The First Farmers

1. 10 The First Farmers Anthropology:The Exploration of Human Diversity 11th Edition Conrad Phillip Kottak

2. The First Farmers • The Neolithic • The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • Other Old World Farmers • The First American Farmers • Explaining the Neolithic • Costs and Benefits

3. The Neolithic • Changes in human subsistence techniques resulted from combination of human invention (e.g., the Neolithic revolution) and changes in environmental pressures (such as post-glacial warming)

4. The Neolithic • “Neolithic period” originally referred only to the presence of advanced stone toolmaking techniques • Now refers to that period in a given region wherein the first signs of domestication are present with which Neolithic tools are commonly associated

5. The Neolithic • By 7500 B.P., most Middle Easterners moving away from a broad spectrum foraging pattern toward more specialized economies based on fewer species

6. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • High plateau • Hilly flanks • Steppe • Alluvial plain • The Fertile Crescent’s Environmental Zones

7. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • Deliberate cultivation eventually became most intensely practiced on the alluvial plain Did not start there because climate was too dry, requiring irrigation

8. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • In the hilly flanks, habitual harvesting of wild grains did occur Suggested that this abundance led to the first sedentary villages (the Natufians) dependent on harvesting wild grains

9. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • Deliberate cultivation most likely came in response to documented climatic changes (a drying trend, 11,000 B.P., shrinking the zone of abundant wild grain) Led inhabitants on the fringe of the hilly flanks to artificially duplicate the dense stands of wheat and barley that grew in the hilly flanks

10. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • Prior to domestication, favored Hilly Flanks zone had densest human population • Sedentary village life developed before farming and herding in the Middle East

11. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • Vertical economies—patterned adaptation that occurs in areas where several different ecological zones in hilly or mountainous terrain occur close to one another • Many of the places where food production evolved (Middle East, Peru, Mesoamerica) were areas of vertical economy

12. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • The Vertical Economy of the Ancient Middle East

13. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • In wild grains, the axis (the stem connecting the seed to the stalk) is brittle • Allows the grain to reseed itself easily • Humans selected grains in which the axis was tougher, allowing less grain to fall to the ground, thus raising yields • First as an accidental by-product of harvesting • Genetic Changes and Domestication

14. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • Humans selected woolly animals from among wild sheep (who are not normally woolly), thus acquiring livestock better suited to lowland heat and from which to obtain wool • Fossil remains indicate that domestication of sheep and goats was accompanied by a decrease in the size of the animal • Genetic Changes and Domestication • Humans also selected plants which were more easily husked

15. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • A Head of Wheat or Barley

16. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • The early stages of food production in the Middle East marked by gradual transition from foraging to producing economies • Food Production and the State

17. The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East • Population increase • Resulting migration • Also gradual, general population increase spurred spread of food production • Food Production and the State • Changes caused by food production forced other areas to respond (e.g., in the hilly flanks, people had to begin cultivating grains; wild yields were no longer sufficient)

18. Other Old World Farmers • Trade • Diffusion of plants, animals, products, and information • Migration of farmers • Egypt’s Nile Valley • Europe • India • Pakistan • Food production spread out from the Middle East

19. Other Old World Farmers • Considerable complexity exited in southern Egypt’s Neolithic economy and social system • First occupied around 12000 B.P. • The African Neolithic: Nabta Plays By 9000 B.P. people lived at Nabta Playa year-round

20. Other Old World Farmers • Seems to have been center for prehistoric herders • Also was ceremonial center • The African Neolithic: Nabta Playas • Around 7500 B.P. new settlers occupied Nabta after a major drought

21. Other Old World Farmers • Around 8000 B.P., communities on Europe's Mediterranean shores started shifting from foraging to farming • By 6000 B.P., there were thousands of farming villages as far east as Russia and as far west as northern France • The Neolithic in Europe and Asia Domestication and Neolithic economies spread rapidly across Eurasia

22. Other Old World Farmers • The Neolithic in Europe and Asia • China was one of the first world areas to develop farming Northern Chinese also domesticated dogs, pigs, and possibly cattle, goats, and sheep by 7000 B.P.

23. Other Old World Farmers • Recent discoveries by Chinese archaeologists suggest rice was domesticated in Yangtze River corridor of southern China as early as 8400 B.P. • It appears that food production arose independently at least seven times in different world areas • The Neolithic in Europe and Asia

24. Other Old World Farmers • Seven World Areas Where Food Production Was Independently Invented

25. The First American Farmers • America first settled by immigrant H. sapiens from Asia • America’s First Immigrants Followed big game (mammoth) herds across Beringia, perhaps 25,000 years ago

26. The First American Farmers • America’s First Immigrants • Early American Indians, Paleoindians, hunted horses, camels, bison, elephants, mammoths, and giant sloths Clovis Tradition—sophisticated stone technology based on a point that was fastened to the end of a hunting spear

27. The First American Farmers • Big-game-focused foraging was widely successful strategy in North America • Caused independent development of food production in the New World to occur 3,000 to 4,000 years after it occurred in Europe and Africa • Large game animals not domesticated in the New World • Staple crops in the New World were maize, potatoes, and manioc • The Foundations of Food Production

28. The First American Farmers • Inhabitants first practiced broad spectrum foraging • Early Farming in the Mexican Highlands Foragers practiced a seasonal economy, making societal and geographical adjustments as they moved

29. The First American Farmers • Valley of Oaxaca became the original center of maize domestication • The apparent ancestor of maize was a wild grass, teocentli • Experienced combination of incidental and intentional selective pressures due to gathering and cultivation • Several millennia passed after the origin of cultivation before the first states arose • Early Farming in the Mexican Highlands

30. The First American Farmers • Food production led to the early village farming community • Humid lowlands supported maize farming • From Early Farming to the State Around 3500 B.P., sedentary life developed separately in Mexico at Gulf Coast and the Pacific

31. The First American Farmers • Conditions uniquely (for the mountains) favorable to cultivation • Constant water sources (for pot irrigation) • Later frost • From Early Farming to the State • Early village farming communities also developed in a few highland valleys such as Oaxaca

32. The First American Farmers • From Early Farming to the State • Maize reached the lowlands by 3500 B.P. where, in combination with the easy water, longer growing season, and rich adjacent microenvironments, maize cultivation quickly gave rise to sedentary village farming communities

33. The First American Farmers • The Ancestors of Native Americans Came to North America as Migrants from Asia

34. Explaining the Neolithic • Development of full-fledged Neolithic economy required settling down • Sedentism especially attractive when several species of plants and animals available locally • Several factors converged to make domestication happen and promote its spread Fertile Crescent had the largest Mediterranean climate with the highest species diversity

35. Explaining the Neolithic • Some world areas managed independently to invent domestication, but inventory too meager to maintain Neolithic economy • Full-fledged Neolithic economy requires minimal set of nutritious domesticates

36. Explaining the Neolithic • Perhaps key factor in domestication is animal social structure • Easiest wild animals to domesticate live in hierarchical herds • Presence or absence of domesticable animals helps explain the divergent trajectories

37. Explaining the Neolithic • Geography of Old World facilitated diffusion of plants, animals, technology, and information • In Eurasia, plants and animals could spread more easily east-west than north south • Common day lengths • Similar seasonal variations • Geography and the Spread of Food Productions

38. Explaining the Neolithic • Geography and the Spread of Food Productions • Spread of Middle Eastern crops southward into Africa eventually halted by climatic contrasts

39. Explaining the Neolithic • Geography and the Spread of Food Productions • In what is now the U.S., east-west spread of farming from southeast to southwest slowed by dry climates and Texas and southern great plains Lack of large animals suitable to domestication also slowed down Neolithic transition in the Americas

40. Costs and Benefits • Learned to spin and weave • Made pottery, bricks, and arched masonry • Learned to smelt and cast metals • Develop trade and commerce by land and sea • Food production brought the advantages of discovery and invention

41. Costs and Benefits • By 5500 B.P. Middle Easterners living in vibrant cities with markets, streets, temples, and palaces

42. Costs and Benefits • Food producers typically work harder than foragers • Herds, fields, and irrigation systems need care • New economy also brought hardship Producers have more children than foragers, increasing child care demands

43. Costs and Benefits • Diets less varied • Disease easier to spread • Social inequality and poverty increased • Rate at which human beings degraded environments increased with food production • New economy also brought hardship • Public health declines