Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-29T01:17:52.607Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Origin of Pottery in East Asia and Its Relationship to Environmental Changes in the Late Glacial

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2016

Yaroslav V Kuzmin
Yaroslav V Kuzmin*
Affiliation:
Institute of Geology and Mineralogy, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Koptyug Ave. 3, Novosibirsk 630090, Russia. Email: [email protected]
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The chronometry of the origin of pottery in East Asia can give some insights to the question: did environmental changes trigger and/or accelerate innovations such as pottery-making, maritime adaptation, and agriculture? Recent results show that pottery emerged in 3 regions of East Asia: south China (up to ∼14,800 BP), the Japanese Islands (about 13,800–13,500 BP), and the Russian Far East (∼13,300 BP). The earliest pottery in the Old World preceded the Bølling-Allerød warm period (about 13,000–11,500 BP). Thus, the relationship between climate and pottery origin was not “linear.” It seems that the combination of environmental changes and the necessity to process freshwater fish and mollusks and terrestrial plants (including acorns and nuts) resulted in the introduction of pottery-making in East Asia. An important feature is the quite nonuniform nature of the Neolithization process in the eastern part of Asia, where often in 2 neighboring regions pottery appeared at very different times: approximately 15,000–14,000 BP in south China and ∼4000 BP in mainland Southeast Asia. Thus, the kind of eternal question like “What caused what?” still stands in terms of what were the driving forces for the emergence of pottery in East Asia and worldwide.

Type
Archaeology
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 52 , Issue 2: 20th Int. Radiocarbon Conference Proceedings , 2010 , pp. 415 - 420
Copyright
Copyright © 2010 by the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

References

Bae, K, Kim, JC. 2003. Radiocarbon chronology of the Palaeolithic complexes and the transition to the Neolithic in Korea. The Review of Archaeology 24(2):46–9.Google Scholar
Boaretto, E, Wu, X, Yuan, J, Bar-Yosef, O, Chu, V, Pan, Y, Liu, K, Cohen, D, Jiao, T, Li, S, Gu, H, Goldberg, P, Weiner, S. 2009. Radiocarbon dating of charcoal and bone collagen associated with early pottery at Yuchanyan Cave, Hunan Province, China. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 106(24):9595–600.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Clark, AN. 2003. The Penguin Dictionary of Geography. 3rd edition. London: Penguin Books. 469 p.Google Scholar
Craig, OE, Forster, M, Andersen, SH, Koch, E, Crombé, P, Milner, NJ, Stern, B, Bailey, GN, Heron, CP. 2007. Molecular and isotopic demonstration of the processing of aquatic products in northern European prehistoric pottery. Archaeometry 49(1):135–52.Google Scholar
Crawford, G. 1996. Jomon tradition. In: Fagan, BM, editor-in-chief. The Oxford Companion to Archaeology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p 365–7.Google Scholar
Crawford, GW, Takamiya, H. 2008. Japanese Archipelago, prehistoric hunter-fisher-gatherers. In: Pearsall, DM, editor-in-chief. Encyclopedia of Archaeology. Volume 1. Oxford: Academic Press. p 637–41.Google Scholar
Darvill, T. 2002. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 506 p.Google Scholar
Hayashi, S, editor. 2008. Mikoshiba Site: Excavation and Research at a Site Transitional from the Terminal Late Palaeolithic to the Incipient Jomon Period. Nagano: Shinmai Shoseki Publishing. In Japanese with English summary. 331 p.Google Scholar
Higham, C, Higham, T. 2009. A new chronological framework for prehistoric Southeast Asia, based on a Bayesian model from Ban Non Wat. Antiquity 83(319):125–44.Google Scholar
Ikawa, F. 1964. The continuity of non-ceramic to ceramic cultures in Japan. Arctic Anthropology 2(2):95–119.Google Scholar
Im, H-J. 1999. New discoveries in the Korean Neolithic archaeology. In: Omoto, K, editor. Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Origins of the Japanese. Kyoto: International Research Center for Japanese Studies. p 155–68.Google Scholar
Jiang, Q, Piperno, DR. 1999. Environmental and archaeological implications of a Late Quaternary palynological sequence, Poyang Lake, southern China. Quaternary Research 52(2):250–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keally, CT, Taniguchi, Y, Kuzmin, YV. 2003. Understanding the beginning of pottery technology in Japan and neighboring East Asia. The Review of Archaeology 24(2):3–14.Google Scholar
Keally, CT, Taniguchi, Y, Kuzmin, YV, Shewkomud, IY. 2004. Chronology of the beginning of pottery manufacture in East Asia. Radiocarbon 46(1):345–51.Google Scholar
Kikuchi, T. 1986. Continental culture and Hokkaido. In: Pearson, RJ, Barnes, GL, Hutterer, KL, editors. Windows on the Japanese Past: Studies in Archaeology and Prehistory. Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan. p 149–62.Google Scholar
Klimin, MA, Kuzmin, YV, Bazarova, VB, Mokhova, LM, Jull, AJT. 2004. Late Glacial-Holocene environmental changes and its age in the Lower Amur River basin, Russian Far East: the Gursky peatbog case study. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research B 223–224:676–80.Google Scholar
Kuzmin, YV. 2003. The Paleolithic-to-Neolithic transition and the origin of pottery production in the Russian Far East: a geoarchaeological approach. Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 3(15):16–26.Google Scholar
Kuzmin, YV. 2006. Chronology of the earliest pottery in East Asia: progress and pitfalls. Antiquity 80(308):362–71.Google Scholar
Kuzmin, YV. 2009. Radiocarbon and the Old World archaeology: shaping a chronological framework. Radiocarbon 51(1):149–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuzmin, YV, Jull, AJT, Burr, GS. 2009. Major patterns in the Neolithic chronology of East Asia: issues of the origin of pottery, agriculture, and civilization. Radiocarbon 51(3):891–903.Google Scholar
Kuzmin, YV, Orlova, LA. 2000. The Neolithization of Siberia and the Russian Far East: radiocarbon evidence. Antiquity 74(284):356–65.Google Scholar
Kuzmin, YV, Vetrov, VM. 2007. The earliest Neolithic complex in Siberia: the Ust-Karenga 12 site and its significance for the Neolithisation process in Eurasia. Documenta Praehistorica 34:9–20.Google Scholar
Lowe, JJ, Rasmussen, SO, Björck, S, Hoek, WZ, Steffensen, JP, Walker, MJC, Yu, ZC, the INTIMATE group. 2008. Synchronisation of palaeoenvironmental events in the North Atlantic region during the Last Termination: a revised protocol recommended by the INTIMATE group. Quaternary Science Reviews 27(1–2):6–17.Google Scholar
Machida, H. 1999. The stratigraphy, chronology and distribution of distal marker-tephras in and around Japan. Global and Planetary Change 21(1–3):71–94.Google Scholar
Medvedev, VE. 2008. O nachalnom neolite Priamurya i keramike osipovskoi kultury [About the Initial Neolithic of the Amur River basin and the pottery of Osipovka culture]. In: Popov, AN, editor. Neolit i Neolitizatsiya Basseina Yaponskogo Morya: Chelovek i Istorichesky Landshaft. Vladivostok: Far Eastern State University Press. In Russian with English abstract. p 115–25.Google Scholar
Morlan, RE. 1967a. The preceramic period of Hokkaido: an outline. Arctic Anthropology 4(1):164–220.Google Scholar
Morlan, RE. 1967b. Chronometric dating in Japan. Arctic Anthropology 4(2):180–211.Google Scholar
Mylnikova, LN, Nesterov, SP. 2008. Fiziko-khimicheskoe issledovanie keramiki pamyatnika Kosanni: k probleme proiskhozhdeniya goncharsktva [Physical-chemical study of the Kosanni site pottery: to the problem of the origin of pottery-making]. In: Popov, AN, editor. Neolit i Neolitizatsiya Basseina Yaponskogo Morya: Chelovek i Istorichesky Landshaft. Vladivostok: Far Eastern State University Press. In Russian with English abstract. p 161–9.Google Scholar
Nakamura, T, Taniguchi, Y, Tsuji, S, Oda, H. 2001. Radiocarbon dating of charred residues on the earliest pottery in Japan. Radiocarbon 43(2B):1129–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nesterov, SP, Sakamoto, M, Imamura, M, Kuzmin, YV. 2006. The Late-Glacial Neolithic complex of the Gromatukha site, Russian Far East: new results and interpretations. Current Research in the Pleistocene 23:46–9.Google Scholar
Rasmussen, SO, Andersen, KK, Svensson, AM, Steffensen, JP, Vinther, BM, Causen, HB, Siggaard-Andersen, M-L, Johnsen, SJ, Larsen, LB, Dahl-Jenses, D, Bigler, M, Röthlisberger, R, Fischer, H, Goto-Azuma, K, Hansson, ME, Ruth, U. 2006. A new Greenland ice core chronology for the last glacial termination. Journal of Geophysical Research (Atmospheres) 111: D06102, doi:10.1029/2005JD006079.Google Scholar
Reimer, PJ, Baillie, MGL, Bard, E, Bayliss, A, Beck, JW, Bertrand, CJH, Blackwell, PG, Buck, CE, Burr, GS, Cutler, KB, Damon, PE, Edwards, RL, Fairbanks, RG, Friedrich, M, Guilderson, TP, Hogg, AG, Hughen, KA, Kromer, B, McCormac, G, Manning, S, Bronk Ramsey, C, Reimer, RW, Remmele, S, Southon, JR, Stuiver, M, Talamo, S, Taylor, FW, van der Plicht, J, Weyhenmeyer, CE. 2004. IntCal04 terrestrial radiocarbon age calibration, 0–26 cal kyr BP. Radiocarbon 46(3):1029–58.Google Scholar
Taniguchi, Y. 1999. Archaeological research at the Odai Yamamoto 1 site: summary. In: Odai Yamamoto 1 Site Excavation Team, editors. Archaeological Research at the Odai Yamamoto 1 Site: Inquiry into the Question of the End of the Palaeolithic Culture and the Beginning of the Jomon Culture. Tokyo: Kokugakuin University. p 135–44.Google Scholar
Taniguchi, Y. 2006. Dating and function of the oldest pottery in Japan. Current Research in the Pleistocene 23:33–5.Google Scholar
Taniguchi, Y, Kawaguchi, J. 2001. 14C ages and calibrated dates of the oldest pottery culture in the Chojakubo-Mikoshiba period. Daiyonki Kenkyu 40(6):485–98. In Japanese with English abstract.Google Scholar
Tsukada, M. 1986. Vegetation in prehistoric Japan: the last 20,000 years. In: Pearson, RJ, Barnes, GL, Hutterer, KL, editors. Windows on the Japanese Past: Studies in Archaeology and Prehistory. Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan. p 11–56.Google Scholar
Vetrov, VM, Kuzmin, YV, Burr, GS. 2006. The Final-Pleistocene pottery of Siberia: Ust'-Karenga 12 site case study. Current Research in the Pleistocene 23:49–51.Google Scholar
Wang, YJ, Cheng, H, Edwards, RL, An, ZS, Wu, JY, Shen, C-C, Dorale, JA. 2001. A high-resolution absolute-dated Late Pleistocene monsoon record from Hulu Cave, China. Science 294(5550):2345–8.Google Scholar
Weber, AW, Beukens, RP, Bazaliiskii, VI, Goriunova, OI, Savel'ev, NA. 2006. Radiocarbon dates from Neolithic and Bronze Age hunter-gatherer cemeteries in the Cis-Baikal region of Siberia. Radiocarbon 48(1):127–66.Google Scholar
Winkler, MG, Wang, PK. 1993. The Late-Quaternary vegetation and climate of China. In: Wright, HE Jr, Kutzbach, JE, Webb, T III, Ruddiman, WF, Street-Perrott, FA, Bartlein, PJ, editors. Global Climates since the Last Glacial Maximum. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. p 221–64.Google Scholar
Yamahara, T. 2006. Taisho 3 site: the discovery of the earliest ceramic culture in Hokkaido. Current Research in the Pleistocene 23:35–6.Google Scholar
Yasuda, Y. 2002. Origins of pottery and agriculture in East Asia. In: Yasuda, Y, editor. The Origins of Pottery and Agriculture. New Delhi: Lustre Press & Roli Books. p 119–42.Google Scholar
Zhao, C, Wu, X. 2000. The dating of Chinese early pottery and a discussion of some related problems. Documenta Praehistorica 27:233–9.Google Scholar
Zhao, J-X, Wanf, Y-J, Collerson, KD, Gagan, MK. 2003. Speleothem U-series dating of semi-synchronous climate oscillations during the last deglaciation. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 216(1–2):155–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zhu, C, Ma, C, Yu, S-Y, Tang, L, Zhang, W, Lu, X. 2010. A detailed pollen record of vegetation and climate changes in Central China during the past 16 000 years. Boreas 39(1):69–76.Google Scholar