2015/10/13 by Valentina Caracuta, Omry Barzilai, Hamudi Khalaily +5 · 3 citations
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Social Sciences · Arts and Humanities · #Archaeology and ancient environmental studies #Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies #Archaeology and Historical Studies #Domestication #Vicia faba #Radiocarbon dating #Crop #Biology #Archaeology #Agriculture #Geography #Agronomy #Ecology
paper · pdf · doi:10.1038/srep14370
openalex publication_date 2015/10/13 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
Even though the faba bean (Vicia faba L.) is among the most ubiquitously cultivated crops, very little is known about its origins. Here, we report discoveries of charred faba beans from three adjacent Neolithic sites in the lower Galilee region, in the southern Levant, that offer new insights into the early history of this species. Biometric measurements, radiocarbon dating and stable carbon isotope analyses of the archaeological remains, supported by experiments on modern material, date the earliest farming of this crop to ~10,200 cal BP. The large quantity of faba beans found in these adjacent sites indicates intensive production of faba beans in the region that can only have been achieved by planting non-dormant seeds. Selection of mutant-non-dormant stock suggests that the domestication of the crop occurred as early as the 11(th) millennium cal BP. Plant domestication| Vicia faba L.| Pre-Pottery Neolithic B| radiocarbon dating| Δ(13)C analysis.