Human subsistence in Iranian prehistory revealed through lipid residue analysis in pottery vessels
Résumé
The Fertile Crescent in SW Asia is a key region for the early domestication of ruminant animals. The domestication of caprine in the SW Asia started about 10000 years ago and took an important place in the development of a farming economy. With the introduction of caprine domestication come the question for which products they were exploited : their primary products (meat), their secondary products (milk) or both.
The development of pottery technology in the early neolithic also influenced food processing and pottery vessels have been extensively used for culinary preparations. The organic residues preserved in archaeological pottery vessels serve therefore as archives for ancient diet through prehistoric times. Using molecular and isotopic analyses on lipid residues recovered in the ceramic vessels, the source of the food residues can be discriminated, including carcass from the dairy products of ruminants.
We report here the study of lipid residues preserved in prehistoric iranian pottery assemblages dating from the 6th and 5th millenium BC which provide insights into prehistoric human subsistence in Iran.