Papers by Monica N Ramsey
Journal of Archaeological Science, 2022
This paper presents an algorithm for automated detection and classification of multi-cell phytoli... more This paper presents an algorithm for automated detection and classification of multi-cell phytoliths, one of the major components of many archaeological and paleoenvironmental deposits. This identification, based on phytolith wave pattern, is made using a pretrained VGG19 deep learning model. This approach has been tested in three key phytolith genera for the study of agricultural origins in Near East archaeology: Avena, Hordeum and Triticum. Also, this classification has been validated at species-level using Triticum boeoticum and dicoccoides images. Due to the diversity of microscopes, cameras and chemical treatments that can influence images of phytolith slides, three types of data augmentation techniques have been implemented: rotation of the images at 45-degree angles, random colour and brightness jittering, and random blur/sharpen. The implemented workflow has resulted in an overall accuracy of 93.68% for phytolith genera, improving previous attempts. The algorithm has also demonstrated its potential to automatize the classification of phytoliths species with an overall accuracy of 100%. The open code and platforms employed to develop the algorithm assure the method's accessibility, reproducibility and reusability.
Journal of Archaeological Science, 2021
Archaeological starch spherulites discovered at the submerged 23,000-year-old site of Ohalo II, S... more Archaeological starch spherulites discovered at the submerged 23,000-year-old site of Ohalo II, Sea of Galilee, Israel, provide a new line of archaeobotanical evidence for plant food processing. Six-hundred and thirty-two (632) starch spherulites were recovered from four stone implements. The analysis of starch spherulites from reliable archaeological contexts is a breakthrough that will potentially allow the identification of a range of plant processing and wet cooking activities. Our work provides a baseline for starch spherulite extraction and identification protocols. They were confirmed as spherulites using Lugol's iodine confirmation and the optical properties of the polarisation cross when rotated on a microscope stage under cross-polarised light. Their identification as starch spherulites was based on their archaeological context, size range and optical (polarized light and SEM) characteristics (including partial iodine uptake). Following our promising results, we encourage researchers to describe archaeological starch spherulite morphology and elemental characteristics in as much detail as possible. Future experimental archaeology work may find that these details provide evidence for how starch spherulites were formed through plant processing and cooking techniques.
The origins of bread have long been associated with the emergence of agriculture and cereal domes... more The origins of bread have long been associated with the emergence of agriculture and cereal domestication during the Neolithic in southwest Asia. In this study we analyze a total of 24 charred food remains from Shubayqa 1, a Natufian hunter-gatherer site located in northeastern Jordan and dated to 14.6-11.6 ka cal BP. Our finds provide empirical data to demonstrate that the preparation and consumption of bread-like products predated the emergence of agriculture by at least 4,000 years. The interdisciplinary analyses indicate the use of some of the "founder crops" of southwest Asian agriculture (e.g., Triticum boeoticum, wild einkorn) and root foods (e.g., Bolboschoenus glaucus, club-rush tubers) to produce flat bread-like products. The available archaeobotanical evidence for the Natufian period indicates that cereal exploitation was not common during this time, and it is most likely that cereal-based meals like bread become staples only when agriculture was firmly established.
Journal of Anthropological Archaeology
This paper employs new phytolith evidence to consider how Early Epipaleolithic people at the site... more This paper employs new phytolith evidence to consider how Early Epipaleolithic people at the site of Kharaneh IV (Azraq Basin, Jordan) used local plant resources to construct their huts, and furnish their indoor space. Forty-five sediment samples from Structure 1 were compared to previously published results (10 sediment samples) from the well-preserved site of Ohalo II (Hut 1) (adjacent to Sea of Galilee, Israel). Our results demonstrate that similar plant resources were employed in both sites' hut constructions, including the heavy use of wetland sedge and reed resources. Interpreting the extensive use of wetland resources in hut construction at Kharaneh IV required the use of new ethnographic analogs focused on wetland-based adaptations, such as Northern Paiute 'tule technology' from the American Great Basin. The phytolith evidence shows that woody and shrubby dicots were employed, likely to construct the hut frame. Phragmites culm may also have been used to frame the structure. While a variety of grasses, wetland reeds, and importantly sedge resources, were used as part of the hut superstructure, perhaps as bundled thatching to cover the frame. In the interior these resources were employed as a loose floor covering or matting to increase the comfort of the living space. Our broader findings emphasize that Early Epipaleolithic hunter-gatherers were increasingly investing in 'place'. Indeed, the construction of these early homes may even have enhanced the ecological productivity and social meaning of the Azraq Landscape.
American Antiquity
Epipaleolithic hunter-gatherers are often interpreted as playing an important role in the develop... more Epipaleolithic hunter-gatherers are often interpreted as playing an important role in the development of early cereal cultivation and subsequent farming economies in the Levant. This focus has come at the expense of understanding these people as resilient foragers who exploited a range of changing micro-habitats through the Last Glacial Maximum. New phytolith data from Ohalo II seeks to redress this. Ohalo II has the most comprehensive and important macrobotanical assemblage in Southwest Asia for the entire Epipaleolithic period. Here we present a phytolith investigation of twenty-eight sediment samples, to make three key contributions. Firstly, by comparing the phytolith assemblage to a sample of the macrobotanical assemblage we provide a baseline to help inform the interpretation of phytolith assemblages at other sites in Southwest Asia. Secondly, we highlight patterns of plant-use at the site. We identify the importance of wetland plant resources to hut construction, and provide evidence that supports previous work suggesting that grass and cereal processing may have been a largely ‘indoor’ activity. Lastly, drawing on ethnographic data from the American Great Basin we reevaluate the significance of wetland plant resources for Epipaleolithic hunter-gatherers, and argue that the wetland-centered lifeway at Ohalo II represents a wider Levantine adaptive strategy.
PLOS ONE
'Neolithization' pathway refers to the development of adaptations that characterized subsequent N... more 'Neolithization' pathway refers to the development of adaptations that characterized subsequent Neolithic life, sedentary occupations, and agriculture. In the Levant, the origins of these human behaviors are widely argued to have emerged during the Early Epipaleolithic (ca. 23 ka cal BP). Consequently, there has been a preoccupation with identifying and modeling the dietary shift to cereal and grains during this period, which is considered to have been a key development that facilitated increasing sedentism and, eventually, agriculture. Yet, direct evidence of plant use in the form of macrobotanical remains is extremely limited at Epipaleolithic sites and the expected 'Neolithization' pathway has not been robustly demonstrated. However, new direct microbotanical phytolith evidence from the large aggregation site of Kharaneh IV, in the Azraq Basin, suggests that increasingly settled occupation was not the result of wild grass and cereal use, but rather the result of a typical hunter-gatherer balance, based on the use of mostly reliable resources supplemented by some risky resources. Moreover, and illustrating this balance, the direct botanical evidence emphases the importance of the wetlands as an under-recognized reliable plant resource. Significantly, the use of these reliable wetland plant resources at Kharaneh IV represents an unexpected 'Neolithization' pathway.
Quaternary International
The mosaic ecology of the Late Pleistocene Levant has been referred to by many authors investigat... more The mosaic ecology of the Late Pleistocene Levant has been referred to by many authors investigating Epipaleolithic use of wild cereals as a prelude to cultivation, but it has rarely been the focus of studies investigating hunter-gatherer adaptations and diverse wild plant collection strategies. Partly, this was due to poor preservation of macro-botanical remains at Epipaleolithic sites with the exception of Ohalo II. Our analyses of 100 phytolith samples from four sites in the eastern Levant, compared with phytoliths from Ohalo II, reveal evidence for how foragers used the unique local ecological opportunities in these regions. Abundant phytoliths from reeds and sedges indicate the critical importance of wetlands in hunter-gatherer subsistence strategies. Wild cereals and grasses point to steppe and parkland exploitation, and woody plants indicate use of woodlands. From the Late Upper Paleolithic through the Middle Epipaleolithic our evidence indicates that wetland, steppe/parkland and woodland zones formed an integrated resilient system of plant-use, with wetlands providing an especially important focal point. We also found that different wetland types and their productivity relative to the surrounding landscape have a clear impact on hunter-gatherer adaptation and plant-use. Focusing subsistence and settlement around the reliable wetland zones provided a dependable natural food-storage repository and allowed greater risk-taking strategies for other types of plant and animal exploitation beyond the wetland zones.
The Viejo Period in West‐Central Chihuahua, Part 3: Additional Studies
2014 Zarrillo, Sonia and Monica Nicolaides. Starch Granule Analysis of Artifacts. In The Viejo Pe... more 2014 Zarrillo, Sonia and Monica Nicolaides. Starch Granule Analysis of Artifacts. In The Viejo Period in West‐Central Chihuahua, Part 3: Additional Studies, J. Holden Kelley and R. D. Garvin, pp. 49‐62. Maxwell Museum Technical Series No. 19, Part 3, Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque.
The Holocene
The ecological impacts of human activities have infiltrated the whole of the “natural world” and ... more The ecological impacts of human activities have infiltrated the whole of the “natural world” and precipitated calls for a newly defined geological epoch - the Anthropocene. While scholars discuss tipping-points and scale, viewed over the longue durée, it is becoming clear that we have inherited the compounding consequences of a constructed environment with a long history of human landscape modification. By linking phytolith and micro-charcoal evidence from sediments in the Azraq Basin, Jordan we discuss potential Early Epipaleolithic (23,000 – 17,400 cal. BP) human-environment interactions in this wetland. Our analyses reveal that during the Last Glacial Maximum, Levantine hunter-gatherers could have had a noticeable and increasing impact on their environment. However, further work needs to be undertaken to assess the range, frequency, intensity and intentionality of marsh disturbance events. We suggest, that the origin of ‘persistent places’ and larger aggregation settlements in the Azraq Basin, may have been, in part, facilitated by human-environment interactions in the Early Epipaleolithic that consequently enhanced the economic, and subsequently, social meaning of that landscape. Through their exploitation of the sensitive wetland environment hunter-gatherers were modifying the marshes and initiating long-term changes to the already dynamic and changing landscape at the close of the Pleistocene. These findings challenge us to further reconsider the way we see early hunter-gatherers in the prehistory of the Levant and in the development of the ‘Anthropocene’.
The Holocene, 2015
The Special Issue provides a deep-time interdisciplinary perspective on the Anthropocene and sign... more The Special Issue provides a deep-time interdisciplinary perspective on the Anthropocene and signals the importance of the Anthropocene concept in past, present, and future human–environmental relationships. This concluding article recognizes that various approaches – scientific, postmodern, catastrophist, and ecomarxist – can contribute to understanding the Anthropocene as a process and that contributions have been made by several disciplines, including Anthropology, Archaeology, Geography, History, and Politics. The critical importance of weaving together social science perspectives with those of the natural sciences is emphasized.
recording, all replica buildings were repaired, leaving some without roofs to enable visitors to ... more recording, all replica buildings were repaired, leaving some without roofs to enable visitors to see diff erent construction stages.
Book Reviews by Monica N Ramsey
MA Thesis by Monica N Ramsey
This thesis presents the results of a macrobotanical analysis conducted on three earth ovens from... more This thesis presents the results of a macrobotanical analysis conducted on three earth ovens from EeRj 226, also known as White Rock Springs (WRS), an upland root processing locale in the interior of British Columbia. The largest documented root-processing locale on the Canadian Plateau. WRS is situated in the mid-Fraser River region. Two key contributions are made by this thesis: an appropriate macrobotanical sub-sampling procedure; and the first comprehensive macrobotanical analysis of Canadian Plateau earth ovens. A total of thirty-five one litre samples were analysed yielding a variety of macrobotanical remains, including wood charcoal, needles and seeds. These samples contain twenty-two identifiable taxa. The fuel and matting materials identified in the ovens provide important evidence regarding patterns of root resource use. These patterns suggest that women may have had a significant interest in the maintenance of ovens and the proliferation of root resource processing, demonstrating the value of paleoethnobotanical analysis for addressing issues of subsistence, socioeconomy and gender.
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Papers by Monica N Ramsey
Book Reviews by Monica N Ramsey
MA Thesis by Monica N Ramsey