Proto-Agriculture - Earliest Vegetable Tending & Processing

[richard01]

'Owning', tending, and processing plant stocks of many kinds must have preceded fully-grown agriculture for quite some time.

I would thank members of the group who could give or point me to any examples of the earliest archaeological evidence of such practices (with dates) such as:

- Grindstones - Found in Upper Palaeolithic sites
(Nutritional ecology and the human demography of Neandertal extinction - Hockett, Haws - downloaded pdf - I don't know now where I got it from).

         There's obvious evidence of grindstones used for ochre, etc - but for food?

         Mithen (Prehistory of the Mind) has an illustration of a full-blown mortar & pestle from Wadi Kubbaniyeh 18000ya - any other examples?

- Which came first - beer or bread?

- What about plant-related wear on stone tools? When did the earliest scythe-shaped stone tools appear? (Or the earliest plant-worn microblades ?)

- Digging sticks - evidence has been found as far back as South African Australopithecus contexts - for termites or tubers ?

- Modern hunter/gatherer practices - Baka pygmies tend (but don't plant*) forest yams (Dunias), Penan tend (bdp*) sago palms (Barkin), but these are the only examples I have found on the net. Any other examples?

- Grass burning - by Australian aborigines - still used in Madagascar - for renewing pasture land etc, but may have been the origin of cooked foods (tubers, etc)

- Horticulture - Very early, Papua/New Guineans found taro grew better on raised banks above swamps - is there any similar evidence in Europe or the Middle East?

Answers to these questions might suggest how those '500 Hs Out of Africa' begot the billions of us who infest the world today.

regards

Richard

[AWSX]

You might check Dr. Edmond de Langhe's website for INIBAP. At one time he posted a short paper with some speculation that cultivation and diffusion of bananas could be traced back possibly 30,000 years. If you cannot find the paper, I have a copy saved.

[Robert Henvell]

 Leads  for your research.

G Irwin [1994] found stones on the Soloman Islands [ca 26000 bce,cal],which he contends were used to grind wild cereal grains.
[P Kirch,1997,"The Lapita Peoples"].

Occupation of Ohalo II,9km south of Tiberus in the Sea of Galilee may date as early as 24750 bce [cal].Semi sedentary people harvested wild cereal grains [date?] and carbonized seeds were retrieved from pits,[D Nadel,1994].There were discussions on Ohalo II on this form.

The Natufians appear to have nurtured  feral, edible plant food during the 13th millennium bce [cal,G hastorf,1998 and G Bor Yosef,1998].Barley was cultivated at Netiv Hogolud,Isreal ca 8000bce [call,M Kislev,nd].

 Abu Hureya on the Euphrates River was settled ca 11500 bce [cal].As the cold Younger Dryas began to impact on the populace,they nurtured crops.G Hillman [nd] identified a few "partially domesticated" rye grains at this site.It was abandoned ,when the cold became more intense and their endeavours to cultivate rye terminated.{this senario may not have been unique?}.

A Pei [1988] contends that the rice in China could have evolved
from the wild "Oryzarafipogen" species.Abundant  feral rice  phytoliths [ca 12000 bce,cal] were identified in the Diaotaonghuan Cave in the Dayuan Basin  south of the Yangtze River [R McNeich,nd].At  the Yuchanyan Ruin in Doa County,Hunan province 6 grains of cultivated rice were found
imbedded in a layer benaeth ceramic shards at a depth of 1m.
Y Jiarong [2005] estimated the age of the grains at ca 10000
bce [cal].

S Oppenheimer ["Eden of the East,1998].reported that yams were cultivated in Indonesia during the 10th millennium bce,
[his source ?].

M  Pierno [2003] contends that hunter-gatherers cultivated
{nurtured ?} anomalously large squash plants in Ecuador, 9600-8550 bce [cal].Guila Naquitz is a small cave in central Mexico,which was intermittently occupied  from ca 8500-6000 bce [cal] by small groups of 4-5 people.They began to selectively plant seeds,that over a millenium gradually became domesticated,Y Matsuoka [2002] suggests that  maize,beans and squash might have been domesticated by 7000 bce [cal].
R McNeich claims that small amounts of chili and squash were grown in the Tehun Valley ca 7200 bce.

Early in the 7th millennium bce [cal] the natives of New Guinea
were draining wetlands to plant crops [S Oppenheimer,ibid].

I Wilson wrote that goats were "herded" near Petra,Jordan,in the 11th millennium bce [cal--his source ?].M Zedar suggests that goat herding was introduced to the Jordan Valley ca 8000 bce [cal].This is based on analysis of the Beida society [80% of fauna bones were goat].F Dupree [1972] estimated that sheep and goats were domesticated at the Aq Kupryk cave on Afganistans  Ballak River ca 8th millennium, bce [cal].

A Closs [2002]  contends that nomads in Chad could have captured feral,native cattle to provide milk,meat and hides as early as the 8th millennium bce [cal].{sounds atad early,it might be a good idea to check with Mikey}.F Marshall [2002]
postulated that animal husbandry at some African locales might predate horticulture by thousands of years.

[Daryl Habel]

'Owning', tending, and processing plant stocks of many kinds must have preceded fully-grown agriculture for quite some time. I would thank members of the group who could give or point me to any examples of the earliest archaeological evidence of such practices (with dates) such as:

- Grindstones - Found in Upper Palaeolithic sites
(Nutritional ecology and the human demography of Neandertal extinction - Hockett, Haws - downloaded pdf - I don't know now where I got it from).

I don't either, but it'd be easy to find.  In any case, if you haven't come across Sarah Mason's work, you might want to check in at: CLICK HERE

There's obvious evidence of grindstones used for ochre, etc - but for food?

Dolni Vestonice is about 25-29 rcyrs old, and according to Mason (and others), edible plant fibres were 'processed'.  Anyways, I can help with some of the questions, but I'll pass to betters on others.

Mithen (Prehistory of the Mind) has an illustration of a full-blown mortar & pestle from Wadi Kubbaniyeh 18000ya - any other examples?

- Which came first - beer or bread?

I vote for beer.  It ferments and you don't need an oven.  But you don't really need an oven to make 'fry-bread', you just need a fire.  So maybe bread first.  In any case, the Ohalo II site we discussed  HERE, and which Bob dates 24750 bce (cal), has its dating based on radiocarbon 14C dates of around 18 ka, to which add 2 ka to calibrate the 14C dates to calendar years (BP), to which add 2 ka more to compensate for the bce to BP conversion and it looks like Ohalo II and Wadi Kubbaniyeh are about the same age, the immediate predecessors of the Natufian culture in the Levant but the Wadi Kubaniyeh culture is called something else, Mikey shot me on that one.  They could have made beer or bread either place.  Maybe fry bread and wash it down with a beer.

- What about plant-related wear on stone tools? When did the earliest scythe-shaped stone tools appear? (Or the earliest plant-worn microblades ?)

Ohalo II and Wadi Kubanniyeh are early examples of later cultures (Natufian in the Levant for plant-worn microblades) and shythe-shaped tools (although  near Holocene for the latter), all this IIRC, I'll check.

I pass (big snip)

Answers to these questions might suggest how those '500 Hs Out of Africa' begot the billions of us who infest the world today.

regards
Richard

Gee, I hope so!!!

Regards,
Dar

[richard01]

Many thanks to all for some very useful leads - I will read mark and inwardly digest before I make any comments.

I am a rank amateur studying current seashore food in the Philippines, recording things at

www.coconutstudio.com

as I go along.

It's an area where very little archaology has ever been done, but I'm convinced that a number of very important tropical food crops (coconuts, bananas, plantains, taro for example) originated there or nearby, and very early indeed, if only because they are so very easy to tend and harvest.

But it will porobably only remain a conviction, because it is so very difficult to date and prove.

regards

Richard