Tracking the development of agricultural lifestyles in island Southeast Asia through modern and prehistoric rodent communities. The emergence of agriculture, a key transformational event in human history, seems to have occurred significantly later in island SE Asia than surrounding regions. However, the early stages of agriculture may be archaeologically ‘invisible’ in the tropics due to simple material culture and housing. This project proposes to use the recent evolutionary history of agricult ....Tracking the development of agricultural lifestyles in island Southeast Asia through modern and prehistoric rodent communities. The emergence of agriculture, a key transformational event in human history, seems to have occurred significantly later in island SE Asia than surrounding regions. However, the early stages of agriculture may be archaeologically ‘invisible’ in the tropics due to simple material culture and housing. This project proposes to use the recent evolutionary history of agricultural rodent pests, all of which emerged in situ from among a native rodent fauna, as a proxy for the origins and spread of agriculture, and its subsequent intensification. This project will use phylogeography and population genetics to infer the history of contemporary rodent populations, combined with archaeozoological and ancient DNA analyses of prehistoric samples to test our inferences.Read moreRead less