Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev Desert
Abstract Understanding past human settlement of inhospitable regions is one of the most intriguing puzzles in archaeological research, with implications for more sustainable use of marginal regions today. During the Byzantine period in the 4th century CE, large settlements were established in the ar...
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| Format: | Article |
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Nature Portfolio
2020-01-01
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| Series: | Scientific Reports |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-58360-5 |
| _version_ | 1818570843669659648 |
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| author | Petra Vaiglova Gideon Hartman Nimrod Marom Avner Ayalon Miryam Bar-Matthews Tami Zilberman Gal Yasur Michael Buckley Rachel Bernstein Yotam Tepper Lior Weissbrod Tali Erickson-Gini Guy Bar-Oz |
| author_facet | Petra Vaiglova Gideon Hartman Nimrod Marom Avner Ayalon Miryam Bar-Matthews Tami Zilberman Gal Yasur Michael Buckley Rachel Bernstein Yotam Tepper Lior Weissbrod Tali Erickson-Gini Guy Bar-Oz |
| author_sort | Petra Vaiglova |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract Understanding past human settlement of inhospitable regions is one of the most intriguing puzzles in archaeological research, with implications for more sustainable use of marginal regions today. During the Byzantine period in the 4th century CE, large settlements were established in the arid region of the Negev Desert, Israel, but it remains unclear why it did so, and why the settlements were abandoned three centuries later. Previous theories proposed that the Negev was a “green desert” in the early 1st millennium CE, and that the Byzantine Empire withdrew from this region due to a dramatic climatic downturn. In the absence of a local climate archive correlated to the Byzantine/Early Islamic transition, testing this theory has proven challenging. We use stable isotopic indicators of animal dietary and mobility patterns to assess the extent of the vegetative cover in the desert. By doing so, we aim to detect possible climatic fluctuations that may have led to the abandonment of the Byzantine settlements. The findings show that the Negev Desert was not greener during the time period under investigation than it is today and that the composition of the animals’ diets, as well as their grazing mobility patterns, remained unchanged through the Byzantine/Early Islamic transition. Favoring a non-climatic explanation, we propose instead that the abandonment of the Negev Byzantine settlements was motivated by restructuring of the Empire’s territorial priorities. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-14T13:47:12Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-7f5ac47b04cb4a6aa829b0dbea64aea8 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2045-2322 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-14T13:47:12Z |
| publishDate | 2020-01-01 |
| publisher | Nature Portfolio |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Scientific Reports |
| spelling | doaj.art-7f5ac47b04cb4a6aa829b0dbea64aea82022-12-21T22:59:16ZengNature PortfolioScientific Reports2045-23222020-01-0110111310.1038/s41598-020-58360-5Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev DesertPetra Vaiglova0Gideon Hartman1Nimrod Marom2Avner Ayalon3Miryam Bar-Matthews4Tami Zilberman5Gal Yasur6Michael Buckley7Rachel Bernstein8Yotam Tepper9Lior Weissbrod10Tali Erickson-Gini11Guy Bar-Oz12Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St Louis, 1 Brookings Dr.Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut, 354 Mansfield RoadZinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, 199 Aba-Hushi AvenueDepartment of Geochemistry, Geological Survey of Israel, 32 Yesha’ayahu, Leibowits Str.Department of Geochemistry, Geological Survey of Israel, 32 Yesha’ayahu, Leibowits Str.Department of Geochemistry, Geological Survey of Israel, 32 Yesha’ayahu, Leibowits Str.Department of Geochemistry, Geological Survey of Israel, 32 Yesha’ayahu, Leibowits Str.Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Manchester Institute of Biotechnology, University of ManchesterJacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev 653Archaeological Division, Israeli Antiquities AuthorityZinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, 199 Aba-Hushi AvenueArchaeological Division, Israeli Antiquities AuthorityZinman Institute of Archaeology, University of Haifa, 199 Aba-Hushi AvenueAbstract Understanding past human settlement of inhospitable regions is one of the most intriguing puzzles in archaeological research, with implications for more sustainable use of marginal regions today. During the Byzantine period in the 4th century CE, large settlements were established in the arid region of the Negev Desert, Israel, but it remains unclear why it did so, and why the settlements were abandoned three centuries later. Previous theories proposed that the Negev was a “green desert” in the early 1st millennium CE, and that the Byzantine Empire withdrew from this region due to a dramatic climatic downturn. In the absence of a local climate archive correlated to the Byzantine/Early Islamic transition, testing this theory has proven challenging. We use stable isotopic indicators of animal dietary and mobility patterns to assess the extent of the vegetative cover in the desert. By doing so, we aim to detect possible climatic fluctuations that may have led to the abandonment of the Byzantine settlements. The findings show that the Negev Desert was not greener during the time period under investigation than it is today and that the composition of the animals’ diets, as well as their grazing mobility patterns, remained unchanged through the Byzantine/Early Islamic transition. Favoring a non-climatic explanation, we propose instead that the abandonment of the Negev Byzantine settlements was motivated by restructuring of the Empire’s territorial priorities.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-58360-5 |
| spellingShingle | Petra Vaiglova Gideon Hartman Nimrod Marom Avner Ayalon Miryam Bar-Matthews Tami Zilberman Gal Yasur Michael Buckley Rachel Bernstein Yotam Tepper Lior Weissbrod Tali Erickson-Gini Guy Bar-Oz Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev Desert Scientific Reports |
| title | Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev Desert |
| title_full | Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev Desert |
| title_fullStr | Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev Desert |
| title_full_unstemmed | Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev Desert |
| title_short | Climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the Byzantine empire in the Negev Desert |
| title_sort | climate stability and societal decline on the margins of the byzantine empire in the negev desert |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-58360-5 |
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