Storage of crops during the fourth and third millennia BC at the settlement mound of Tell Brak, northeast Syria

摘要

Excavations at Tell Brak in northeast Syria have uncovered two monumental non-domestic structures from the fourth and third millennia B.C. respectively, containing evidence for large-scale supra-household economic organisation. The charred plant remains from these structures lures include glume wheat, two-row hulled barley and flax, all found in storage contexts. In the fourth millennium B.C. (the late Chalcolithic). barley grain and flax seeds have been found in storage contexts. as well as glume wheat chaff. indicating the economic importance of this byproduct of crop processing. In the third millennium B.C. (the early Bronze Age), barley is the only crop found in a definite storage context. indicating that storage practices may have changed by this time and focused oil a Much narrower range of crops to be held in communal storage