The University of Science and Technology of China has made important progress in the study of the evolution of prehistoric human food processing methods

Xin'an Evening News Anhui Network Dawan News The evolution of prehistoric human food processing methods is an important part of archaeological research. The reporter learned from the University of Science and Technology of China that the team of Professor Yang Yuzhang of the Department of Science and Technology History and Archaeology of Science and Technology of the University has made important progress in this field. Professor Yang Yuzhang's team cooperated with the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and other units to analyze the source and damage characteristics of the residual ancient starch grains extracted from the surface of some stone tools excavated from the Shuangdun site in Bengbu, Anhui Province, and obtained direct evidence for the first time of the transformation of the grinding rod of the human plant-based food processing tool from the middle and late Neolithic era to the combination tool of pestle and mortar.

The evolution of prehistoric human food processing methods is an important part of archaeological research, and archaeological discoveries and studies in recent years have shown that as early as the late Paleolithic Period 28,000 years ago, early humans in the middle reaches of the Yellow River on the mainland have begun to use irregular stone grinding tools to process and process various types of wild plant resources collected and obtained. Since then, this type of tool has been used for a long time in the late Paleolithic to early Neolithic sites in the north and south of the mainland, and has developed to the peak in the Peiligang cultural stage dating back to 9000-7000 years ago, forming a well-formed and well-made grinding disc grinding rod combination tool, however, after entering the Yangshao culture stage 7000 years ago, this type of tool quickly disappeared.

Some studies believe that the decline of the grinding disc grinding rod combination tool is related to the rapid development of prehistoric agriculture in the Yangshao culture period, that is, with the rapid increase in the proportion of crops in the human recipe structure, the shelling tools with higher efficiency of pestle mortars have gradually replaced the grinding disc grinding rod as the main food processing tool since the middle and late Neolithic period, however, due to the lack of archaeological materials, there is no direct evidence of the occurrence of the above food processing method transformation.

Anhui Bengbu Shuangdun site is located on the north bank of the Huai River, is the middle reaches of the Huai River Neolithic transition stage of the representative site, it is very rare that archaeological excavators in the excavation process of the site at the same time found the millstone grinding rod and pestle mortar two types of stone processing tools, for the study of the relationship between the above two types of food processing tools provide an important opportunity.

The researchers used the starch grain analysis method to extract the ancient starch grain residues on the surface of 6 stone tools excavated from the site, and found ancient starch grains from different plant species such as wheat family, rice, coix, lotus root, cowpea genus, etc. It is worth noting that the starch grain types and damage characteristics extracted from the surface of different types of tools have more obvious differences, among which the simple and rough stone grinding disc has no grinding function, and the processing object is relatively single, compared with the Pei Ligang cultural period. Its function has been significantly degraded, while the pestle-mortar combination tool has both smashing and grinding functions, and its processing objects are more diverse.

Most importantly, the starch grains of crop rice are only found on the surface of pestle mortar samples, which is of direct evidence for studying the evolution of food processing tools of prehistoric ancestors in the continent due to its higher hulling efficiency due to its higher dehulling efficiency.

The results were recently published online in archaeometry, an internationally renowned archaeological magazine sponsored by the University of Oxford. The research has been funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the International Cooperation Bureau of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the National Basic Research Program of the Ministry of Science and Technology.

Xin'an Evening News Anhui Network Dawan News reporter Chen Mu

(Anhui Net)