Multi-Dimensional Analyses into Plant Processing and Technological Changes during the Paleolithic-Neolithic Transition in North China

Abstract

This project examines economic and technological specialization associated with the adoption of agriculture in North China between 26,000 and 8,000 years ago. The origins and spread of agriculture represent one of the most significant economic transitions in human history. It is widely believed that agricultural economies led to increased economic specialization and division of labor, two central aspects of modern economies. This specialization is thought to be reflected in technology, particularly in the development of specialized tools for processing agricultural products such as grains. In China, early farmers adopted ground-edged tools while continuing to use flaked tools and grinding stones, technologies inherited from their hunter-gatherer ancestors. This dissertation investigates whether economic and technological specialization was an inevitable outcome of plant processing or whether it occurred only in certain contexts. To address this question, I examine how a range of stone tools were actually used before and after the adoption of agriculture.The data for this study come from the Peiligang site in the Middle Yellow River Basin of North China. This region is particularly well suited for such a study because it was a center of early mixed millet and rice agriculture and contains cultural components spanning from the Upper Paleolithic to the Early Neolithic, with both pre-agricultural and agricultural practices represented within the same locality. Artifact functions were investigated using two independent lines of evidence. The first is use-wear analysis, which examines physical alterations on tool surfaces to infer motions of use and contact materials, such as soft plants, wood, animal tissue, hide, and bone. The second is microfossil residue analysis, including starch grains, phytoliths, and microfibers, which provide direct evidence of the plants that people were cutting, grinding, and scraping with these tools. By integrating experimental models with archaeological evidence, I propose a new interpretation of the persistence of flaked tools alongside innovations in ground stone technology. Specifically, my experiments suggest that compared to flaked tools, ground-edged stone tools do not show significantly increased efficiency in harvesting grasses, but that they are more efficient for harvesting fibrous plants and weeds. Supported by correlations from archaeological analyses, I argue that ground-edged stone tools were developed in response to the long-term and large-scale demands of bast fiber processing in the Early Neolithic. Although they were also commonly used for harvesting and processing plant foods, these functions were shared with flaked tools. Grinding stones, by contrast, show a trajectory of intensification rather than replacement, with larger and more complex forms supporting sustained processing of cereals and other plants. Residues preserved in pottery vessels further demonstrate the diversification of plant use, including alcohol production and ritualized consumption. Together, these lines of evidence reveal that toolkits became increasingly specialized not through simple substitution of old technologies with new ones, but through overlapping and complementary roles in food and non-food plant processing. This dissertation therefore offers new insights into the dynamics of technological continuity and innovation within broader social, cultural, and environmental contexts.