Resilience and Adaptation of Agricultural Practice in Neolithic Çatalhöyük, Turkey

Ayala, G.; Bogaard, A.; Charles, M.; Wainwright, J.

Abstract

Andrew Sherratt’s ‘Water, soil and seasonality’, World Archaeology (1980), signposted a long-term debate surrounding early farming adaptations to riverine landscapes in western Asia and Europe. Recent research at Çatalhöyük in central Anatolia, a key case study in Sherratt’s ‘floodplain cultivation’ model, enables integrated, evidence-based assessment of the local hydrology and agroecology, and of farmers’ resilience over more than a millennium. In contrast to previous models, the agroecological niche at Çatalhöyük featured strategic planting of diverse crops across a range of hydrological conditions, within and beyond a broad ‘belt’ of small anastomosing river channels extending a kilometre from the site. Growing conditions likely depended on location relative to settlement, a nutrient-rich ‘hot spot’, with diminishing inputs of organic matter and mechanical disturbance away from the tell. This reconstruction contrasts with the original model of ‘floodplain cultivation’ and demonstrates the complexity with which agroecologies evolved through landscape affordances, creative cropping, and resilience.

Citation

Ayala, G., Bogaard, A., Charles, M., & Wainwright, J. (2022). Resilience and Adaptation of Agricultural Practice in Neolithic Çatalhöyük, Turkey. World Archaeology, 54(3), 407-428. https://doi.org/10.1080/00438243.2022.2125058

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 30, 2022
• Online Publication Date: Oct 28, 2022
• Publication Date: 2022
• Deposit Date: May 26, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 14, 2023
• Journal: World Archaeology
• Print ISSN: 0043-8243
• Electronic ISSN: 1470-1375
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis Group
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 54
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 407-428
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00438243.2022.2125058
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1204402