Landscape 'Neolithization' Among the Hunter-Fisher-Gatherers of Lake Biwa, Central Japan

The concept of Neolithization has been used to examine a wide range of human relationships to the post-glacial environment, including the rise of farming and the invention of new adaptive technologies, like pottery. This paper focuses on understanding the establishment of sedentary life-ways by Jomon hunter-fisher-gatherers living around Lake Biwa, Central Japan, as a key aspect of Neolithization processes. Natural landscapes in this area presented different opportunities for human subsistence and settlement. Focusing on the characteristics and distribution of key aquatic and terrestrial resources, it is clear that two settlement strategies could have been sustained by local hunter-fisher-gatherer populations. The first involved targeting settlement in areas with complementary resources to avoid the risk of seasonal shortfalls; these areas are, however, limited geographically and would have filled up quickly. The second strategy involved a more elaborate approach to the logistics of mobility and food storage to secure the resources to sustain a settled life; this strategy opened up much larger areas for colonization. This analysis demonstrates that early populations initially favored the first strategy, but then shifted to the second, as population pressures generated major landscape shifts toward the end of the Middle Jomon period (4000 cal BP).