Yabbaa Dabbaa Dooooo!
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Thanks Blam. |
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· Mirabilis · Texas AM Anthropology News · Yahoo Anthro & Archaeo · · History or Science & Nature Podcasts · Excerpt, or Link only? · cgk's list of ping lists · |
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Very interesting. I would like to see a more detailed and thoroughgoing analysis of his findings.
Makes sense. If you build fish traps then you have a stable food source with low energy expenditure.
This meshes with another idea that the first farmed crops were fruit and nut trees. Another stable food resource that also would not require a much energy expenditure.
Women with small children who had no man to hunt for them or men who were injured and could no longer take part in hunts were probably the first to realize this. Minnows might not be as tasty as fresh zebra meat but it beats dying of hunger by a wide margin.
This could actually reinforce the Aquatic ape theory of man's ascent. Humans have certain traits that no other primate do: Hair on the head that never stops growing, large pendulous breasts on females, no fur on skin, tear ducts, downward pointed nostrils shielded by a fleshy nose, innate ability to hold breath submerged--even in infants, subcanteaceous fat layer under the skin, and many more traits point to an aquatic past somewhere along the line for us. We're a strange kind of primate for sure.
Of course when hunters/gatherers found a steady food supply they stayed in one place, and even manipulated their environment. Doh.
No manner of flints and ancient wood (measured how???) or supposed maritime migrations can add up to the “quantum leap” that the Neolithic revolution represents: the change from managing food supply to controlling and creating it.
I don't see the 'contest'. Necessities for survival, in order: Water, food, shelter... And where you find water, you generally find food and rudimentary shelter. And a primo location is going to attract a crowd.
Our local Karuk and Yurok had seasons of lamprey, spring chinook, fall chinook and deer come to them. They didn’t have to move. They developed family “owned” fishing spots for dip net, rather than garden plots - although they did gather acorns and basket making materials. If the aquatic resources were plentifull year round in an area, it would seem to make sense that the tribe would be sedentary to secure their use.
For one thing, it pushes language back from the current thinking of 50,000 to 85,000 years ago. Really starts one to thinking.
...the team analysed over 50,000 pieces of wood and nearly 36,000 flints from two hearths associated with a Homo erectus settlement dating back 790,000 years. More contentiously, Robert Bednarik is convinced that Upright Man ushered in the dawn of trans-ocean travel between 900,000 and 800,000 years ago as part of a wider revolution...