Unlocking

THE ANCIENT RECIPES

Landscape in the vicinity of the Simagou site (ca. 8000BP) in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Re

Our
Mission

We are not only what we eat, but also where, when, how, and with whom we eat.

Our Group

We are a team of archaeologists from Stanford University discovering ancient food cultures around the world.

Stanford Archaeology Center

SAC

Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures

EALC

Meet the Director, Our Current Members, and Alumni

OUR TEAM

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The Archaeological Science Lab at Stanford

OUR LAB

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Our Research Employs A Variety of Experimental Works.

EXPERIMENTAL WORKS

Collaborating with SUAC and Campus Archaeology

COLLABORATIONS

Discovering Ancient Food
at Stanford University...

Our
Themes

Our lab explores many aspects of foodways in ancient societies worldwide, with a focus on China.

Transitioning from foraging to agriculture under microscopes

China is one of the few centers in the world where plant domestication evolved independently, but its developmental trajectory is not sufficiently understood.

The Quest for Alcohol
in Ancient World

Fermented and alcoholic beverages played a pivotal role in feastings and social events in past agricultural and urban societies across the globe, but the origins of the sophisticated relevant technologies remain elusive.

Subsistence strategies and development of social complexity

Subsistence strategies are the essence of a political-economic system, and may predict other forms of behavior, such as population size, division of labor, and social structure.

New Publications

PNAS

Archaeological evidence for initial migration of Neolithic Proto Sino-Tibetan speakers from Yellow River valley to Tibetan Plateau

Liu et al. 2022

Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution

Brewing and Serving Alcoholic Beverages to Erlitou Elites of Prehistoric China: Residue Analysis of Ceramic Vessels

He et al. 2022

New Book

Fermented Beverages in

Yangshao Culture

SAC Lunch Lecture, Oct. 2022

The farming/language dispersal hypothesis proposes that significant language families in the world dispersed along with the expansions of agriculture. Sino-Tibetan is one of the largest language families in the world.

By Li Liu

Archaeological evidence for the origin and dispersal of Proto

Sino-Tibetan: Settlement patterns and ritual feasts

SAA Conference, Apr. 2023

Symposium: Drinking Beer In A Blissful

Mood: A Global Archaeology of Beer

SL director Li Liu, member Yahui He, and Jingbo Li presented their research in the symposium: Drinking Beer In A Blissful Mood: A Global Archaeology of Beer.

By Li Liu, Yahui He, Jingbo Li

ASL Spotlight

Outreach, Oct. 2022

Ph.D. Candidate Yahui He and Yuyang Wang talk to 6th grade students at JLS Middle School about Neolithic China, archaeobotany, and petrographic analysis.

JLS Middle School Talk

Lab Tour, Nov. 2022

Post-doc scholar Matthew Chastain and Ph.D. candidate Yuyang Wang led lab tour for petrographic analysis and pXRF analysis for undergraduate students .

SAC Archaeological Labs Tour