Oliver Edward Craig

The University of York · Department of Archaeology

Foodcrusts have received relatively little attention in the burgeoning field of proteomic analysis of ancient cuisine. We remain ignorant of how cooking and burial impact protein survival, and crucially, the extent to which the extractome reflects the composition of input ingredients. Therefore, through experimental analogues, we explore the extent...

The medieval period in Sicily was turbulent, involving successive regime changes, from Byzantine (Greek Christian), Aghlabid (Sunni Muslim), Fatimid (Shīʿa Muslim), to Normans and Swabians (Latin Christian). To shed new light on the local implications of regime changes, we conducted a multidisciplinary analysis of 27 individuals buried in adjacent...

Rice and millet arrived in Western Japan from Korea around 3,000 years ago and spread eastwards across the archipelago in the next 700 years. However, the extent to which agriculture transformed traditional Jōmon hunter-gatherer-fisher communities is debated. Central Japan is a key area of study as remodelling of radiocarbon dates shows a slowdown...

Rationale Alkylresorcinols (AR) are cereal‐specific biomarkers and have recently been found in archaeological pots. However, their low concentrations and high susceptibility to degradation make them difficult to detect using conventional gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC/MS). Here we describe the development of a more sensitive liquid chroma...

Organic residue analysis (ORA) is a valuable tool for the study of ancient diets, but conventional methods remain limited in terms of taxonomic identification or to resolve mixtures. Here, we propose a method to further explore a class of compounds—triacylglycerols (TAGs)—using high‐resolution mass spectrometry to overcome these limitations in an a...

Foodcrusts have received relatively little attention in the burgeoning field of proteomic analysis of ancient cuisine. We remain ignorant of how cooking and burial impacts protein survival, and crucially, the extent to which the extractome reflects the composition of input ingredients. Therefore, through experimental analogues we explore the extent...

Biophysical conditions played a fundamental role in early human colonization of insular territories, particularly in food-producing societies dealing with limited resources and the challenges of maintaining a sustainable carrying capacity. Studies on past human colonization of small oceanic islands thus offer insights into economic plasticity, ecol...

To investigate changes in culinary practices associated with the arrival of farming, we analysed the organic residues of over 1,000 pottery vessels from hunter-gatherer-fisher and early agricultural sites across Northern Europe from the Lower Rhine Basin to the Northeastern Baltic. Here, pottery was widely used by hunter-gatherer-fishers prior to t...

Understanding long-term dynamics of past socio-ecological systems is essential for their future management. The southern Atlantic Forest coast of Brazil with its biodiverse littoral zone and artisanal fishing communities, is a priority for conservation. Traditional maritime knowledge is thought to have a deep-history and indeed, marine exploitation...

The transition from foraging to farming was a key turning point in ancient socio-economies. Yet, the complexities and regional variations of this transformation are still poorly understood. This multi-proxy study provides a new understanding of the introduction and spread of early farming, challenging the notions of hierarchical economies. The most...

Ceramic technology makes an abrupt appearance in the New World Arctic at circa 2800 cal BP. While there is general consensus that the ultimate source of these Alaskan pottery traditions lay in continental NE Asia, the motivations for the adoption of pottery in Alaska have remained unclear. Through organic residue analysis we investigated the functi...

Unlabelled: Ceramic objects account for over 90% of the cultural material recovered from archaeological sites in the Caribbean. However, little research has been conducted on molecular evidence for past food production from these same vessels. Forty ceramic sherds from Isla de Mona have been analysed by GC-MS and GC-C-IRMS in order to address ques...

Until now, Šventoji in northwest Lithuania was considered the most northern site of the Neolithic Globular Amphora Culture (hereafter GAC; ca. 3400–2500 cal BC) in Europe. Recently, however, ceramics typologically resembling GAC ware were identified among the materials from the multi-period sites of Abora 1 and Iča in Latvia and further to the nort...

The detection of dairy processing is pivotal to our understanding of ancient subsistence strategies. This culinary process is linked to key arguments surrounding the evolution of lactase persistence in prehistory. Despite extensive evidence indicating the presence of dairy products in ceramics in the European Neolithic, questions remain about the n...

From the 9th to 14th centuries AD, Sicily experienced a series of rapid and quite radical changes in political regime, but the impact of these regime changes on the lives of the people that experienced them remains largely elusive within the historical narrative. We use a multi-faceted lipid residue approach to give direct chemical evidence of the...

Determining the degree to which humans relied on coastal resources in the past is key for understanding long-term social and economic development, as well as for assessing human health and anthropogenic impacts on the environment. Prehistoric hunter–gatherers are often assumed to have heavily exploited aquatic resources, especially those living in...

Human history has been shaped by global dispersals of technologies, although understanding of what enabled these processes is limited. Here, we explore the behavioural mechanisms that led to the emergence of pottery among hunter-gatherer communities in Europe during the mid-Holocene. Through radiocarbon dating, we propose this dispersal occurred at...

This paper explores the relations developed between Mycenaeans and their northern neighbours through the study of cooking assemblages from four sites in the region of Pieria, in present-day Greek Central Macedonia. A strong connection with the Mycenaean sphere in the 13th -12th century BC has already been indicated through archaeological evidence f...

Artificial illumination is a fundamental human need. Burning wood and other materials usually in hearths and fireplaces extended daylight hours, whilst the use of flammable substances in torches offered light on the move. It is increasingly understood that pottery played a role in light production. In this study, we focus on ceramic oval bowls, mad...

The Bronze Age—Iron Age transition in Central Asia (ca. 800 BCE) was a period of significant cultural change that was heavily influenced by greater population interaction and mobility. Indeed, scholars have increasingly emphasized the role that “food globalization in prehistory” has played in defining this period. In the mountain foothills of Kazak...

Swahili cuisine is known across Africa and globally as a highly distinctive product of a cosmopolitan, coastal, urban society. Here we present a comprehensive study of precolonial Swahili diet and culinary practices at the coastal town of Songo Mnara, positioning archaeological and ethnographic understandings of cuisine in a long-term coastal tradi...

This study attempts a holistic approach to past foodways in prehistoric northern Gujarat, India, by considering evidence of food production, distribution, preparation and consumption. We present here the results of a pilot residue study, integrating lipid and starch grain analyses, conducted on 28 ceramic vessels from three Chalcolithic/Harappan se...

Processed fish is known to have been systematically traded in Europe since the Early Middle Ages to meet increasing demand of incipient markets and religious precepts, yet specific details regarding the supply of different fish in Southern Europe is often missing. Here, we address this gap through an integrated approach involving bone metrics and s...

Despite growing evidence to the contrary, wine remains the assumed content of many types of ancient pottery. Vessels from the Kyrenia and Mazotos shipwrecks, and Yeronisos island presumed to have contained wine were subjected to three different extraction protocols to test the assumption that these vessels were used to import and serve wine. Chemic...

The Eastern European steppe and forest-steppe is a key region for understanding the emergence of pottery in Europe. The vast region encompasses the basins of two major waterways, the Don and the Volga rivers, and was occupied by hunter-gatherer-fisher communities attracted to highly productive forest/aquatic ecotones. The precise dates for the ince...

Pottery production, like fermentation, is a highly skilled technology that requires the careful selection and transformation of raw ingredients under controlled conditions. Although the precise drivers for the invention and dispersal of ceramic containers are uncertain, it is clear that even the earliest pottery had a culinary role for processing f...

The oxygen (δ¹⁸Ocarbonate), strontium (⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr), and previously unpublished carbon (δ¹³Ccarbonate) isotope data presented herein from the Imperial Roman site of Velia (ca. 1st to 2nd c. CE) were obtained from the dental enamel of human permanent second molars (M2). In total, the permanent M2s of 20 individuals (10 male and 10 female) were sampled...

Residue analysis in pottery usually concerns habitat or funerary sites. In this work, we have studied 21 vases from the Mines of Gavà (Barcelona, Spain) which constitute the oldest evidence of mining focused on variscite during the IVth millennium BC. The main objectives are determining the degree of preservation of lipids in this context, identify...

The remains of those who perished at Herculaneum in 79 CE offer a unique opportunity to examine lifeways across an ancient community who lived and died together. Historical sources often allude to differential access to foodstuffs across Roman society but provide no direct or quantitative information. By determining the stable isotope values of ami...

Sicily, during the 9th-12th century AD, thrived politically, economically, and culturally under Islamic political rule and the capital of Palermo stood as a cultural and political centre in the Mediterranean Islamic world. However, to what extent the lifeways of the people that experienced these regimes were impacted during this time is not well un...

Significance As a high-value luxury commodity, wine has been transported across the Mediterranean since the Bronze Age. The wine trade was potentially disrupted during political and religious change brought about by Islamization in the Early Medieval period; wine consumption is prohibited in Islamic scripture. Utilizing a quantitative criterion bas...

Ceramic containers, intentionally deposited into wetlands, offer detailed insights into Early Neolithic culinary practices. Additionally, they are key for ascertaining the Neolithisation process in Denmark since they appear to form a typo-chronological sequence. Here, we use a combination of organic residue analysis (ORA) of pottery alongside Bayes...

This paper focuses on the functional analysis of Swifterbant pottery (c. 5000-3800 cal BC) in the Lower Rhine-Meuse area (the Netherlands). It examines pottery use across the transition to agriculture and aims to assess temporal changes in human-animal relations during the 5th millennium BC in the Lower Rhine-Meuse area through lipid residue analys...

This paper presents novel insights into the archaeology of food in ancient South Asia by using lipid residue analysis to investigate what kinds of foodstuffs were used in ceramic vessels by populations of the Indus Civi-lisation in northwest India. It examines how vessels were used in urban and rural Indus settlements during the Mature Harappan per...

The past decade has witnessed an intensification of research into the use of pottery by hunter-gatherers. Long viewed by Western scholars as a marginal practice among these groups, pottery production is now known to have been widespread among prehistoric hunter-gatherers, many of whom practised no other activities associated with agriculture. In em...

The goal of this contribution is to stimulate a wider reflection on the role of food consumption practices throughout prehistory. We focussed on the Jōmon communities of Hokkaidō Island in Northern Japan since these mobile foragers underwent a process of economic diversification and intensification, eventually leading to higher levels of sedentism...

In the early Holocene, Mesolithic hunter-gatherer communities inhabiting the Cis-Baikal region of Eastern Siberia were participating in a series of important cultural changes. These included the establishment of large cemeteries in the Angara Valley and on the Southwest shores of Lake Baikal, culminating in the formation of the distinctive Early Ne...

The multilayer settlement Rakushechny Yar, situated in the lower Don River, is one of the sites with the most ancient pottery known in Eastern Europe. The subsistence strategies and the life cycle of these communities describe a particular system of resource management determined by specific economic, environmental and cultural conditions. Rich fis...

Pottery technology, originating in Northeast Asia, appeared in Alaska some 2800 years ago. It spread swiftly along Alaska's coastline but was not adopted on Kodiak Island until around 500 cal BP, as part of the Koniag tradition. While in the southeast pottery was used extensively, people on the northern half of the island did not adopt the technolo...

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1098/rsos.192016.].

Between 2800 and 2400 cal BC pastoralists from Central Europe migrated into the eastern Baltic paving the way for the Corded Ware Culture (CWC), and a new type of economy, animal husbandry. Traditionally the CWC people were viewed as highly mobile due to the lack of substantial traces of dwellings and material culture at settlement sites; they were...

The introduction of farming had far-reaching impacts on health, social structure and demography. Although the spread of domesticated plants and animals has been extensively tracked, it is unclear how these nascent economies developed within different environmental and cultural settings. Using molecular and isotopic analysis of lipids from pottery,...

This paper focuses on the functional analysis of Swifterbant pottery from North-western Europe (ca. 4300–4000 BC) through lipid residue analysis. The main aim is to understand the role of pottery in terms of its relation to hunter-fisher-gatherer lifestyle, and the change in available food resources brought about by the arrival of domesticated anim...

The introduction of pottery vessels to Europe has long been seen as closely linked with the spread of agriculture and pastoralism from the Near East. The adoption of pottery technology by hunter-gatherers in Northern and Eastern Europe does not fit this paradigm, and its role within these communities is so far unresolved. To investigate the motivat...

Mobility and human migration are seen as hallmarks of Roman society. With increasing territorial expansion throughout the Mediterranean region during the Imperial Roman period, wider opportunities for both self-driven and forced mobility became possible. This study analyzes δ¹⁸O and ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr values from the dental enamel of 20 human second molars...

Chemical analysis of archaeological artefacts is used with increasing regularity to understand how wine was produced, traded, and consumed in the past and to shed light on its antiquity. Based both on an extensive review of the published literature and on new analyses, here we critically evaluate the diverse range of methodological approaches that...

A re-evaluation of manner of death at Roman Herculaneum following the AD 79 eruption of Vesuvius - Rachelle Martyn, Oliver E. Craig, Sarah T.D. Ellingham, Meez Islam, Luciano Fattore, Alessandra Sperduti, Luca Bondioli, Tim Thompson

Lipids preserved within the walls of ancient pottery vessels are routinely analysed to reveal their original contents. The provenience of aquatic lipids in pottery is generally connected to vessel function (e.g., for cooking or storing fish, shellfish and aquatic mammals). However, ethnographic reports from early‐historic Alaska mention the use of...

This paper presents for the first time the results of a combination of petrographic, geochemical and organic residue analyses of early Neolithic ceramics from the Iron Gates region of the Danube basin. Eleven early Neolithic potsherds from Schela Cladovei (Romania) were analysed in detail. The results of the petrographic analysis show that the cera...

There has long been debate over the origins of dairy consumption within European populations. Whilst it was previously assumed that lactase persistence (LP) was under positive selection following the advent of agriculture, recent genetic studies of prehistoric human remains have revealed LP may have only emerged in Europe in the last 4000 years. Th...

Lipid residue analysis has recently been applied to investigate the adoption of pottery by Early Woodland hunter-gatherers in north-eastern North America. Results, however, have proven contradictory, especially regarding the extent to which early ceramics were used for processing aquatic resources. Here, the authors argue that this inconsistency is...

This chapter discusses human bones and teeth, which are the primary databank for biological anthropologists. The topic has aroused little interest among historians of antiquity. The beginnings of an explanation of this disparity are to be sought in the fact that human skeletal remains have no obvious relevance as a source of information for politic...