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A prehistoric cosmic airburst preceded the advent of agriculture in the Levant
PhysOrg ^

Posted on 10/06/2023 4:16:13 AM PDT by FarCenter

Agriculture in Syria started with a bang 12,800 years ago as a fragmented comet slammed into the Earth's atmosphere. The explosion and subsequent environmental changes forced hunter-gatherers in the prehistoric settlement of Abu Hureyra to adopt agricultural practices to boost their chances for survival.

That's the assertion made by an international group of scientists in one of four related research papers, all appearing in the journal Science Open: Airbursts and Cratering Impacts. The papers are the latest results in the investigation of the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis, the idea that an anomalous cooling of the Earth almost 13 millennia ago was the result of a cosmic impact.

"In this general region, there was a change from more humid conditions that were forested and with diverse sources of food for hunter-gatherers, to drier, cooler conditions when they could no longer subsist only as hunter-gatherers," said Earth scientist James Kennett, a professor emeritus of UC Santa Barbara . The settlement at Abu Hureyra is famous among archaeologists for its evidence of the earliest known transition from foraging to farming. "The villagers started to cultivate barley, wheat and legumes," he noted. "This is what the evidence clearly shows."

These days, Abu Hureyra and its rich archaeological record lie under Lake Assad, a reservoir created by construction of the Taqba Dam on the Euphrates River in the 1970s. But before this flood, archaeologists managed to extract loads of material to study. "The village occupants," the researchers state in the paper, "left an abundant and continuous record of seeds, legumes and other foods."

By studying these layers of remains, the scientists were able to discern the types of plants that were being collected in the warmer, humid days before the climate changed and in the cooler, drier days after the onset of what we know now as the Younger Dryas cool period.

Before the impact, the researchers found, the inhabitants' prehistoric diet involved wild legumes and wild-type grains, and "small but significant amounts of wild fruits and berries." In the layers corresponding to the time after cooling, fruits and berries disappeared and their diet shifted toward more domestic-type grains and lentils, as the people experimented with early cultivation methods.

By about 1,000 years later, all of the Neolithic "founder crops"—emmer wheat, einkorn wheat, hulled barley, rye, peas, lentils, bitter vetch, chickpeas and flax—were being cultivated in what is now called the Fertile Crescent. Drought-resistant plants, both edible and inedible, become more prominent in the record as well, reflecting a drier climate that followed the sudden impact winter at the onset of the Younger Dryas.

The evidence also indicates a significant drop in the area's population, and changes in the settlement's architecture to reflect a more agrarian lifestyle, including the initial penning of livestock and other markers of animal domestication.


TOPICS: Astronomy; Food; Gardening; Science
KEYWORDS: abuhureyra; agriculture; animalhusbandry; asteroid; asteroids; astronomy; bittervetch; catastrophism; chickpeas; clovisimpact; comet; comets; dietandcuisine; einkornwheat; emmerwheat; euphrates; fertilecrescent; flax; godsgravesglyphs; hulledbarley; huntergatherers; impact; jameskennett; lakeassad; lentils; meteor; meteorite; meteorites; meteors; neolithic; peas; rye; science; tallelhammam; taqbadam; youngerdryas
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1 posted on 10/06/2023 4:16:13 AM PDT by FarCenter
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To: FarCenter

Plant trees


2 posted on 10/06/2023 4:27:14 AM PDT by linMcHlp
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To: linMcHlp

Terraform the desert.

It may take hundreds of years but it can be done.


3 posted on 10/06/2023 5:25:19 AM PDT by Pontiac (The welfare state must fail because it is contrary to human nature and diminishes the human spirit.)
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To: FarCenter

I suddenly acquire n w skills after a life changing event as well.

/s

smh


4 posted on 10/06/2023 5:33:40 AM PDT by logi_cal869 (-cynicus the "concern troll" a/o 10/03/2018 /!i!! &@$%&*(@ -)
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To: FarCenter

More likely they were already doing agriculture in combination with hunting/gathering, and just shifted more towards agriculture and domestic animals.


5 posted on 10/06/2023 5:37:22 AM PDT by SauronOfMordor (Either you will rule. Or you will be ruled. There is no other choice.)
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To: FarCenter

Climate Change for 20,000 years and we are still here.


6 posted on 10/06/2023 5:51:43 AM PDT by Delta 21 (If anyone is treasonous, it is those who call me such.)
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To: FarCenter

Not every climate change is bad!


7 posted on 10/06/2023 6:22:27 AM PDT by AZJeep
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To: FarCenter

They ate berries but they couldn’t figure out how to grow berries. Then all of a sudden they figured out how to grow beans. All the berries burnt up? But not the bean plants? Oh a selective comet that doesn’t like berries but loves beans. This is pure bullsht. These are city slicker researchers. Then never set foot on a farm.
How much money was wasted on this pile of donkey manure. These idiots don’t even have common sense... My cat is 1000 times smarter than these morons.


8 posted on 10/06/2023 7:24:35 AM PDT by bunkerhill7 (Don't shoot until you see the whites of their lies)
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To: bunkerhill7

My berry patches survive thru 40 below freezing every year.


9 posted on 10/06/2023 7:26:23 AM PDT by bunkerhill7 (Don't shoot until you see the whites of their lies)
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To: FarCenter

“Area population dropped” I thought that the more agrarian production increased, more food supply available thus an increase in population. .These guys have it backwards. That’s the basis for Egypt, lotsa silt, Lots a crops Lots a food supply, Lots a people..These researchers apparently never do any research...


10 posted on 10/06/2023 7:39:55 AM PDT by bunkerhill7 (Don't shoot until you see the whites of their lies)
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To: linMcHlp; Pontiac
This Indian man planted a tree every day for 35 years. The result is unbelievable
11 posted on 10/06/2023 7:40:31 AM PDT by yesthatjallen
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To: FarCenter

WTF?!?!?!

12,800 years ago marked the end of the last Ice Age and a remarkable, sustained warming trend; significantly warmer than it is today. I wonder if the author of this report has considered that not having to worry about freezing to death every night had a liberating effect on the pursuit of organized agriculture as a means of survival?


12 posted on 10/06/2023 8:28:52 AM PDT by T. Rustin Noone (Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum)
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To: T. Rustin Noone
The Bølling-Allerod warm period was followed by the Younger Dryas cold period.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas

13 posted on 10/06/2023 9:37:25 AM PDT by FarCenter (https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/aircraft-glitch-delays-canada-pm-trudeaus-departure-india-202)
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To: 75thOVI; Abathar; agrace; aimhigh; Alice in Wonderland; AnalogReigns; AndrewC; aragorn; ...



14 posted on 10/06/2023 10:53:42 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (Putin should skip ahead to where he kills himself in the bunker.)
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To: StayAt HomeMother; Ernest_at_the_Beach; 1ofmanyfree; 21twelve; 24Karet; 2ndDivisionVet; 31R1O; ...

15 posted on 10/06/2023 10:54:23 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (Putin should skip ahead to where he kills himself in the bunker.)
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To: FarCenter; SunkenCiv
"The villagers started to cultivate barley, wheat and legumes"
Oh, sure... they just "started" to farm. I read a study that concluded it takes 200-300 years for a wheat field to be transformed from wild to domesticated plants. If so, it means two things:

1) the people were already sedentary or semi-sedentary;
2) there were the correct weather-conditions for the crops to grow.

In other words, domestication didn't follow abandonment of hunting and gathering (caused by climate- or extraterrestrial-related conditions or not), it followed adoption of sedentism.
16 posted on 10/06/2023 12:10:25 PM PDT by nicollo ("This is FR!")
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To: FarCenter

Hi.

Probably when Sodom and Gomorrah were wiped out.

Big asteroid hitting the Alps. North to South.

I’m guessing a very big BOOM!

That’s my story and I’m stik’n to it.

5.56mm


17 posted on 10/06/2023 2:01:23 PM PDT by M Kehoe (Quid Pro Joe and the Ho have got to go)
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To: yesthatjallen

A great achievement

I wish the article was had a few more details

Such as how he selects the the trees to be planted, where to plant, how far apart, where did he get his first saplings to plant?

He apparently has be successful in building an ecosystem.


18 posted on 10/06/2023 7:50:49 PM PDT by Pontiac (The welfare state must fail because it is contrary to human nature and diminishes the human spirit.)
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To: M Kehoe; SunkenCiv; bunkerhill7; blam

The best study on this asteroid(s) phenom was written by a group, Firestone, et al. Sunken Civ should post the cover of this book as he has done at other times.

This book primarily covers what happened in North America and Canada, although there are also signs of the crisis in northern Europe, Siberia, etc. Perhaps there was more than one event as a same swarm of asteroids was passed through several times. My guess is Sodom and Gomorrah were wiped out around the time a mile wide crater was created in the Iraq marshes around 4,000 years ago. A number of middle east kingdoms experience crisis around that time some growing, others disappearing. I think Abraham showed up on the scene soon after that crater event.


19 posted on 10/06/2023 8:14:56 PM PDT by gleeaikin ( Question authority!)
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To: gleeaikin

Up n here there’s a string of craters in the mountains
maybe few hundreds yards wide , goes on for miles. My sis has one about 30 ft wide next to her farm..others to the West apparently hit the lake and lakeshore, creating perfectly round bays about the same diameter..my geologist cousin
Climbed there to inspect same , said they were remnants of a recent bolide or comet breakup ..because hardly any erosion... these impact craters are in solid granite ...Indian legend sAys giant turtle came down from the sky with a woman on it


20 posted on 10/06/2023 9:31:57 PM PDT by bunkerhill7 (Don't shoot until you see the whites of their lies)
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