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Mariani M, Wills A, Herbert A, Adeleye M, Florin SA, Cadd H, Connor S, Kershaw P, Theuerkauf M, Stevenson J, Fletcher MS, Mooney S, Bowman D, Haberle S. Shrub cover declined as Indigenous populations expanded across southeast Australia. Science 2024; 386:567-573. [PMID: 39480950 DOI: 10.1126/science.adn8668] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/04/2024] [Revised: 04/18/2024] [Accepted: 09/13/2024] [Indexed: 11/02/2024]
Abstract
Wildfires in forests globally have become more frequent and intense because of changes in climate and human management. Shrub layer fuels allow fire to spread vertically to forest canopy, creating high-intensity fires. Our research provides a deep-time perspective on shrub fuel loads in fire-prone southeastern Australia. Comparing 2833 records for vegetation cover, past climate, biomass burning, and human population size across different phases of human occupation, we demonstrated that Indigenous population expansion and cultural fire use resulted in a 50% reduction in shrub cover, from approximately 30% from the early to mid-Holocene (12 to 6 thousand years ago) to 15% during the late to mid-Holocene (6 to 1 thousand years ago). Since the start of British colonization to the present, shrub cover has increased to the highest ever recorded (mean of 35% land cover), increasing the risk of high-intensity fires.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michela Mariani
- School of Geography, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK
- School of Culture, History, and Language, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Alastair Wills
- School of Geography, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK
| | - Annika Herbert
- School of Culture, History, and Language, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Matthew Adeleye
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Department of Geography, University of Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, UK
| | - S Anna Florin
- School of Archaeology and Anthropology, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia
| | - Haidee Cadd
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia
- School of Earth, Atmospheric and Life Sciences, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia
| | - Simon Connor
- School of Culture, History, and Language, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Peter Kershaw
- School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment, Monash University, Clayton, Australia
| | - Martin Theuerkauf
- Institut für Botanik und Landschaftsökologie, University of Greifswald, Greifswald, Germany
- Institute of Ecology, Leuphana University of Lüneburg, Lüneburg, Germany
| | - Janelle Stevenson
- School of Culture, History, and Language, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Michael-Shawn Fletcher
- Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Australia
- School of Geography, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Australia
- Indigenous Knowledge Institute, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Australia
| | - Scott Mooney
- School of Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - David Bowman
- Fire Centre, School of Natural Sciences, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia
| | - Simon Haberle
- School of Culture, History, and Language, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
- Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
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Herrera Malatesta E, de Valeriola S. Ambiguous landscapes: A framework for assessing robustness and uncertainties in archaeological point pattern analysis. PLoS One 2024; 19:e0307743. [PMID: 39316601 PMCID: PMC11421812 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0307743] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/22/2024] [Accepted: 07/10/2024] [Indexed: 09/26/2024] Open
Abstract
Landscape research in archaeology has greatly benefited from the increasing application of computational methods over the last decades. Spatial statistical methods such as point pattern analysis have been particularly revolutionary. Archaeologists have used point pattern analysis to explore spatial arrangements and relations between 'points' (e.g., locations of artefacts or archaeological sites). However, the results obtained from these techniques can be greatly affected by the uncertainty coming from the fragmentary nature of archaeological data, their irregular distribution in the landscape, and the working methods used to study them. Furthermore, the quantification of uncertainty in spatial data coming from non-systematic surveys has never been fully addressed. To overcome this challenge, archaeologists have increasingly relied on applying advanced methods from statistics, data science, and geography. While the application of advanced methods from formal sciences will provide robustness to models based on uncertain datasets, as with uncertainty, robustness must be assessed in relation to the case study, the regional context, and the methods used. These issues are of great importance when the models from advanced methods are directly used to create narratives about past landscapes. In this paper, we gather previous research on uncertainty quantification in archaeology and formalize its best practices into a framework to assess robustness and uncertainty in spatial statistical models, particularly focusing on one commonly used in the discipline, i.e., the Pair Correlation Function. This framework allows us to understand better how incomplete data affect a model, quantify the model uncertainties, and assess the robustness of the results achieved with spatial point processes.
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Gayo EM, Lima M, Gurruchaga A, Estay SA, Santoro CM, Latorre C, McRostie V. Towards understanding human-environment feedback loops: the Atacama Desert case. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2024; 379:20220253. [PMID: 37952616 PMCID: PMC10645077 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2022.0253] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/17/2023] [Accepted: 08/15/2023] [Indexed: 11/14/2023] Open
Abstract
The overall trajectory for the human-environment interaction has been punctuated by demographic boom-and-bust cycles, phases of growth/overshooting as well as of expansion/contraction in productivity. Although this pattern has been explained in terms of an interplay between population growth, social upscaling, ecosystem engineering and climate variability, the evoked demographic-resource-complexity mechanisms have not been empirically tested. By integrating proxy data for population sizes, palaeoclimate and internal societal factors into empirical modelling approaches from the population dynamic theory, we evaluated how endogenous (population sizes, warfare and social upscaling) and exogenous (climate) variables module the dynamic in past agrarian societies. We focused on the inland Atacama Desert, where populations developed agriculture activities by engineering arid and semi-arid landscapes during the last 2000 years. Our modelling approach indicates that these populations experienced a boom-and-bust dynamic over the last millennia, which was coupled to structure feedback between population sizes, hydroclimate, social upscaling, warfare and ecosystem engineering. Thus, the human-environment loop appears closely linked with cooperation, competition, limiting resources and the ability of problem-solving. This article is part of the theme issue 'Evolution and sustainability: gathering the strands for an Anthropocene synthesis'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eugenia M. Gayo
- Departamento de Geografía, Universidad de Chile, Santiago 8331051, Chile
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Santiago 8331150, Chile
- Center for Climate and Resilience Research (CR)2, Santiago 8370449, Chile
- Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity (IEB), Santiago 7750000, Chile
| | - Mauricio Lima
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Santiago 8331150, Chile
- Departamento de Ecología, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago 8331150, Chile
| | - Andone Gurruchaga
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Santiago 8331150, Chile
| | - Sergio A. Estay
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Santiago 8331150, Chile
- Instituto de Ciencias Ambientales y Evolutivas, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia 5090000, Chile
| | - Calogero M. Santoro
- Instituto de Alta Investigación, Universidad de Tarapacá, Arica 1001236, Chile
| | - Claudio Latorre
- Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity (IEB), Santiago 7750000, Chile
- Departamento de Ecología, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago 8331150, Chile
- Centro PUC Desierto de Atacama (CDA), Santiago 7821093, Chile
| | - Virginia McRostie
- Escuela de Antropología, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago 7821093, Chile
- Centro PUC Desierto de Atacama (CDA), Santiago 7821093, Chile
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Rayfield KM, Mychajliw AM, Singleton RR, Sholts SB, Hofman CA. Uncovering the Holocene roots of contemporary disease-scapes: bringing archaeology into One Health. Proc Biol Sci 2023; 290:20230525. [PMID: 38052246 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2023.0525] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/03/2023] [Accepted: 11/06/2023] [Indexed: 12/07/2023] Open
Abstract
The accelerating pace of emerging zoonotic diseases in the twenty-first century has motivated cross-disciplinary collaboration on One Health approaches, combining microbiology, veterinary and environmental sciences, and epidemiology for outbreak prevention and mitigation. Such outbreaks are often caused by spillovers attributed to human activities that encroach on wildlife habitats and ecosystems, such as land use change, industrialized food production, urbanization and animal trade. While the origin of anthropogenic effects on animal ecology and biogeography can be traced to the Late Pleistocene, the archaeological record-a long-term archive of human-animal-environmental interactions-has largely been untapped in these One Health approaches, thus limiting our understanding of these dynamics over time. In this review, we examine how humans, as niche constructors, have facilitated new host species and 'disease-scapes' from the Late Pleistocene to the Anthropocene, by viewing zooarchaeological, bioarchaeological and palaeoecological data with a One Health perspective. We also highlight how new biomolecular tools and advances in the '-omics' can be holistically coupled with archaeological and palaeoecological reconstructions in the service of studying zoonotic disease emergence and re-emergence.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kristen M Rayfield
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY, USA
- Laboratories of Molecular Anthropology & Microbiome Research, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA
- Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019-0390, USA
- Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA
| | - Alexis M Mychajliw
- Laboratories of Molecular Anthropology & Microbiome Research, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA
- Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019-0390, USA
- Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA
- Department of Biology & Program in Environmental Studies, Middlebury College, Middlebury, VT 05753-6203, USA
| | - Robin R Singleton
- Laboratories of Molecular Anthropology & Microbiome Research, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA
- Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019-0390, USA
| | - Sabrina B Sholts
- Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA
| | - Courtney A Hofman
- Laboratories of Molecular Anthropology & Microbiome Research, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA
- Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019-0390, USA
- Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA
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Stevens CJ, Crema ER, Shoda S. The importance of wild resources as a reflection of the resilience and changing nature of early agricultural systems in East Asia and Europe. Front Ecol Evol 2022. [DOI: 10.3389/fevo.2022.1017909] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
We examine the changing importance of wild starch rich plant staples, predominantly tree nuts, in early agricultural societies in East Asia and Europe, focusing on Korea, Japan, and Britain. A comparative review highlights variations in the importance of wild plant staples compared to domesticated crops. The Korean Middle to Late Chulmun periods (c. 3,500–1,500 BC) was characterized by a high reliance on nuts alongside millet. This declines with the transition to rice agriculture, but remains significant during the Mumun period (c. 1,500–300 BC). In Japan, the arrival of rice and millets in the Yayoi Period (c. 1,000 BC−250 AD) saw continued evidence for high levels of reliance on wild resources, which declines only in the Kofun and early historical periods. In Early Neolithic Britain (c. 4,000–3,300 BC) cereal agriculture is accompanied by high evidence for wild plant foods. But during the Middle to Late Neolithic (3,300–c. 2,400/2,200 BC) cereals were abandoned on the mainland with hazelnuts becoming a prominent plant staple. Agriculture returned in the second half of the 3rd millennium BC, followed by a strong decline in wild plant food use during the Middle to Late Bronze Age (1,700–700 BC). Such patterns have previously been attributed to the slow adoption of farming by indigenous peoples, with a continued reliance on wild resources. In light of evidence demonstrating that the dispersal of agriculture was largely driven by a mixture of demic-diffusion and introgression of hunter-gatherers into agricultural groups, a reinterpretation of the role of wild foods is needed. It is argued that the relative importance of wild plant staples provides an indicator of the stability and dependability of agricultural and social systems. A heavy reliance on wild foods in early agricultural societies is tied to the slow adaptation of domesticated crops to new environments, where agricultural and social landscapes are yet to be firmly established, and social systems that could mitigate for poor harvests and storage were often absent. The retained lengthy persistence of wild plant staples in East Asian subsistence systems compared to the British Isles likely reflects differences in the ecological and labor demands for rice compared to Western Asiatic cereals.
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Crema ER, Stevens CJ, Shoda S. Bayesian analyses of direct radiocarbon dates reveal geographic variations in the rate of rice farming dispersal in prehistoric Japan. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2022; 8:eadc9171. [PMID: 36129978 PMCID: PMC9491708 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adc9171] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/09/2022] [Accepted: 08/04/2022] [Indexed: 06/15/2023]
Abstract
The adoption of rice farming during the first millennium BC was a turning point in Japanese prehistory, defining the subsequent cultural, linguistic, and genetic variation in the archipelago. Here, we use a suite of novel Bayesian techniques to estimate the regional rates of dispersal and arrival time of rice farming using radiocarbon dates on charred rice remains. Our results indicate substantial variations in the rate of dispersal of rice within the Japanese islands, hinting at the presence of a mixture of demic and cultural diffusion, geographic variations in the suitability of its cultivation, and the possible role of existing social networks in facilitating or hindering the adoption of the new subsistence economy.
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Affiliation(s)
- Enrico R. Crema
- Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
- McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
| | - Chris J. Stevens
- McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
| | - Shinya Shoda
- Nara National Research Institute for Cultural Properties, Nara, Japan
- BioArCh, University of York, York, UK
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Cortell-Nicolau A, García-Puchol O, Barrera-Cruz M, García-Rivero D. The spread of agriculture in Iberia through Approximate Bayesian Computation and Neolithic projectile tools. PLoS One 2021; 16:e0261813. [PMID: 34962962 PMCID: PMC8714124 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0261813] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/21/2021] [Accepted: 12/13/2021] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
In the present article we use geometric microliths (a specific type of arrowhead) and Approximate Bayesian Computation (ABC) in order to evaluate possible origin points and expansion routes for the Neolithic in the Iberian Peninsula. In order to do so, we divide the Iberian Peninsula in four areas (Ebro river, Catalan shores, Xúquer river and Guadalquivir river) and we sample the geometric microliths existing in the sites with the oldest radiocarbon dates for each zone. On this data, we perform a partial Mantel test with three matrices: geographic distance matrix, cultural distance matrix and chronological distance matrix. After this is done, we simulate a series of partial Mantel tests where we alter the chronological matrix by using an expansion model with randomised origin points, and using the distribution of the observed partial Mantel test’s results as a summary statistic within an Approximate Bayesian Computation-Sequential Monte-Carlo (ABC-SMC) algorithm framework. Our results point clearly to a Neolithic expansion route following the Northern Mediterranean, whilst the Southern Mediterranean route could also find support and should be further discussed. The most probable origin points focus on the Xúquer river area.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alfredo Cortell-Nicolau
- Departament de Prehistòria, Arqueologia i Història Antiga, Facultat de Geografia i Història, Universitat de València, València, Spain
- Department of Archaeology, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Faculty of Human, Social, and Political Science, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
- * E-mail: (OGP); (ACN)
| | - Oreto García-Puchol
- Departament de Prehistòria, Arqueologia i Història Antiga, Facultat de Geografia i Història, Universitat de València, València, Spain
- * E-mail: (OGP); (ACN)
| | - María Barrera-Cruz
- Departament de Prehistòria, Arqueologia i Història Antiga, Facultat de Geografia i Història, Universitat de València, València, Spain
| | - Daniel García-Rivero
- Department of Prehistory and Archaeology, Faculty of Geography and History, University of Seville, Seville, Spain
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Riris P, de Souza JG. Formal Tests for Resistance-Resilience in Archaeological Time Series. Front Ecol Evol 2021. [DOI: 10.3389/fevo.2021.740629] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The study of resilience is a common pathway for scientific data to inform policy and practice towards impending climate change. Consequently, understanding the mechanisms and features that contribute towards building resilience is a key goal of much research on coupled socio-environmental systems. In parallel, archaeology has developed the ambition to contribute to this agenda through its unique focus on cultural dynamics that occur over the very long term. This paper argues that archaeological studies of resilience are limited in scope and potential impact by incomplete operational definitions of resilience, itself a multifaceted and contested concept. This lack of interdisciplinary engagement fundamentally limits archaeology’s ability to contribute meaningfully to understanding factors behind the emergence and maintenance of long-term societal resilience, a topic of significant interest that the field is in theory ideally positioned to address. Here, we introduce resilience metrics drawn from ecology and develop case studies to illustrate their potential utility for archaeological studies. We achieve this by extending methods for formally measuring resistance, the capacity of a system to absorb disturbances; and resilience, its capacity to recover from disturbances, with a novel significance test for palaeodemographic data. Building on statistical permutation and post-hoc tests available in the rcarbon package in the R statistical environment, we apply our adapted resilience-resistance framework to summed probability distributions of calibrated radiocarbon dates drawn from the Atlantic Forest of eastern Brazil. We deploy these methods to investigate cross-sectional trends across three recognised biogeographical zones of the Atlantic Forest domain, against the backdrop of prehistoric phases of heightened hydroclimatic variability. Our analysis uncovers novel centennial-scale spatial structure in the resilience of palaeodemographic growth rates. In addition to the case-specific findings, we suggest that adapting formal metrics can help archaeology create impact and engagement beyond relatively narrow disciplinary concerns. To this end, we supply code and data to replicate our palaeodemographic analyses to enable their use and adaptation to other archaeological problems.
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Kim H, Lee GA, Crema ER. Bayesian analyses question the role of climate in Chulmun demography. Sci Rep 2021; 11:23797. [PMID: 34893660 PMCID: PMC8664936 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-03180-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/28/2021] [Accepted: 11/26/2021] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
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 14C dates. We focus on testing whether a cooling climate, and its potential negative impact on millet productivity around the mid 5th-millennium cal. BP, triggered the population decline suggested by the archaeological record. We employ a Bayesian approach that estimates the temporal relationship between climatic events and change-points in the rate of growth in human population as inferred from radiocarbon time frequency data. Our results do not support the climate-induced population decline hypothesis for three reasons. First, our Bayesian analyses suggest that the cooling event occurred after the start of the population decline inferred from the radiocarbon time-frequency record. Second, we did not find evidence showing a significant reduction of millet-associated dates occurring during the cooling climate. Third, we detected different magnitudes of decline in the radiocarbon time-frequency data in the inland and coastal regions, indicating that the even if cooling episodes were ultimately responsible of these population 'busts', their impact was most likely distinct between these regions. We discuss our results highlighting the long tradition of mobility-based subsistence strategy in coastal regions as a potential factor contributing to the regional differences we were able to detect.
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Affiliation(s)
- Habeom Kim
- Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon, 1321 Kincaid Street, Eugene, OR, 97403, USA
| | - Gyoung-Ah Lee
- Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon, 1321 Kincaid Street, Eugene, OR, 97403, USA
| | - Enrico R Crema
- Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, CB2 3ER, UK.
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Approximate Bayesian Computation of radiocarbon and paleoenvironmental record shows population resilience on Rapa Nui (Easter Island). Nat Commun 2021; 12:3939. [PMID: 34168160 PMCID: PMC8225912 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-24252-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/12/2021] [Accepted: 06/02/2021] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Examining how past human populations responded to environmental and climatic changes is a central focus of the historical sciences. The use of summed probability distributions (SPD) of radiocarbon dates as a proxy for estimating relative population sizes provides a widely applicable method in this research area. Paleodemographic reconstructions and modeling with SPDs, however, are stymied by a lack of accepted methods for model fitting, tools for assessing the demographic impact of environmental or climatic variables, and a means for formal multi-model comparison. These deficiencies severely limit our ability to reliably resolve crucial questions of past human-environment interactions. We propose a solution using Approximate Bayesian Computation (ABC) to fit complex demographic models to observed SPDs. Using a case study from Rapa Nui (Easter Island), a location that has long been the focus of debate regarding the impact of environmental and climatic changes on its human population, we find that past populations were resilient to environmental and climatic challenges. Our findings support a growing body of evidence showing stable and sustainable communities on the island. The ABC framework offers a novel approach for exploring regions and time periods where questions of climate-induced demographic and cultural change remain unresolved. Summed probability distributions of radiocarbon dates can be used to estimate past demography, but methods to test for associations with environmental change are lacking. Here, DiNapoli et al. propose an approach using Approximate Bayesian Computation and illustrate it in a case study of Rapa Nui.
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