Three thousand years of farming strategies in central Thailand
Open accessAbstract
In prehistoric coastal and western-central Thailand, rice was the dominant cultivar. In eastern-central Thailand, however, the first known farmers cultivated millet. Using one of the largest collections of archaeobotanical material in Southeast Asia, this article examines how cropping systems were adapted as domesticates were introduced into eastern-central Thailand. The authors argue that millet reached the region first, to be progressively replaced by rice, possibly due to climatic pressures. But despite the increasing importance of rice, dryland, rain-fed cultivation persisted throughout ancient central Thailand, a result that contributes to refining understanding of the development of farming in Southeast Asia.
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Rice and millet were cultivated by mixed foraging and cereal producing Neolithic communities in mainland Southeast Asia.
“Rice and millet (Setaria italica) were cultivated by mixed foraging and cereal producing Neolithic communities in mainland Southeast Asia (86–88).”
From The biocultural origins and dispersal of domestic chickens (2022) · cites this paper as [88]
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- Authors
- d'Alpoim Guedes, J., Hanson, S., Lertcharnrit, T., Weiss, A. D., Pigott, V. C., Higham, C. F. W., Higham, T. F. G., & Weber, S. A.
- Affiliations
- State of Washington (US)
- Silpakorn University (TH)
- University of Pennsylvania (US)
- University of Otago (NZ)
- University of Oxford (GB)
- Washington State University Vancouver (US)
- Venue
- Antiquity
- Publisher
- Antiquity Publications
- Published
- 2020-08
- Volume
- 94
- Issue
- 376
- Pages
- 966-982
- ISSN
- 0003-598X (ISSN-L)
- 1745-1744
- OpenAlex
- W3047620178
- Cited by
- 23
- References
- 48
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 1 · 2023: 1 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 2
- FWCI
- 1.86
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Antiquity (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Greater South Information System
- Funders
- National Science Foundation
- American Philosophical Society
- National Geographic Society
- University of Pennsylvania
- Natural Environment Research Council (NE/S011854/1)
- Marsden Fund
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Paleontology › Archaeology and ancient environmental studies
- Social Sciences › Geography, Planning and Development › Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › History › Amazonian Archaeology and Ethnohistory
- Keywords
- prehistoric agriculture, rice cultivation, millet, crop domestication, cropping systems, rainfed agriculture, climate change, Southeast Asian prehistory, Central Thailand, archaeobotany
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