Silkworm cultivation predating the Silk Road in southern Central Asia (2000 BCE)

Historical narratives hold that sericulture originated in China and spread along the Silk Road roughly two millennia ago. In questioning this assumption, we conducted micromorphological and proteomics analyses on three cocoons recovered from the Sapalli Tepe (approximately 2000 to 1500 BCE) site in Uzbekistan. We identified them as Bombyx mori, directly dated to 1940 to 1765 cal. BCE, representing the earliest remains of Bombyx cocoons. We further report the earliest mulberry (Morus sp.) charcoal fragments from Central Asia, attesting to mulberry-Bombyx sericulture in the Oxus nearly 2000 years earlier than previously documented. We highlight that early silkworms and mulberry trees may have been introduced to Central Asia along the southern slope of the Himalayas, although other routes could also plausibly explain the observed pattern. This multidisciplinary research rewrites the enigmatic history of early sericulture and its globalization.