Early childhood nurturing strategies in groups of the Yellow River's middle reaches from the late Yangshao culture (3500–2800 BCE): A stable isotope perspective

Abstract

We have reconstructed the feeding patterns, weaning age, dietary structure, and physiological stress experienced by the late Yangshao culture (3500–2800 BCE) of the Middle Yellow River in different individuals early years through comparative carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analyses of dentin incremental sections, limb bones, or rib assemblages. We present dentin incremental and bone collagen δ¹³C and δ¹⁵N isotope data from 17 individuals from two late Yangshao culture archeological sites (Qingtai 青台 and Shuanghuaishu 双槐树). The result showed that all individuals in the sample weaned between 2.5 and 3.8 years old, and other than the fact that females weaned slightly sooner than males in the Qingtai sites, there were no sex variations in dietary trends across life history stages. The majority of individuals consistently consumed C₄ foods (millets) from early childhood onward. A small number of individuals consumed both C₃ and C₄ foods at an early age, and the proportion of C₃ foods (rice) consumed declined or gradually disappeared with increasing age. In addition to the traditional local foods based on millets, a small number of individual families added rice, a newly accessible resource, in varying proportions for young children's foods, which has directly contributed to the dichotomy within this research group in terms of dietary patterns and child-rearing concepts. The emergence of early childhood nurturing strategies in this study serves as a significant microcosm of the social context in which individual families, private ownership, and civilization progressively took shape in early China.