Rita DAL MARTELLO

RESEARCH INTERESTS

I specialize in the analysis of ancient plant remains from archaeological sites in China and Central Asia as the first line of evidence to investigate past subsistence practices. In addition to direct plant remains, I also analyse material culture and textual evidence related to past plant use and dispersal to reconstruct the development of complex agrarian societies and trace ancient routes of contact and trade in Eurasia during late prehistoric and early historic times. More broadly, I am interested in agricultural and culinary traditions along ecological frontier zones in East Asia, and I investigate the spread of crops outside their domestication centres. I have a particular interest in how the movement of plants and people impacted changes in agricultural societies through time and space, with special attention to the production and consumption of local minor crops and the shaping of local culinary identities.

PREVIOUS POSITIONS

2023- today Assistant Professor in Chinese Art History and Archaeology, Ca'Foscari University, Department of Asian and North African Studies

2020-2023 Post-doctoral research fellow, Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology (previously known as the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany). Member of the Domestication and Anthropogenic Evolution (DAE) Reserach Group; ERC-funded project "Fruits of Eurasia: Domestication and Dispersal" (FEDD); PI: Dr. Robert N. Spengler III

2019 PhD placement, Visual Arts Collections, British Library (London, UK) cataloguing of Chinese botanical paintings

2018 Researcher, Institute of Archaeology, University College London (London, UK) ERC-funded project "Comparative Pathways to Agriculture" (ComPag); PI: Prof. Dorian Q Fuller

2014-2015 Research Assistant, Centre for Early Civilisation and Research, School of Archaeology and Museology, Peking University, (Beijing, China)

EDUCATION

2015-2020 PhD in Archaeology, Institute of Archaeology, University College London (London, UK)

2012-2015 MA in Chinese Neolithic Archaeology, School of Archaeology and Museology, Peking University (Beijing, China)

2009-2012 BA in Language, Culture and Society of East Asia (China), Università Ca'Foscari (Venice, Italy)

INTERNATIONAL RESEARCH PROJECTS

-2023-in progress: Archaeobotanist for the Tell Zeyd Archaeological Project, Iraqi Kurdistan (ZAP), led by Prof. Cristina Tonghini, Università Ca’Foscari

-2022-in progress: Archaeobotanist for the Italian Archaeological Mission in Pakistan, led by Prof. Luca Maria Olivieri, Università Ca’Foscari, Associazione Internazionale di Studi sul Mediterraneo e l’Oriente (ISMEO)

-2021-in progress: Archaeobotanist for the TAP, Turkmenistan (Togolok Archaeological Project); PI: Dr. Barbara Cerasetti, ISMEO

-2020-22: Archaeobotanist for the Kakapel Archaeological Project; PI: Dr. Steven T. Goldstein, Pittsburgh University and Dr. Natalie Mueller, Washington University in St. Louis (USA)

-2020-2024: PARIS (Prunus Archaeological Research Initiative and Survey); co-PI with Dr. Madelynn von Baeyer, Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology (Germany). Development of a geometric morphometrics methodology for the identification of Prunus remains from archaeological contexts.

-2020-23: ERC-funded project: FEDD (Fruits of Eurasia: Domestication and Dispersal); PI: Dr. Robert N. Spengler III, Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology (Germany). Domestication and evolution of Prunoideae and Maloideae fruit trees from Central Asia.

-2015-18: ERC-funded project ComPag (Comparative Pathways to Agriculture); PI: Prof. Dorian Fuller, UCL (UK)

INVITED LECTURES

13/03/2024   “Plant uses at Buddhist Barikot, Pakistan” Lunch in the Lab. UCL (UK)

10/11/2022   “Secondary crop domestication: A case study from Haimenkou, Yunnan”. China Night Lecture Series, UCL (UK)

11/06/2022   “Semi che raccontano. Agricoltura e commercio nell’Asia Centrale Meridionale tra il III e il II millennio a.C”. Archeologia dell’Asia Centrale: il Turkmenistan meridionale dal V al I millennio a.C. I Sabati dell’Accademia, Accademia delle Antiche Civiltà, Milano (Italy)

20/05/2021   “The origins and dispersal of Trans-Eurasian cereal crops: perspective from archaeobotany”. Institute of Asian and Oriental Studies Lecture Series, University of Zurich (Switzerland)

24/06/2019   “Agricultural Production in Yunnan from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age”. From Villages to Cities: Agricultural Production and Settlement Growth in Eastern Eurasia, International Centre for Chinese Heritage and Archaeology (ICCHA), UCL (UK)

29/04/2019   “Tracing the spread of agriculture and local plant use innovation in Yunnan, Southwest China”. Asian Archaeology Seminar Series, Cambridge University (UK)

29/10/2018   “Exploring Agricultural Pathways in Southwest China: archaeobotanical material from early sites”. Asian Archaeology Seminar Series, Oxford University (UK)

23-28/09/2018   “Comparing the agricultural pathways of India and Southwest China: similarities and differences between crops and agricultural practices in distinct geographies”. The Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association IPPA 21st Congress, Hue (Vietnam)

3-6/08/2018   “Rice mixed economies in Southwest china: insights from weed flora”. Current Frontiers in the Archaeobotany of Rice International Workshop, Peking University, Pechino (China)

15-19/04/2015   “Rethinking Qijia Burial Practice”. SAA Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco (USA)

PRESENTATIONS AT INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES

19-24/08/2025         “Archaeobotany in China: Past, Present, Future” speaker and session organizer “From Forest and Fields: Investigating Food, Fuel and Plant Use in Ancient China”. Society for East Asian Archaeology, 10th Worldwide Conference, Aberdeen (Scotland).

9-12/09/2024     "Contrasting Diachronic Regional Trends in Cereal Grain Evolution across Eurasia: A metadata analysis of linear morphometrics from antiquity to today." Domesticating Earth, Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology Tegernsee (Germany)

27-30/08/2024    “Xinjiang as Corridor of Diffusion and Exchange: a review of the archaeobotanical evidence” European Association of Chinese Studies 25th biennial conference, Tallin (Estonia)

22-26/01/2023   “Archaeobotany of Barikot, Pakistan”. Environments, Land Use, and Urbanization in Ancient Central Asia, Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, Jena (Germany)

13-17/06/2022   “Comparative morphometric study of post-domestication evolution of trans-Eurasian cereals crops”. International Work Group for Palaeoethnobotany (IWGP) 19th Conference, České Budějovice (Czechia)

7-12/06/2018   “Recent developments on the spread of agriculture to Southwest China: a comparative analysis of archaeobotanical, remains, ecology and climate in Yunnan”. SEAA Society for East Asian Archaeology (SEAA) 8th Worldwide Conference, Nanjing (China)

8-12/06/2016   “Archaeobotanical Results from Baiyangcun, Yunnan: exploring agricultural practices in Southwest China”. SEAA Society for East Asian Archaeology (SEAA) 7th Worldwide Conference, Boston/Cambridge (USA)

PEER REVIEWER FOR THE FOLLOWING ACADEMIC JOURNALS:

Early China

Antiquity

Nature Communications

Vegetation History and Archaeobotany

Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences

Quaternary Science Reviews

Journal of Archaeological Sciences: Reviews

Geoarchaeology

Quaternary International

MEMBERSHIPS

European Association for Asian Art and Archaeology (EAAA)

European Association of Chinese Studies (EACS)

Society for East Asian Archaeology (SEAA)

The Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association (IPPA)

International Working Group for Paleoethnobotany (IWGP)