Cultivating Villa Economies: Archaeobotanical and Isotopic Evidence for Iron Age to Roman Agricultural Practices on the Chalk Downlands of Southern Britain

Agricultural practices are key for understanding socio-economic change, community organization, and relationships with landscape the environment. Under Roman Empire, cereals were vital supplying urban military populations, yet cereal husbandry within villa landscapes remain underexplored. In this article, author applies new methods to analyse a large assemblage of charred plant remains from an area chalk downland in central-southern England order evaluate changes production strategies over Middle Iron Age late periods. Archaeobotany, carbon nitrogen isotope analysis, functional weed ecology combined reconstruct crop practices, establish system villas preceding settlements, consider environmental impact systems.