Palaeoethnobotany from Saharan Archaeological Sites and Related Ethnobotanical Observations (Libya and Niger)

Archaeobotanical remains from archaeological contexts provide information onthe past relationships between human populations and environment. Within the multidisciplinary studies carried out in different sites of Sahara desert, pollen and seeds/fruits helped to reconstruct past environments giving details on the flora and vegetation cover during the early and middle Holocene. Plant remains are generally known to be effective tools to reconstruct plant landscape evolution, as they permit to study diachronically environmental changes. Data from burials, rockshelters and caves enhance our knowledge of ancient customs of plants use, which can be often correlate with the current use of the same. Ethnobotanical observations on Tuareg today use of plants are a key reference to interpret archaeobotanical data, especially for food and medicinal plants. An example of this type of approach is the studies on Citrullus colocynthis (L.) Schrader, a wild and toxic plants used for human nu- trition and traditional medicine.