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Crops and Agriculture in Medieval Age in Europe
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Crops and Agriculture in Medieval Age in Europe

A special issue of Plants (ISSN 2223-7747). This special issue belongs to the section "Plant Systematics, Taxonomy, Nomenclature and Classification".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 September 2022) | Viewed by 10173

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Mariano Ucchesu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Institut des Sciences de l’Évolution (ISEM), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) Université Montpellier, UMR 5554, CEDEX 05, 34095 Montpellier, France
Interests: archaeobotany; seed image analysis; crop evolution; agriculture; domestication; CWR
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Giovanna Bosi

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Laboratory of Palynology and Palaeobotany, Department of Life Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (UNIMORE), via Campi 287, 41125 Modena, Italy
Interests: archaeobotany; seeds/fruits; food plants; synanthropic plants; agriculture history; ethnobotany
Dr. Marco Sarigu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Centre for Conservation of Biodiversity (CCB) Department of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Cagliari, v.le Sant'Ignazio da Laconi, 9-11, 09123 Cagliari, Italy
Interests: archaeobotany; seed image analysis; crop evolution; agriculture; domestication; CWR
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

One of the most debated topics of the medieval history concerns the great economic transformations related to changes in agricultural production systems starting from the fall of the Roman Empire; but the our knowledge on production systems, method of cereal storage and diversity of plant crops of the Medieval period is based mostly on historical sources.

This Special Issue of Plants will collect archaeobotanical research on the food plants (cultivated and wild) such as cereals, pulses, fruits and vegetables used in the diet of the European Middle Ages.

We welcome original research papers, methods, reviews, and perspectives, able to provide a clearer picture on the plant economy of the Medieval period.

Dr. Mariano Ucchesu
Dr. Giovanna Bosi
Dr. Marco Sarigu
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Plants is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • Archaeobotany
  • Agriculture
  • Seeds/fruits
  • Diet
  • Mediaeval period

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

25 pages, 5737 KiB  
Article
Brassica and Sinapis Seeds in Medieval Archaeological Sites: An Example of Multiproxy Analysis for Their Identification and Ethnobotanical Interpretation
by Giovanna Bosi, Simona De Felice, Michael J. Wilkinson, Joël Allainguillaume, Laura Arru, Juri Nascimbene and Fabrizio Buldrini
Plants 2022, 11(16), 2100; https://doi.org/10.3390/plants11162100 - 12 Aug 2022
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2315
Abstract
The genus Brassica includes some of the most important vegetable and oil crops worldwide. Many Brassica seeds (which can show diagnostic characters useful for species identification) were recovered from two archaeological sites in northern Italy, dated from between the Middle Ages and the [...] Read more.
The genus Brassica includes some of the most important vegetable and oil crops worldwide. Many Brassica seeds (which can show diagnostic characters useful for species identification) were recovered from two archaeological sites in northern Italy, dated from between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. We tested the combined use of archaeobotanical keys, ancient DNA barcoding, and references to ancient herbarium specimens to address the issue of diagnostic uncertainty. An unequivocal conventional diagnosis was possible for much of the material recovered, with the samples dominated by five Brassica species and Sinapis. The analysis using ancient DNA was restricted to the seeds with a Brassica-type structure and deployed a variant of multiplexed tandem PCR. The quality of diagnosis strongly depended on the molecular locus used. Nevertheless, many seeds were diagnosed down to species level, in concordance with their morphological identification, using one primer set from the core barcode site (matK). The number of specimens found in the Renaissance herbaria was not high; Brassica nigra, which is of great ethnobotanical importance, was the most common taxon. Thus, the combined use of independent means of species identification is particularly important when studying the early use of closely related crops, such as Brassicaceae. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crops and Agriculture in Medieval Age in Europe)
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14 pages, 1491 KiB  
Article
Discovering Plum, Watermelon and Grape Cultivars Founded in a Middle Age Site of Sassari (Sardinia, Italy) through a Computer Image Analysis Approach
by Marco Sarigu, Diego Sabato, Mariano Ucchesu, Maria Cecilia Loi, Giovanna Bosi, Oscar Grillo, Salvador Barros Torres and Gianluigi Bacchetta
Plants 2022, 11(8), 1089; https://doi.org/10.3390/plants11081089 - 16 Apr 2022
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 3410
Abstract
The discovery of several waterlogged plant remains in a Middle Ages context (1330–1360 AD) in Sassari (NS, Sardinia, Italy) enabled the characterisation of archaeological plum fruit stones and watermelon and grape seeds through computer image analysis. Digital seed/endocarp images were acquired by a [...] Read more.
The discovery of several waterlogged plant remains in a Middle Ages context (1330–1360 AD) in Sassari (NS, Sardinia, Italy) enabled the characterisation of archaeological plum fruit stones and watermelon and grape seeds through computer image analysis. Digital seed/endocarp images were acquired by a flatbed scanner and processed and analysed by applying computerised image analysis techniques. The morphometric data were statistically elaborated using stepwise linear discriminant analysis (LDA), allowing comparisons among archaeological remains, wild populations and autochthonous cultivars. Archaeological samples of plum were compared with 21 autochthonous cultivars of Prunus domestica from Sardinia, while archaeological watermelon seeds were compared with 36 seed lots of Citrullus from Europe, Africa and Asia. Moreover, archaeological grape seeds were compared with 51 autochthonous traditional cultivars of Vitis vinifera subsp. vinifera from Sardinia, 16 cultivars from Tuscany, six cultivars from Liguria, and eight cultivars from Catalonia (Spain). Archaeological plum remains showed morphological affinity with five cultivars of Sardinia. Seed features of the archaeological watermelon remains demonstrated affiliation with a proper sweet dessert watermelon, Citrullus lanatus, and similarity with some Sardinian cultivars. Regarding the archaeological remains of grape, morphometric comparisons showed a high similarity with autochthonous cultivars from Catalonia and Liguria. This study provides new information about ancient fruit cultivated and consumed during the Middle Ages in Sardinia. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crops and Agriculture in Medieval Age in Europe)
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26 pages, 64366 KiB  
Article
Crops on the Rocks: Production, Processing, and Storage at the Early Medieval Site of Senhora Do Barrocal (Municipality of Sátão, Central Portugal)
by Luís Seabra, Catarina Tente, Filipe Costa Vaz, Cláudia Oliveira, Lara González Carretero and João Pedro Tereso
Plants 2022, 11(4), 471; https://doi.org/10.3390/plants11040471 - 9 Feb 2022
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 2823
Abstract
Small rural places are largely absent from early medieval written sources, but they were profuse and relevant in regional settlements and economies. Only through archaeological and archaeobotanical investigation is it possible to unveil their structure and productive strategies; however, this kind of investigation [...] Read more.
Small rural places are largely absent from early medieval written sources, but they were profuse and relevant in regional settlements and economies. Only through archaeological and archaeobotanical investigation is it possible to unveil their structure and productive strategies; however, this kind of investigation is still uncommon in Iberia. Here, the assemblage of fruits/seeds, wood charcoal, and food remains from Senhora do Barrocal (SB) (Sátão, Portugal) will be presented and discussed in order to understand the crop production, processing, and storage. The site was destroyed by a fire somewhere between the 10th and the 11th centuries AD, which allowed the preservation of abundant plant remains in a storage area. Charcoal analyses suggest that the building was made with oak and chestnut timber. The massive fruits/seeds assemblage was dominated by cereals, mostly oat and rye, but also barley, millet, and naked wheat, some fully dehusked, others still hulled. Furthermore, evidence of food products has also been found, suggesting that the area was used for the storage of multiple foods and crops at different processing stages. SB is a good example of how communities adopted a diverse set of crops and multifaceted storage strategies to prevent food shortages and to endure in a harsh environment. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Crops and Agriculture in Medieval Age in Europe)
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