Elsevier

Quaternary International

Volume 242, Issue 2, 15 October 2011, Pages 416-433
Quaternary International

Human responses to the Younger Dryas in Japan

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2010.12.026Get rights and content

Abstract

The effect of the Younger Dryas cold reversal on the survival of Late Glacial hunter-gatherers in the Japanese Archipelago is evaluated, through a synthetic compilation of 14C dates obtained from excavated Late Glacial and initial Holocene sites (332 14C dates from 88 sites). The estimated East Asian monsoon intensity and vegetation history based on the loess accumulations in varved sediments and pollen records in and around the Japanese Archipelago suggest an abrupt change to cool and dry climate at the onset of Younger Dryas, coupled with the Dansgaard–Oeschger Cycles as recorded in Greenland. The chronometric placement of sites based on an assessment of 14C dates show that the site numbers decrease from the Bølling–Allerød to Younger Dryas and increase from the Younger Dryas to Preboreal. However, human population dynamics inferred from a site distribution analysis was little changed from the previous Bølling–Allerød and to the following Preboreal. Moreover, hunter-gatherers consistently employed ceramic pottery technology since its emergence prior to the onset of Younger Dryas, while the quantity of ceramic vessels that were undermined during the Younger Dryas dramatically increased at the onset of the Holocene, implying that a substantial change in hunter-gatherer socioeconomy occurred after the end of Younger Dryas.

Introduction

A central issue in studying prehistoric hunter-gatherer society is to discuss whether and how extent paleoclimatic oscillations affected human adaptive responses. The interglacial–glacial cycles originally predicted by Milankovitch are now proven to coincide with fluctuations in oxygen-isotope signatures (δ18O values), recorded in ice cores and marine and terrestrial sediments (e.g., Hays et al., 1976, Dansgaard et al., 1993, Yuan et al., 2004, Kawamura et al., 2007, Wang et al., 2008). In East Asia, recent studies on the oxygen-isotope signatures in cave stalagmites in China (e.g., Sabano and Hulu Caves) have traced millennium-scale fluctuations of Asian monsoon intensity, well synchronized with the climatic fluctuations recorded in the Greenland ice cores (Cheng et al., 2006, Cheng et al., 2009, Wang et al., 2001, Wang et al., 2008). In developing the relationship between environmental conditions and variability in human adaptations, the Younger Dryas cold reversal, dated to 12,900–11,600 cal BP (11,000–10,000 BP), gives an appropriate chronometric framework. There are several advantageous characteristics in employing the Younger Dryas. The first advantage is that the Younger Dryas is a short climatic episode, but long enough for exploring changes in human societies at the Pleistocene/Holocene transition. An abrupt climatic transition from the previous Bølling–Allerød interstadial and its abrupt termination at the end of the Pleistocene (Alley et al., 1993, Wang et al., 2001) give the prospect that this millennium climatic event could have had a substantial effect on the socioeconomies of hunter-gatherer societies.

The second reason is that archaeological records are abundant for the Late Glacial, especially after the end of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) around 17–16,000 BP. It was during the Late Glacial when hunter-gatherers came to settle various regions worldwide (e.g., Gamble, 1993, Hoffecker et al., 1993, Straus, 1996, Goebel et al., 2008). Because hunter-gatherer archaeological records at the regional scale are highly visible in the Late Glacial, it is worthwhile to make a comparison of archaeological records at the regional scale. Among the other geographic locations in East Asia, because of the large number of excavated sites in late Upper Pleistocene (ca. 35,000–10,000 BP), the Japanese Archipelago now can provide sufficient datasets to evaluate the impact of Younger Dryas on human adaptations.

The third reason is the emergence of complexity in hunter-gatherer societies. The Late Glacial archaeological records in Far Eastern Asia in and around the Japanese Archipelago witnessed a variety of technological innovations, notably pottery and bow and arrow technologies. The debatable topics include how technological innovation contributed to changes in hunter-gatherers lifeways and the beginning of sedentary lifeways (e.g., Nishida, 1986, Pearson, 2006), the beginning of broad-spectrum subsistence strategies (e.g., Aikens and Akazawa, 1996), the introduction of horticultural economies with rice domestication (e.g., Matsui and Kanehara, 2006, Bleed and Matsui, 2010), and the emergence of pottery technology (e.g., Clark, 1969, Ikawa-Smith, 1976, Rice, 1999). Research provides a new avenue toward an understanding of evolution in social complexity at the cultural transition from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic, through the clarification of how new technologies changed ways of resource exploitation that in turn altered variability in archaeological records (e.g., Cohen, 1998, Yasuda, 2000, Keally et al., 2003, Kuzmin, 2006).

Given these environmental and archaeological backgrounds of the Late Glacial, the present paper addresses the question as to whether and how the Younger Dryas impacted hunter-gatherers in the insular environment of Japan, situated in the mid- to high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. Because the Japanese Archipelago is isolated from the Continental East Asia, it is an independent geographic entity that can serve as a natural regional framework, but its internal geographic variability is high because of elongated extension and diverse landscapes. Thus, regionally diverse geography needs to be seen as something that potentially influences the adaptive variability of hunter-gatherers. In this sense, it is reasonably hypothesized that adaptive variation in hunter-gatherer lifeways is expected, and that variability in the Late Glacial archaeological records was affected by both macro-climatic conditions (i.e., the Younger Dryas cold reversal) and ecological diversity at the regional scale. The Japanese Archipelago serves as an ideal geographic entity for testing the hypothesis.

The main goal of this paper is to discuss the changes in human occupations during the Younger Dryas in the Japanese Archipelago. This will be achieved through a synthetic compilation of currently available radiocarbon dates obtained from excavated archaeological sites, and comparison of dates among the three continuous periods of Bølling/Allerød, Younger Dryas, and Preboreal. The second goal is to see whether there were any socioeconomic changes at the transitions to the onset and at the end of the Younger Dryas. As Pleistocene archaeological sites in the Japanese Archipelago are virtually sterile in osteological and botanical remains, used to reconstruct human subsistence economy in resource exploitations, assessment of socioeconomic change will involve an examination of foraging patterns at the regional scale by the analysis of site locations (i.e., latitudes and altitudes). The emergence of pottery is the notable technological innovation at the end of Pleistocene in East Asia. The new datasets of artifact assemblages associated with radiocarbon dates are used to assess the issue as to whether and how the late Late Glacial hunter-gatherers maintained ceramic technology during the Younger Dryas. Results will illuminate aspects of the human technological and socioeconomic responses to the Younger Dryas, and further suggest implications as to how Late Glacial hunter-gatherers adapted in the insular environments of East Asia.

Section snippets

The environmental background of the Japanese Archipelago during the Younger Dryas

Japan is a latitudinally long chain of islands, situated in the mid- to high latitudes along the northwestern Pacific Rim. The main islands, Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu, from north to south, extend along a northeast–southwest axis. These four main islands are situated between 45–30°N and 145–130°E. With the Japan Sea to the west, the archipelago stretches parallel to China, Korea, and the Russian Far East. While the land bridge between the Korean Peninsula and Kyushu Island (southern

The sample and analytical procedure

Following the records in the Greenland ice cores (Stuiver et al., 1995), the Younger Dryas began at 12,900 cal BP and ended in 11,650 cal BP The sites falling in the range dated between 14,700 and 12,900 cal BP are placed in the Bølling/Allerød, while those falling in the range dated to 11,650–8500 BP are situated in the Preboreal. Table 1 lists the 14C dates that are attributed to the terminal Pleistocene and the initial Holocene. Placement of archaeological sites in Younger Dryas was done

Discussion

The synthetic evaluation of calibrated 14C dates compiled from the excavated Late Glacial and initial Holocene sites in the Japanese Archipelago demonstrates a decrease in site numbers in the Younger Dryas. The effect of the Younger Dryas on the socio-economies of the hunter-gatherers in Japan was investigated through the comparison of foraging patterns at the regional scale and the role of pottery technology among the three contiguous chronozones: the Bølling/Allerød, Younger Dryas, and

Acknowledgments

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the symposium of the Younger Dryas in the 75th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in St. Louis. We are grateful to Profs. Lawrence Straus and Ted Goebel for their invitation to the symposium. We thank Lawrence Straus, Robert Elston, Takashi Tsutsumi, Matt Dawson, Takuya Yamaoka, Masashi Suzuki, and Keiko Kitagawa for helping us to obtain relevant information while working on the present research topic. Comments from anonymous

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