Yunnan’s location at the crossroad of temperate China, Northeast India and tropical mainland Southeast Asia makes it a pivotal area for the understanding of early cultural contacts and agricultural spread between these ecologically diverse regions. This paper evaluates current evidence relating to the emergence of the first agricultural systems in Yunnan. It also reviews previous theories on agricultural dispersal to Yunnan, including whether Austroasiatic speakers were responsible for the spread of rice from Yunnan to mainland Southeast Asia, and builds a new framework that allows to tie agricultural development in the region into broader patterns of early migration and exchange networks. Archaeobotanical remains attest to an initial spread of rice and millet from Central China into Yunnan in the third millennium B.C. and the establishment of a mixed-crop economy; the introduction of wheat and barley in the second millennium B.C. allowed for increased diversification of the agricultural system, with a two-season intensification trend in the late first millennium B.C. Differences in early rice cultivation ecologies between Yunnan and mainland Southeast Asia suggest that Yunnan rice farmers may not have had a primary role in the southern dispersal of rice, however, more data is needed to fully clarify the source and development of dryland cultivation of rice in mainland Southeast Asia.

The Prunus genus contains many of the most economically significant arboreal crops, cultivated globally, today. Despite the economic significance of these domesticated species, the pre-cultivation ranges, processes of domestication, and routes of prehistoric dispersal for all of the economically significant species remain unresolved. Among the European plums, even the taxonomic classification has been heavily debated over the past several decades. In this manuscript, we compile archaeobotanical evidence for the most prominent large-fruiting members of Prunus, including peach, apricot, almonds, sloes, and the main plum types. By mapping out the chronology and geographic distributions of these species, we are able to discuss aspects of their domestication and dispersal more clearly, as well as identify gaps in the data and unanswered questions. We suggest that a clearer understanding of these processes will say a lot about ancient peoples, as the cultivation of delayed return crops is an indicator of a strong concept of land tenure and the specialization of these cultivation strategies seems to be tied to urbanism and reliable markets. Likewise, the evolution of domestication traits in long-generation perennials, especially within Rosaceae, represents awareness of grafting and cloning practices.

Historical sources describe irrigation and intensive agriculture being practiced in lowland Yunnan from at least the first century AD, but so far archaeobotanical remains allowing investigation of this issue have been scarce. Here, we present new archaeobotanical evidence, including macro-botanical and phytoliths results, from the Dian settlement site of Dayingzhuang, with direct AMS radiocarbon dates on two wheat grains falling between 750 and 390 BC. We compare these results with contemporary Dian sites and analyse the agricultural systems in Central Yunnan between the eight and fourth centuries BC. We propose that agriculture was intensified toward the end of the Dian through both multiple cropping seasons and increased evidence for irrigated rice fields.

The origins and dispersal of the chicken across the ancient world remains one of the most enigmatic questions regarding Eurasian domesticated animals. The lack of agreement concerning timing and centers of origin is due to issues with morphological identifications, a lack of direct dating, and poor preservation of thin, brittle bird bones. Here we show that chickens were widely raised across southern Central Asia from the fourth century BC through medieval periods, likely dispersing along the ancient Silk Road. We present archaeological and molecular evidence for the raising of chickens for egg production, based on material from 12 different archaeological sites spanning a millennium and a half. These eggshells were recovered in high abundance at all of these sites, suggesting that chickens may have been an important part of the overall diet and that chickens may have lost seasonal egg-laying

Cannabis grains are frequently reported from archaeological sites in Asia, and hypothesized centers of origins are China and Central Asia. Chinese early cannabis remains are often interpreted as evidence of hemp fabric production, in line with early textual evidence describing ritualistic hemp cloth use and hemp cultivation as a grain crop. Modern measurements on cannabis varieties show distinct sizes between fibre or oil/fibre and psychoactive varieties, the former having larger seeds on average than the latter. This paper reviews the current macro-botanical evidence for cannabis across East, Central and South Asia and builds a comparative framework based on modern cannabis seed measurements to help identify cannabis use in the past, through the metric analysis of archaeologically preserved seeds. Over 800 grains of cannabis were retrieved from the 2008 excavation of Haimenkou, Yunnan, Southwest China, dating to between 1650 and 400 bc. These are compared with other known archaeological cannabis and interpreted through the metric framework. This offers a basis for exploration of the seed morphometrics potential to infer cannabis cultivation and diversification in uses. At Haimenkou, cannabis seeds size mostly plot in the range of overlapping psychoactive/fibre types; we therefore suggest that the cannabis assemblage from Haimenkou is indicative of a crop beginning to undergo evolution from its early domesticated form towards a diversified crop specialized for alternative uses, including larger oilseed/fibre adapted varieties.