Plant ways in Middle Bronze Age Anatolia—an archaeological interpretation of phytoliths and other plant remains from Zincirli Höyük, Türkiye

Vegetation History and Archaeobotany https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-024-01021-8 ORIGINAL ARTICLE Plant ways in Middle Bronze Age Anatolia—an archaeological interpretation of phytoliths and other plant remains from Zincirli Höyük, Türkiye Birgül Öğüt1 · Doğa Karakaya2 Received: 15 August 2023 / Accepted: 21 June 2024 © The Author(s) 2024 Abstract This paper presents the results of phytolith analysis from Middle Bronze Age II (1800–1600 bce) Zincirli Höyük, Türkiye. The study area was destroyed by a single fire event resulting in the preservation and recovery of several food processing installations (archaeological features) and restorable vessels (broken pots) in situ. The archaeological contexts were only slightly disturbed by later sedimentary and human activities. In this paper, we focus on the interpretation of the phytolith assemblages from samples collected from various archaeological features and destruction debris, including potential Phragmites (reed) matting, pottery contents and various kinds of installations. Complementary evidence from diatoms, dung spherulites and macrobotanical remains from this study and a previous one are also evaluated to add to the contextual significance of the phytolith record. Keywords Archaeobotany · Phytoliths · Diatoms · Dung spherulites · Middle bronze age · Anatolia Introduction The settlement of Zincirli Höyük (ancient Sam’al), located in the Islahiye valley within the lower Orontes basin in Gaziantep Province, south-eastern Türkiye, was first established in the Early Bronze Age IVA (2400–2200 bce) (Fig. 1). The ca. 2 ha site was reoccupied in the Middle Bronze Age II, a period of extensive trade networks (Massa and Palmisano 2018) and regional incursions of the Amorites throughout the Near East, who are thought to have been nomadic pastoralists (Burke 2020). The military expedition of the Hittite kings Hattushili I and Murshili I at the end of the 17th century bce caused widespread destruction of settlements in the region under study. It is suggested that the destruction Communicated by M. Dal Corso. * Birgül Öğüt 1 Institut für Archäologische Wissenschaften, Abteilung Vorderasiatische Archäologie, Albert- Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, Platz der Universität, 79085 Freiburg, Germany 2 Institut für Naturwissenschaftliche Archäologie, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, Rümelinstraße 23, 72070 Tübingen, Germany at Zincirli may well be linked to these Hittite attacks, which most probably happened between 1632 and 1610 cal bce (Herrmann et al. 2023). The settlement reached its zenith during the Iron Age II and became the seat of an independent Neo-Hittite kingdom around 920 bce. In the 7th century bce, Zincirli was annexed by the expanding Neo-Assyrian Empire as the provincial capital of a vassal kingdom (Wartke 2005). Recent work at Zincirli, by the Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures, University of Chicago (ISAC), excavated a Middle Bronze Age building complex which consisted of buildings (DD/I and DD/II), a paved street (Street 200) and a semi-sheltered area (DD11) (Fig. 2). Based on the site plans, archaeological finds and archaeobiological data, it is thought that the two buildings were part of an area used for the preparation, processing and storage of foodstuffs, drinks and woven material (Herrmann and Schloen 2021; Morgan and Soldi 2021 for archaeological evidence; Deckers et al. 2023 for plant and animal evidence). Building DD/I contained several storage containers, kitchen ware, various structures and a sunken pithos (storage container). Building DD/I had three rooms, DD1, DD2 and DD3 (details in ESM 1 Figs. S1–S5). A pot containing Vicia ervilia (bitter vetch) was found in room DD1. The room was covered by mud brick and destruction debris. Room DD2 was full of pottery Vol.:(0123456789) Vegetation History and Archaeobotany contradictory, as well as how to combine the archaeobotanical results at different analytical scales. Materials and methods Fig. 1  Location of Zincirli Höyük and its geographical context. (Source: https://zincirli.uchicago.edu/site-and-setting/. Accessed 13 August 2023) vessels and kitchenware on a raised platform in the north and northeastern part; against the southern wall of DD2 was an installation (feature) connected with processing cereals and a type of fire installation. Room DD3 also contained various installations, pottery containers and a sunken pithos (Morgan and Richardson 2020; Morgan and Soldi 2021; Deckers et al. 2023). Building DD/II seems to have had thicker walls than DD/I. It was probably a multi-storey building containing large vessels or bins that were full of charred plant remains (Morgan and Soldi 2021). The only semi-open space, DD11, was located to the north of Building DD/II and had clay storage containers and pottery. Preliminary results of the phytoliths, diatoms, dung spherulites and plant macro-remains were given in an earlier paper to provide insights into local use of resources and environmental conditions (Deckers et al. 2023). In that paper, the results were presented in a summarised form and grouped into very general analytical categories. The present article contributes towards a detailed reinterpretation of the archaeological contexts by presenting the full phytolith data for the first time. Furthermore, this paper investigates how to deal with micro- and macrobotanical data which seem to be The samples for phytolith analysis were collected as bulk sediment samples from various archaeological contexts during the 2017 excavation season. A total of 19 phytolith samples were collected from nine different archaeological contexts (loci) of the DD/I complex from rooms DD1, 2, 3 and one sample from a semi-open area north of the DD/ II complex (called “room” DD11). In addition to phytolith analysis, dung spherulites and diatoms were also investigated. To trace the exact archaeological contexts of the samples and the possible origin of the material, field notes were used (Table 1). These context descriptions by the field archaeologists are summarized into five analytical categories, building material of mud brick mixed with organic material, destruction debris, woven material such as reed matting, vessel contents and various structures (more information about sampling strategy is given in ESM 1). The preparation of the phytolith samples was carried out according to the fast heavy-liquid extraction process described in Katz et al. (2010) and the numerical and statistical analysis was done according to Albert et al. (1999). Subsamples of 50 µL of material were mounted on microscope slides with 24 × 24 mm coverslips on top. Phytoliths were examined in random fields at ×200 and ×400 magnification using an Olympus BX-43 microscope. Although ideally 250–300 phytoliths per slide should be counted (Zurro 2018), the phytoliths in 25 fields of view on each slide were counted because of the rapid crystallization of sodium polytungstate in the slides and the (...truncated)