Xinyi Liu

Xinyi Liu

​Associate Professor of Archaeology
PhD, University of Cambridge
research interests:
  • Plant domestication
  • Food Globalization in Prehistory
  • Millet
  • Prehistory of China
  • Archaeobotany
  • Stable Isotopes

contact info:

office hours:

  • By appointment
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mailing address:

  • Washington University
    CB 1114
    One Brookings Drive
    St. Louis, MO 63130-4899

Xinyi Liu is an archaeologist of food and environment exploring how past societies domesticated, produced and consumed plants and animals and how they adapted to new environments in prehistoric globalization.

I am an archaeologist of food and environment devoted to understanding how past societies domesticated, produced and consumed plants and animals and how they adapted to new environments in the context of farming dispersal. My current research explores a period of ‘food globalization’ in prehistory, which transformed the Eurasian foodways and had profound social and ecological impacts on ancient populations. Past and on-going field investigations in the Tibetan Plateau, Hexi Corridor, Inner Mongolia, and regions in Kazakhstan, Russia and Romania document the trans-continental movements of domesticated species and the context in which agricultural innovations may have occurred. My recent research examines the mechanisms farmers and herders employed to incorporate newly introduced domesticates into their long-standing social and culinary systems. My research also contributed to the knowledge of the prehistoric trajectories of ancient China and their implications for our understanding of the human past on a more global scale.

Students and postdocs at Washington University’s Laboratory for the Analysis of Early Food-Webs (LAEF) utilize various archaeological, isotopic and biological approaches to address questions concerning paleodiets and paleoenvironments. Members of the LAEF group conduct research in a range of markedly different environments and timeframes, including the Bronze Age Tibetan Plateau and Hexi Corridor, Paleolithic and Neolithic northern China and Inner Mongolia, prehistoric Greece, Byzantine Levant, Tiwanaku Andes, the Classic Period Mesoamerica and the 20th Century Costa Rica.

Selected Publications (see CV for the full list and google scholar)

Li, H., Y. Sun, Y. Yang, Y. Cui, L. Ren, H. Li, G. Chen, P. Vaiglova, G. Dong* and X. Liu*, 2022. Distinct water and soil management by first wheat and barley cultivators in north China. Antiquity, first available online: https://doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2022.138

Ritchey, M. M.*, Y. Sun, G. Motuzaite Matuzeviciute, S. Shaoda, A. K. Pokharia, M. Spate, L. Tang, J. Song, H. Li, G. Dong, P. Vaiglova, M. Frachetti and X. Liu*, 2022. The Wind that Shakes the Barley: the role of eastern Eurasian cuisines and environments on barley grain size. World Archaeology, 53(1): 1-18. Abstract 

Tian, D., Y. Sun, R.M. Melissa, T. Xi, M. Ren, J. Ma, J. Wang, Z. Zhao, X. Ling* and X. Liu*, 2022. Varying cultivation strategies in eastern Tianshan corresponded to growing pastoral lifeways between 1300 BCE and 300 CE. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 10: 966366. Open access article

Reid, R.E.B., J.T. Waples, D.A. Jensen, C.E. Edwards and X. Liu, 2022. Climate and vegetation and their impact on C and N isotope ratios in bat guano. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 10: 929220. Open access article

 

Vaiglova, P.*, R. E. B. Reid, E. Lightfoot, S. E. Pilaar Birch, H. Wang, G. Chen, S. Li, M. K. Jones and X. Liu*, 2021. Localized management of non-indigenous animal domesticates in northwestern China during the Bronze Age. Scientific Reports, 11: 15764. Open access article

Sanborn, L. H., R. E. B. Reid, A. S. Bradley and X. Liu, 2021. The effect of water availability on the carbon and nitrogen isotope composition of a C4 plant (pearl millet, Pennisetum glabucum). Journal of Archaeological Sciences, 28: 103047. Abstract

Liu, X., and R. E. B. Reid, 2020. The prehistoric roots of Chinese cuisines: Mapping staple food systems of China, 6000 BC -220 AD. PLOS ONE, 15(11), e0240930. Open access article

Zhang, Z., Z. Chen, F. Marshall, H. Lü, X. Lemoine, T. Wangyal, T. Dorje and X. Liu, 2019. The importance of hunting of diverse animals at Xiaoenda (5000 - 4000 BP), East Tibet. Quaternary International, 529, 38-46. Abstract

Liu, X., P.J. Jones, G. Motuzaite Matuzeviviute, H.V. Hunt, D.L. Lister, T. An, N. Przelomska, C.J. Kneale, Z. Zhao and M.K. Jones, 2019. From ecological opportunism to multi-cropping: mapping food globalisation in prehistory. Quaternary Science Reviews, 206(15), 21-8. Abstract

Liu, X., G. Motuzaite Matuzeviciute & H.V. Hunt, 2018. From a fertile idea to a fertile arc: The origins of broomcorn millet 15 years on, in Far from the Hearth: Essays in Honour of Martin K. Jones, eds. E. Lightfoot, X. Liu & D.Q. Fuller. Cambridge: McDonald Institute Conversations, 155-64. Abstract

Liu, X., D.L. Lister, Z. Zhao, C.A. Petrie, X. Zeng, P.J. Jones, R. Staff, A.K. Pokharia, J. Bates, R.N. Singh, S.A. Weber, G. Motuzaite Matuzeviviute, G. Dong, H. Li, H. Lü, H. Jiang, J. Wang, J. Ma, D. Tian, G. Jin, L. Zhou, X. Wu & M.K. Jones, 2017. Journey to the East: diverse routes and variable flowering times for wheat and barley en route to prehistoric China. PLOS ONE, 12(11), e0209518. Open access article

 

Liu, X., Z. Zhao & M.K. Jones, 2017. From people's commune to household responsibility: Ethnoarchaeological perspectives of millet production in prehistoric northeast China. Archaeological Research in Asia, 11, 51-7. Abstract

Liu, X., D.L. Lister, Z.-Z. Zhao, R.A. Staff, P.J. Jones, L.-P. Zhou, A.K. Pokharia, C.A. Petrie, A. Pathak, H.-L. Lu, G. Motuzaite Matuzeviciute, J. Bates, T.K. Pilgram and M.J. Jones, 2016. The virtues of small grain size: Potential pathways to a distinguishing feature of Asian wheats. Quaternary International, 426(28), 107-9. Abstract

Ren, X., X. Lemoine, D. Mo, T.R. Kidder, Y. Guo, Z. Qin & X. Liu, 2016. Foothills and intermountain basins: Does China's Fertile Arc have a 'Hilly Flanks'? Quaternary International, 426(28), 86-96. Abstract

Liu, X., D. Fuller and M. K. Jones. 2015. Early agriculture in China. In The Cambridge World History - Volume II:  A world with agriculture, 12,000 BCE-500CE, edited by G. Barker and C. Goucher. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 310-334. Abstract

Chen, F., F. Dong, D. Zhang, X. Liu, X. Jia, C. An, M. Ma, Y. Xie, L. Barton, X. Ren, Z. Zhao, X. Wu and M. K. Jones. 2015. Agriculture facilitated permanent human occupation of the Tibetan Plateau after 3600 B.P. Science 347 (6219), 248-250. Abstract

Liu, X., E. Lightfoot, T. C. O'Connell, H. Wang, S. Li, L. Zhou, Y. Hu, G. Motuzaite Matuzeviciute and M. K. Jones. 2014. From necessity to choice: dietary revolutions in west China in the second millennium BC. World Archaeology 46 (5), 661-680. Abstract

Liu, X. and M. K. Jones. 2014. Food globalization in prehistory: top down or bottom up? Antiquity 88 (341), 956-963. Abstract

Liu, X., M. K. Jones, Z. Zhao, G. Liu and T. C. O'Connell. 2012. The earliest evidence of millet as a staple crop: New light on Neolithic foodways in North China. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 149 (2), 238-290. Abstract

Jones, M. K. and X. Liu. 2009. Origins of agriculture in East Asia. Science 324 (5928), 730-731. Abstract

Liu, X., H. V. Hunt and M. K. Jones. 2009. River valleys and foothills: changing archaeological perceptions of north China's earliest farms. Antiquity 83 (319), 82-95. Abstract

Edited Book and Special Issues:

Lightfoot, E., X. Liu and D. Q. Fuller, eds. 2018. Far from the Hearth: Essays in Honour of Martin K. Jones. Cambridge: McDonald Institute Conversations.

Xinyi Liu, Giedre Motuzaite Matuzeviciute, Shinya Shoda and Petra Vaiglova, eds. 2022/23. Research Topic: Effects of Novel Environments on Domesticated Species. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution.

Jianping Zhang, Ying Guan and Xinyi Liu, eds. 2022/23. Research Topic: Frontiers in the Study of Ancient Plant Remains. Frontiers in Plant Science.

Xinyi Liu and Giedre Motuzaite Matuzeviciute, eds. 2023. Special Issue: Millet and Pseudocereals: New Insights into Archaeobotany, Plant Domestication and Global Foodways. Agronomy.

in the news:

Thirsty wheat needed new water management strategy in ancient China

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