Margins or Nodes? The Role of the Inner Asian Mountain Communities in Prehistoric Food Globalization

Abstract

Abstract The multi-directional translocation of domesticates across Central Asia played a major role in the past cultural, demographic, and environmental transformations of Eurasia. The mountain chains that stretch across Central Asia are especially intriguing for addressing prehistoric network formation systems across Eurasia. Mountain zones acted as geographical filters by influencing when and what animal and plant species were dispersed to trans-range regions of Eurasia, and how networks of interaction formed. At the same time, diverse ecosystems of the mountain valleys and abundance of water acted as a vital area for holding those networks together. This paper discusses the earliest evidence of food production in the Tien Shan and the role of mountain communities in distributing crop and animal species across the wider regions of Asia. In the light of the newest research, the chapter will discuss human subsistence strategies in these high-elevation zones in prehistory, pinpointing the timings of crop and animal arrival, and identifying selection between species due to marginal climates. It will also discuss the environmental and cultural processes that facilitated early crop and domesticated animal movement across the region where filtering effects of plant and animal selection by communities were very distinct. Thus, this region holds a clue to explaining the distribution patterns of our earliest domesticates. Finally, this paper shows that mountains zones were not marginal ‘pass over’ territory, but instead densely populated regions that anchored diverse agricultural economies and long-distance Eurasian exchange networks.