The transition to sedentary agricultural societies in northern China fuelled considerable demographic growth from 5000 to 2000 BC. In this article, we draw together archaeobotanical, zooarchaeological and bioarchaeological data and explore the relationship between several aspects of this transition, with an emphasis on the millet-farming productivity during the Yangshao period and how it facilitated changes in animal husbandry and consolidation of sedentism. We place the period of domestication (the evolution of non-shattering, initial grain size increase and panicle development) between 8300 and 4300 BC. The domestication and post-domestication of foxtail (Setaria italica) and broomcorn (Panicum miliaceum) millet increased their productivity substantially, with much greater rate of change than for rice (Oryza sativa). However, millets are significantly less productive per hectare than wet rice farming, a point reflected in the greater geographical expanse of northern Neolithic millet cultures (5000–3000 BC) in comparison with their Yangtze rice-growing counterparts. The domestication of pigs in the Yellow River region is evidenced by changes in their morphology after 6000 BC, and a transition to a millet-based diet c. 4500–3500 BC. Genetic data and isotopic data from dogs indicate a similar dietary transition from 6000 to 4000 BC, leading to new starch-consuming dog breeds. Significant population increase associated with agricultural transitions arose predominately from the improvement of these crops and animals following domestication, leading to the formation of the first proto-urban centres and the demic-diffusion of millet agriculture beyond central northern China between 4300–2000 BC.

This paper outlines the ways in which the project is addressing the colonial legacy of Henry Wellcome as well as presenting the data from the first three field seasons at Jebel Moya, south-central Sudan. These data have substantially revised our chronological and socio-economic understanding of the site. Our excavations, initiated in 2017 and continued in 2019 and 2022, show a longer, more continuous occupation of the site than has been previously recognised. The faunal and botanical remains have implications for the spread of early domesticates in the eastern Sahel and for climate changes, and raise issues of resilience. There is confirmed human burial activity from at least the third millennium BC onwards, while the pottery continues to yield information about the variety of decoration and, for the final Assemblage 3, data on its usage. Overall, the continued importance of the site for the eastern Sahel is re-emphasised.

Following their early domestication, broomcorn millet and rice (in East Asia) and wheat and barley (in South-west Asia) were subsequently adopted across Eurasia during the Bronze Age/early historic period. The precise timing and dispersal routes for this trans-Eurasian exchange, however, remain unclear. Here, the authors present archaeobotanical evidence from sites on the Caspian Sea's southern coast, demonstrating that broomcorn millet reached West Asia by c. 2050 BC and rice by c. 120 BC. These dispersals relate to two waves of globalisation and were based on two different mechanisms: an ‘infiltration’ model (broomcorn millet) and a ‘leapfrog’ model (rice). The results contribute to our understanding of the continental-scale connectivity of the late prehistoric/early historic periods.

The authors present preliminary results from a new research project based in Jebel Shaqadud, Sudan. Their findings highlight the potential for this region's archaeological record to expand our understanding of the adaptation strategies used by human groups in arid north-east African environments away from rivers and lakes during the Holocene. Furthermore, they present exceptionally early radiocarbon dates that push postglacial human occupation in the eastern Sahel back to the twelfth millennium BP.

Established chronologies indicate a long-term ‘Hoabinhian’ hunter-gatherer occupation of Mainland Southeast Asia during the Terminal Pleistocene to Mid-Holocene (45 000–3000 years ago). Here, the authors re-examine the ‘Hoabinhian’ sequence from north-west Thailand using new radiocarbon and luminescence data from Spirit Cave, Steep Cliff Cave and Banyan Valley Cave. The results indicate that hunter-gatherers exploited this ecologically diverse region throughout the Terminal Pleistocene and the Pleistocene–Holocene transition, and into the period during which agricultural lifeways emerged in the Holocene. Hunter-gatherers did not abandon this highland region of Thailand during periods of environmental and socioeconomic change.

The earliest claim for domesticated rice in Island Southeast Asia (4960–3565 cal BP) derives from a single grain embedded in a ceramic sherd from Gua Sireh Cave, Borneo. In a first assessment of spikelet-base assemblages within pottery sherds using quantitative microCT analysis, the authors found no additional rice remains within this sherd to support the early date of rice farming; analysis of a more recent Gua Sireh sherd (1990–830 cal BP), however, indicates that 70 per cent of spikelet bases are from domesticated rice. This technique offers a high degree of contextual and temporal resolution for approaching organic-tempered ceramics as well-preserved archaeobotanical assemblages.

Lying on the north-west coast of Sri Lanka, the ancient port of Mantai was ideally situated as a ‘hub’ for trade between East and West from the first millennium BC onwards. Excavations at the site were interrupted by civil war in 1984, delaying publication of these results and leading to the underestimation of Mantai's importance in the development of Early Historic Indian Ocean trade. Renewed excavations in 2009–2010 yielded extensive archaeobotanical remains, which, alongside an improved understanding of the site's chronology, provide important new insights into the development of local and regional trade routes and direct evidence for early trade in the valuable spices upon which later empires were founded.

New excavations at the Jebel Moya cemetery in Sudan reveal extensive evidence for Meroitic-era occupation, providing valuable data on contemporaneous diet, migration, exchange and population composition in sub-Saharan Africa.

New evidence from archaeological investigations in north-east Thailand shows a transition in rice farming towards wetland cultivation that would have facilitated greater yields and surpluses. This evidence, combined with new dates and palaeoclimatic data, suggests that this transition took place in the Iron Age, at a time of increasingly arid climate, and when a number of broader societal changes become apparent in the archaeological record. For the first time, it is possible to relate changes in subsistence economy to shifts in regional climate and water-management strategies, and to the emergence of state societies in Southeast Asia.

Late prehistoric archaeological research in Myanmar is in a phase of rapid expansion. Recent work by the Mission Archéologique Française au Myanmar aims to establish a reliable Neolithic to Iron Age culture-historical sequence, which can then be compared to surrounding regions of Southeast Asia. Excavations at Nyaung'gan and Oakaie in central Myanmar have provided 52 new AMS dates, which allow the creation of Myanmar's first reliable prehistoric radiometric chronology. They have also identified the Neolithic to Bronze Age transition in central Myanmar, which is of critical importance in understanding long-range interactions at the national, regional and inter-regional level. This research provides the first significant step towards placing late prehistoric Myanmar in its global context.

Plant macrofossils from the sites of Khao Sam Kaeo and Phu Khao Thong on the Thai-Malay Peninsula show evidence of cross-cultural interactions, particularly between India to the west and Southeast Asia to the east. Archaeobotanical analysis of various cereals, beans and other crops from these assemblages sheds light on the spread and adoption of these species for local agriculture. There is also early evidence for the trade of key commodities such as cotton. The plant remains illustrate a variety of influences and networks of contact across South and Southeast Asia during the late first millennium BC.

The cultivation of rice has had a major impact on both societies and their environments in Asia, and in China in particular. Phytolith assemblages from three Neolithic sites in the Lower Yangtze valley reveal that in early rice fields the emphasis was on drainage to limit the amount of water and force the rice to produce seed. It was only in the later third millennium BC that the strategy changed and irrigated paddies came into use. The results demonstrate that plant remains, including weed assemblages, can reveal wetter or drier growing conditions, showing changes in rice cultivation from flooded and drained fields to large, intensively irrigated paddies.