h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: The Neolithic Revolution - How Farming Changed the World - A1943813
Author: Woodpigeon - U30129

OK - here's my latest. It's a *big* subject - how the move to farming ten thousand years ago spawned human civilisation.

Comments and critiques will be gratefully accepted.

Woodpigeon

Hi Woodpigeon,

Oh no, it's the again (*LOL*), but I did say I'd look out for your entry .

This was fabulous stuff! What a wealth of information you've included. You've put an awful lot of work into this, and, boy, does it show! It really makes you wonder how human life would have turned out if the Neolithic Revolution had never taken place, and, of course, it's effects on the environment. We tend to take our environment for granted these days, and do not seem to realise just how it's been shaped by revolutions such as the Neolithic.



Your entry really gets people thinking, methinks.

Prideth

Hi Woodpigeon

What a great entry . I really like your line of thought from sedentary life to government, wars, legal systems and so on. You bring the significance of the Neolithic Revolution right home to the modern day.

I'm interested when you say that the end of the Ice Age resulted in a greater abundance of food, and therefore humans no longer need to be migratory. Isn't that also because they're the top of the food chain already and their herbivore prey stops migrating so much - because vegetation is richer and growing all year round? I know that's picky

One other comment: there's a tautological moment with .

Fantastic work


F/b

Cracking entry

I can't fault the well-structured arguments and clear prose. Did you have any particular sources that expand on the succinct points being made?

Pimms

Thanks all for your comments!

Frenchbean, I have removed the excess surplus comment, and slightly changed the sentence.

To your point on sources, Pimms - the major reference was Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel", and I am also currently reading "After the Ice" by Steven Mithen at the moment. Both give very informative accounts of this exciting time in pre-history.

Thanks again,

Woodpigeon

I have made a small update by adding in a few links where I could find them on H2G2.

Woodpigeon

Hi woodpigoen. Firstly this is a brilliant entry I love it! I am very interested in the topic and have read a lot, but unfortunatly it's all be popular history books from my local libarary on my morning commute, when my brain isn't up to anything of university standard - so I don't think it counts as a knowledge as detailed as this.

I just wonder if it would be possible to work some of the longer footnotes into the text? They make interesting points, and don't seem to be asides to me, footnote 5 in particular.


Good work

OK - I have removed footnote 5 and stuck it into the main text - as you say, it is a very interesting piece of information, and sort of implies that this transition was a natural transition for hunter-gatherers eventually.

I have also added a reference to the Natufian culture, who are the first known sedentary (pre-farming) folk. I'll take a look later to see if I can incorporate any more footnotes into the main text.

Thanks again,

Woodpigeon

Great entry, Woodpigeon

I was thinking of early hunter gatherer societies only a few days ago and wondering when they started to cultivate root crops as well. Hunter gatherer societies have traditionally dug up roots. Did this cultivation take place at the same time as the grasses - wheat, oats, barley, etc, or did it come later?

I agree that this is a great entry. However, I have one teensy problem with the way it presents agriculture as a totally beneficial development:

As hunter gatherers, there were far fewer of us. but we ate extremely well in comparison to the early farmers. When we *did* start farming we were able to support a much larger population density, but our nutrition suffered. We got a lot smaller as a race. It's only now that we are beginning to fulfil our genetic potential, which is why human beings are getting taller with each successive generation. If you don't believe me, look at the Japanese. Six-footers aren't uncommon now, but a generation ago they were regarded as giants.

Here's a link which bears out my assertions:
http://www.beyondveg.com/nicholson-w/angel-1984/angel-1984-1a.shtml

Hi Zarquon,

Interestingly, root crops were not cultivated at all in the Middle East, because it isn't really root crop country. Carrots and turnips appear to be mid-Asian (Afghanistan) in origin, yams come from New Guinea, and potatos are from America. So it appears that they came some time later, or were cultivated *completely independently* as would be the case in New Guinea and America.

Hope that helps!

Woodpigeon

Thanks for that info, Woodpigeon . I did wonder.

FM, really interesting information.

Hi FM,

Sorry - I didn't see your contribution, and you raise a very good point which I agree with entirely. The aim of my entry was not so much to compare agricultural life to hunter-gathering in terms of its superiority, but instead to say "hey, the Neolithic Revolution caused all of this stuff to happen afterwards". I am quite neutral on the "benefits" (not the right word, but whatever), of the revolution itself. I am more interested in the effects.

I have added in a comment in paragraph 4 as follows "In fact, it can be argued that in the beginning, it was in many ways an inferior lifestyle to hunter-gathering, since settled people are easier targets for attack, their nutrition undoubtedly suffered due to lack of a balanced diet and they were more likely to suffer diseases".

Thanks again

Woodpigeon

This is looking really good.


F/b

Hi Woodpigeon!

Have you any evidence for your claim that in hunter-gatherer societies the men did the hunting and the women managed the nuts and berries?

Some typos:

or to attack others to in order to --> or to attack others in order to
every day lives --> everyday lives

Hi Gnomon,


Typos corrected.

I have changed it to say that groups of people hunted while others gathered. I originally had something like this in, but I changed it to a man / woman thing after one or two of the books I have pointed out that women and men would have had very different roles in most hunter gatherer groups, and that for most of their adult lives, the women would be pregnant or rearing children. Anyway - this still sounds terribly simplistic to me, and could easily be overruled as a hard fact. The evidence either way would not be very strong since its a long time ago.

If you want I can find out later where I got the reference on the separation of the sexes.

Woodpigeon

Yet you say that the hunter gatherers produced less children than the farming women. In modern farming communities in the third world, it is mainly the women who do the hard farm work. And they manage to raise the children as well. So with less children around, it is conceivable that the women could have shared the hunting equally with the men.

Are there any hunter-gatherer communities left? Could they be used as an indication of what went on 14,000 years ago?

The issue is one of mobility - women can do farm work with small children nearby because cattle, pigs, etc are relatively benign, enclosed, and not apt to be frightened away to the same extent by the presence of humans. Remember in a hunt, the human justs want to do one thing to the animal being hunted at the time - to kill it. One false move and you lose your prey. You could not expect to go on a hunt with small children and to be successful.

I don't at all rule out women joining the hunt. The small children could of course be cared for by older members of the tribe or other women or even men, after they are weaned, young girls might also be brought on hunts, as well as women who could not for what ever reason have children. Based on the complexity we see in any society, all of these things might have happened. There would however be times where it would have been very difficult for women to go hunting - late pregnancy and infant nursing for instance.

There are still hunter-gatherers in Africa among the Bush People, tribes in the Amazon, Papua New Guinea, and the Arctic. I'll try to find out as much as I can about the division of labour here.

Woodpigeon