suggested. c is found in sherd bottom from Petrenko (1989). However, contra the latter (ibid. p.119), few In the case of dehusked grain impression, the identifying of these impressions are found on anthropomorphic figurines features: shape of grain, shape and location of hilum and shape but instead on pottery sherds and clay daubs. Given the small and length of embryo. Hilum and embryo can be clearly number of crop impressions encountered, we infer that crops discerned in the impression, although one may expect to see were added along with straws and weedy species as vegetative only one of the two in each case. additives. From our visual re-examination of Usatovo materials (around 3500–2950 BC), we have been able to confirm that one of the commonest forms of impression void matches the Robustness of millet impression identification dimensions of Panicum miliaceum grain. The SEM examina- tion of our Usatovo casts offers more details about the voids. Among all crop impressions, the findings of potential millet Apart from a slightly larger dimension than those of simulated imprints are of particular interest. millet impressions, we can also see that some voids are round- There are different identification features for millet impres- ish while others are elliptical. The acute end of Panicum sions of untreated and dehusked grain. On the one hand, in miliaceum is not always seen. The absence of distinctive scu- simulated impressions of husked millet grain, this includes tellum details would indicate that most of the impressions had size, the shape of grain end (one is acute and the other blunt) been made from husked grain. The one exception is the one in and absence of surface patterns on lemma and palea. The Image D (Fig. 5), on which the shape of an embryo may absence of husk surface pattern is significant in distinguishing possibly be discerned. Surface patterns is absent from all spec- from other millet species such as Setaria italica. Meanwhile, imens, which may not necessarily confirm Panicum rachises are seen in two images of our simulated millet im- miliaceum grain but helps to exclude Setaria sp. and also pressions. This is consistent with Bakels’ findings of broom- Echinochloa sp., whose husks carry distinctive patterns (An corn millet impressions with rachises on Bronze Age vessels 2018). Moreover, rachises are not seen in any of the images dating to around 2000 BC (Bakels 2003). Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 3209 Fig. 6 SEM images of plasticine casts of our Usatovo samples. e is found (18c in Table 1), no identification suggested. g is also found in large in vessel bottom from hillfort Usatovo (17c in Table 1), identified as cf. undecorated vessels from hill fort Usatovo (18f in Table 1), identified Lathyrus sp. f is found in large undecorated vessels from hillfort Usatovo as cf. Trifolium sp. while spikelets are visible in most images, which might indi- of the chronology of Usatovo culture. As indicated above, cate that the impressions are made from brittle rachis forms. In the conventionally accepted date range for Usatovo cul- the case of dehusked grain impression in Image D, if the ture is 3500–2900 BC. If both this date range, and the embryo details are substantiated, then it does not eliminate identification of any of the millet impressions proved to the possibility of dehusked Panicum miliaceum grain. There be secure, then that would favour a significantly early is insufficient evidence of shape to clarify the species. date for Asian millet movement across Eurasia, unparal- leled by other evidence. If, however, the later carbon dates which had been excluded as outliers by Petrenko and Reliability of Usatovo chronology Kaiser (2011) proved instead to be robust and indicated a much longer duration for Usatovo culture, then the mille As our findings leave open the possibility that some im- pressions may be millet, it is relevant to return to the issue impressions might theoretically fall into the second Table 3 Measurements (in centimetres) of both simulated millet impressions and our usatovo samples Modern simulated Panicum miliaceum Usatovo cf. millet impression (Figs. 5 and 6) impression (Fig. 3) Husked grain Grain A: length 2.2, width 1.5 Grain A: length 2.9 (incomplete), width 2.6 (incomplete) Grain B: length 2.3, width 1.9 Grain B: length 2.7 (incomplete), width 2.5 Grain C: length 2.5, width 1.7 Grain C: length 2.7, Width: 2.5 Grain E: length 2.8 (incomplete), width 2.6 Grain F: length 2.7 (incomplete), width 2.2 Grain G: length 2.5 (incomplete), width 2.0 Dehusked grain Grain D: length 1.7, width 1.4 Grain D: length 2.5 (incomplete), width 2.3 (incomplete) 3210 Archaeol Anthropol Sci (2019) 11:3201–3211 millennium BC, in line with a larger body of trans- 4. The hilum is round and is located close (but not attached) Eurasian evidence. to the basal end Whatever the resolution of the very early millet-shaped Conclusion impressions from the west of the Altai, that resolution will have important implications for understanding of the prehis- Our re-examination of Usatovo millet impressions contributes tory of trans-Eurasian contact. Meanwhile, flotation should be to the ongoing debate on the robustness of pre-2000 BC millet encouraged in sites with early millet-shaped impression find- findings in Europe. The current study shows that one of the ings so as to answer the question once and for all. commonest forms of impression void matches the dimensions Acknowledgements The paper is part of TA’s doctoral thesis carried out of Panicum miliaceum grains. While sufficient recorded sur- under the supervision of MJ at Department of Archaeology, University of face feature to allow a secure identification remain elusive, Cambridge. We are grateful to Dr. Giedrė Motuzaitė-Matuzevičiūtė for plausible voids have been confirmed in ceramics from the putting the co-authors into contact. We thank Dr. Vlad Petrenko, Usatovo west assumed to predate the second millennium BC. specialist from Odessa Archaeological Museum for permission and facil- ities to work there. We thank Mr. Dmitriy Yanov from Odessa Turning from archaeological evidence to simulated impres- Archaeological Museum for the incredible amount of interpretation and sions, we have demonstrated that all diagnostic features of translation work. We thank Dr. Emma Lightfoot and Miss Huiru Lian for millet taxa are in principle observable through SEM in the helping prepare the figures. TA is grateful to McDonald institute for case of actual millet impressions. These features include one Archaeological Research (Cambridge) and also 2016 Andrew Sherratt Grant (from Department of Archaeology, University of Sheffield) for acute end, the other blunt, and absence of surface patterns on travel support. lemma and palea, or in the case of dehusked grain, the shape and length of embryo and the shape and location of hilum. In Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative the SEM images of our Ukraine samples, apart from dimen- Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http:// sions, we were only able to observe the absence of surface creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, patterns in impressions of possible husked grain and potential distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appro- embryo details in one impression of dehusked grain. Whether priate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. or not any of these do relate to Panicum miliaceum, the ab- sence of patterning allows us to exclude both Setaria sp. and Echinochloa sp. Publisher’sNote Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdic- tional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Our re-examination of Usatovo millet impressions and Usatovo chronology permits more than one narrative. If both Usatovo millet impressions and Usatovo chronology are sub- stantiated, this might indicate either a very early contact be- tween Eurasian communities, or alternatively a domestication References event in the west, although the latter is not supported by ge- An T (2018) Re-visiting the co-relation of movement of Chinese millet netic evidence (Hunt et al. 2018). If millet impressions are and painted pottery before the 2nd millennium BC. 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Journal

Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences – Springer Journals

Published: Nov 17, 2018

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