num_pages: 71
description: The archaeobotanical analysis of 72 samples of occupation deposits from the Garamantian rural village of Fewet, Libyan Sahara, dated to the end of the first millennium BC, and of 23 samples from 10 tumuli of the adjacent necropolis, dated from 650 BC to 350 AD, has identified 24185 plant remains. Several crop plants, including cereals, pulses and fruits (mainly dates), were found, in addition to vegetables, tubers, wild plants, charcoals and local basket-making material. Evidence for Iron Age spatial innovations such as agricultural specialization, cultural landscape and spatial structuring processes, as well as cultural links with both the Mediterranean and the sub-Saharan worlds, is also now available from the Akakus region. The plant repertoire of the Garamantes has been enriched greatly by new species [i.e. Acacia nilotica (L.) Willd. ex Del., Cyperus rotundus L., Ziziphus lotus (L.) Lam., Balanites aegyptiaca (L.) Del., Reseda odorata L.]. Evidence for a death cult was also found.
language: English
title: The «Domestication» of the Desert: Agriculture, Spatial Structuring Processes and the Cult of Death at Fewet (Libyan Sahara) in Garamantian Times