Abstract
Samples of dental calculus were taken from 11 human individuals buried at Nemrik 9, a Pre-Pottery Neolithic site in Northern Iraq. All of them represented the time span of ca. 9100–8600 bp. In total, 95 microfossils were retrieved from these samples, including 70 phytoliths, 9 starch granules or clusters of starch, 3 pollens, and 1 xylem fragment. Most microfossils could be attributed to C3 cool season cereals, most likely wheat and barley, which is consistent with previous knowledge about the composition of crops in early farming communities living in the Fertile Crescent. In addition, three phytoliths and one starch granule typical of C4 warm season grasses were recovered including one subangular and faceted starch granule, which might derive from a native grass, but is not diagnostic of any genus. Prior to assigning diagnostic status to this starch, exhaustive reference work on native grass seeds is necessary. The presence of one Phragmites phytolith suggests non-alimentary processing of reeds using teeth or perhaps using the stem of this grass as a toothbrush or toothpick.
Highlights
Analysis of plant microfossils retrieved from dental calculus provides direct insight into diet and sometimes into non-alimentary tooth use in ancient human populations (Cummings and Magennis 1997; Henry and Piperno 2008)
No analysis of plant microfossils embedded in human dental calculus has been conducted so far using samples from archaeological sites dated to the beginning of agriculture in the Fertile Crescent, data on direct plant consumption would be very useful in reconstructions of processes that led to transformation of wild grass gatherers into plant cultivators
We present the results of research on phytoliths, starches, and other plant microfossils recovered from several samples of dental calculus retrieved from Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPN) human skeletons buried at Nemrik 9, which is an important site of early farmers located on the upper Tigris in the hilly area of Northern Mesopotamia (Fig. 1)
Summary
Analysis of plant microfossils retrieved from dental calculus provides direct insight into diet and sometimes into non-alimentary tooth use in ancient human populations (Cummings and Magennis 1997; Henry and Piperno 2008). This method has been used successfully in research on diet and subsistence in Neanderthals (Henry et al 2011, 2014; Hardy et al 2012) and in several Holocene human populations around the world (e.g., Dudgeon and Tromp 2012; Mickleburgh and Pagán-Jiménez 2012), including one Bronze Age site in Syria (Henry and Piperno 2008). Nemrik 9, together with Zawi Chemi, Qermez Dere, M’lefaat, and Tell Magzalia, represents the eastern part of the Fertile Crescent, which has been much less investigated than Levantine or Anatolian areas of early plant cultivation in the Near East (Willcox 2012)
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