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The Neolithic Revolution was the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture, as first adopted by various independent prehistoric human societies. The term refers to both the general time period over which these initial developments took place and the subsequent changes to Neolithic human societies which either resulted from, or are associated with, the adoption of early farming techniques and crop cultivation.

In the refinement of archaeological and historical dating systems, as a time period the Neolithic Revolution broadly defines the transition from the late Upper Palaeolithic to the succeeding Neolithic ages; this demarcation is particularly applied to cultures in the Old World, and less frequently to others.

The societal changes most often associated with the Neolithic Revolution include an increased tendency to live in permanent or semi-permanent settlements, a corresponding reduction in nomadic lifestyles, the concept of land ownership, modifications to the natural environment, the ability to sustain higher population densities, an increased reliance on vegetable and cereal foods in the total diet, alterations to social hierarchies, nascent "trading economies" using surplus production from increasing crop yields, and the development of new technologies. The relationship of these characteristics to the onset of agriculture, to each other, their sequence and even whether some of these changes are supported by the available evidence remains the subject of much academic debate.

Agricultural transition

The term Neolithic Revolution was first coined in the 1920s by Vere Gordon Childe to describe the first in a series of agricultural revolutions to have punctuated human history. This period is described as a "revolution" not so much in the sense that its uptake or spread was rapid, but rather to denote the great significance and degree of change brought about to the communities in which these practices were gradually adopted and refined.

This involved a gradual transition from a hunter-gatherer mode of subsistence which was practiced by all early human societies, to one based more upon the deliberate nurturing and cultivation of crops for the purpose of food production. Evidence for the first beginnings of this process obtained from several regions is dated from approximately 10th millennium BC to the 8th millennium BC. This transition also saw a change from a largely nomadic lifestyle to a more settled, agrarian-based one, with the onset of the domestication of plants and (later) animals. The chronology, social foundations, plant genetics, plant morphology and selective mechanisms of humans, and the processes of the spread of agriculture have been documented by archaeologists in many parts of the world where agriculture first arose (e.g. the Fertile Crescent, Mesoamerica, South Asia, India, Southeast Asia).

Incentive to settle

Around 12,500 years ago as the world's climates were changing, hunter-gatherers were forced to turn to alternative methods of obtaining food. Climatic changes over time forced some people to work much harder and travel longer distances in search of food. Over thousands of years, hunter-gatherers unconsciously adjusted to their surroundings. Hunter-gatherers began to stay near reliable sources of water and bring wild seeds back to their base camp to plant nearby. The Australian archaeologist Vere Gordon Childe maintained that the key factor in this change was that global climates at the end of the last ice age became warmer and drier, making plants more efficient at producing crops but encouraging settlement near water sources. Paleoclimatology and the study of sub-fossil pollen demonstrated that climates had actually turned wetter, requiring that the forces governing Childe's "Neolithic Revolution" be revised. In either case, gradual climatic changes are generally viewed as providing an incentive to settle.

Agriculture the Answer to a Food Crisis?

An alternative explanation for the origin of agriculture is propounded by Mark Nathan Cohen. Cohen believes that following the widespread extinctions of large mammals in the late Palaeolithic, the human population had expanded to the limits of the available territory and a population explosion led to a food crisis. Agriculture was the only way in which it was possible to support the increasing population on the available area of land. First seen in Southwest Asia.

Emergence of civilization

Without agriculture, the emergence of many of the traits popularly referred to as "civilization" would not have been possible (e.g. cities, advanced technology, social hierarchies, organized warfare, etc.). The documentation and interpretation of the natural and social changes associated with the origins of agriculture is one of the great success stories of archaeology (particularly environmental archaeology).

Domestication of plants

Once agriculture started gaining momentum, humans were unknowingly altering the genetic make-up of certain cereal grasses (beginning with emmer, einkorn and barley), and not simply those that would favour greater caloric returns through larger seeds. Plants that possessed traits such as small seeds, or bitter taste would have been seen as undesirable. Plants that rapidly shed their seeds on maturity tended not to be gathered at harvest, thus not stored and not seeded the following season; years of harvesting selected for strains that retained their edible seeds longer. Several plant species, the "pioneer crops" or Neolithic founder crops, were the earliest plants successfully manipulated by humans. Some of these pioneering attempts failed at first and crops were abandoned, sometimes to be taken up again and successfully domesticated thousands of years later: rye, tried and abandoned in Neolithic Anatolia, made its way to Europe as weed seeds and was successfully domesticated in Europe, thousands of years after the earliest agriculture Wild lentils present a different challenge that needed to be overcome: most of the wild seeds do not germinate in the first year; the first evidence of lentil domestication, breaking dormancy in their first year, was found in the early Neolthic at Jerf el-Ahmar, (in modern Syria), and quickly spread south to the Netiv Hagdud site in the Jordan Valley [http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?apage=1&cid=1150355513473&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull. This process of domestication allowed the founder crops to adapt and eventually become larger, more easily harvested, more dependable in storage and more useful to the human population.

Barley and, most likely, oats, were cultivated in the Jordan Valley, represented by the early Neolithic site of Gilgal, where in 2006 archaeologists found caches of seeds of each in quantities too large to be accounted for even by intensive gathering, at strata dateable c. 11000 years ago. Some of the plants tried and then abandoned during the Neolithic period in the Ancient Near East, at sites like Gilgal, were later successfully domesticated in other parts of the world.

Once early farmers perfected their agricultural techniques, their crops would yield surpluses which needed storage. Hunter gatherers could not easily store anything as they were on the move constantly, whereas those with a sedentary dwelling could store their surplus grain. Eventually granaries were developed that allowed villages to store their seeds for longer periods of time. So with more food, the population expanded and communities developed specialized workers and more advanced tools.

The process was not as linear as once was thought, but a more complicated effort, which was undertaken by different human populations in different regions.

Agriculture in Asia

The Neolithic Revolution is believed to have become widespread in southwest Asia around 8000 BC–7000 BC, though earlier individual sites have been identified. Although archaeological evidence provides scant evidence as to which of the genders performed what task in Neolithic cultures, by comparison with historical and contemporary hunter-gatherer communities it is generally supposed that hunting was typically performed by the men, whereas women had a more significant role in the gathering. By extension, it may be theorised that women were largely responsible for the observations and initial activities which began the Neolithic Revolution, insofar as the gradual selection and refinement of edible plant species was concerned.

The precise nature of these initial observations and (later) purposeful activities which would give rise to the changes in subsistence methods brought about by the Neolithic Revolution are not known; specific evidence is lacking. However, several reasonable speculations have been put forward; for example, it might be expected that the common practice of discarding food refuse in middens would result in the regrowth of plants from the discarded seeds in the (fertilizer-enriched) soils. In all likelihood, there were a number of factors which contributed to the early onset of agriculture in Neolithic human societies.

Agriculture in the Fertile Crescent

Agriculture first arose in the Fertile Crescent because of many factors. The Mediterranean climate has a long, dry season with a short period of rain, which made it suitable for small plants with large seeds, like wheat and barley. These were the most suitable for domestication because of the ease of harvest and storage and the wide availability. In addition, the domesticated plants had especially high protein content. The Fertile Crescent had a large area of varied geographical settings and altitudes. The variety given made agriculture more profitable for former hunter-gatherers. Other areas with a similar climate were less suitable for agriculture because of the lack of geographic variation within the region and the lack of availability of plants for domestication.

Agriculture in Africa

The Revolution developed independently in different parts of the world, not just in the Fertile Crescent. On the African continent, three areas have been identified as independently developing agriculture: the Ethiopian highlands, the Nile River Valley and West Africa.

Domestication of animals

When hunter-gathering began to be replaced by sedentary food production it became more profitable to keep animals close at hand. Therefore, it became necessary to bring animals permanently to their settlements. The animals' size, temperament, diet, mating patterns, and life span were factors in the desire and success in domesticating animals. Animals that provided milk, such as cows and goats, offered a source of protein that was renewable and therefore quite valuable. The animal’s ability as a worker (for example ploughing or towing), as well as a food source, also had to be taken into account. Besides being a direct source of food, certain animals could provide leather, wool, hides, and fertilizer. Some of the earliest domesticated animals included sheep, goats, cows, and pigs. Out of the thousands of species of animals only fourteen eventually became domesticated for agricultural purposes.

Domestication of animals in the Middle East

The Middle East served as the source for many domesticatable animals, such as goats and pigs. This area was also the first region to domesticate the Dromedary Camel. The presence of these animals gave the region a large advantage in cultural and economic development. As the climate in the Middle East changed, and became drier, many of the farmers were forced to leave, taking their domesticated animals with them. It was this massive emigration from the Middle East that would later help distribute these animals to the rest of Afroeurasia.

Domestication of animals in China's Yellow River valley

The agricultural revolution was inspired, in part, by the spreading of domesticated plants and animals and the growth of complex societies. The origin of plant and animal domestication was in China’s Yellow River Valley, and the fertile crescent, before it spread in Eurasia. Since Eurasia was connected by land, and there were open trade routes in that region, it was easy for agricultural methods to be adopted by neighbouring communities. The same latitudes of the Eurasian continent meant that plants would grow well in similar climates. This way, they had a productive yield. Either the neighbouring hunter gathers adopted these new methods or they were displaced. The change to the agrarian way of life lead to more developed technology, organized society, and increased populations which requires sedentary lifestyles to spread, therefore the indigenous hunter-gatherers either adapted to this new way of life or else they gradually died off.

Social change

Agriculture gave humans more control over their food supply, but required settled occupation of territory and encouraged larger social groups. These sedentary groups were able to reproduce at a faster rate due to the added convenience of raising children in such societies. The children accounted for a denser population, and introduced specialization by providing diverse forms of labour. The development of larger societies called for a means of governmental organization. Food surpluses made this possible by feeding chieftains as they focused on work, rather than producing sustenance. In addition, domesticated animals provided means of transportation and clothing.

Disease

Throughout the development of sedentary societies, disease spread more rapidly than it had during time in which hunter-gatherer societies existed. Inadequate sanitary practices and the domestication of animals may explain the rise in deaths and sickness during the Neolithic Revolution from disease, as diseases jumped from the animal to the human population. Some examples of diseases spread from animals to humans are influenza, smallpox, and measles.

Surprisingly, the humans who first domesticated the wild animals quickly built up immunities to the diseases. Although the humans who built up immunities to the new diseases survived their sickness, others were not so fortunate. According to Jared Diamond, civilizations which had not domesticated any wild animals nor been exposed to the diseases were not immune at all and “epidemics resulted in which up to 99 percent of the ... population was killed” (92).

The beginnings of technology

Living in one spot would have more easily permitted the accrual of personal possessions and an attachment to certain areas of land. From such a position, it is argued, prehistoric people were able to stockpile food to survive lean times and trade unwanted surpluses with others. Once trade and a secure food supply were established, populations could grow, and society would have diversified into food producers and artisans, who could afford to develop their trade by virtue of the free time they enjoyed because of a surplus of food. The artisans, in turn, were able to develop technology such as metal weapons. Such relative complexity would have required some form of social organisation to work efficiently and so it is likely that populations which had such organisation, perhaps such as that provided by religion were better prepared and more successful. In addition, the denser populations could form and support legions of professional soldiers. Also, during this time property ownership became increasingly important to all people.

Subsequent revolutions

Ultimately, Childe argued that this growing social complexity, all rooted in the original decision to settle, led to a second Urban Revolution in which the first cities were built. Recently, Ian Hodder, who directed the excavations at Çatalhöyük has suggested that the earliest settled communities, and the Neolithic revolution they represent, actually preceded the development of agriculture. He has been developing the ideas first expressed by Jacques Cauvin, the excavator of the Natufian settlement at Mureybet in northern Syria. Hodder believes that the Neolithic revolution was the result of a revolutionary change in the human psychology, a "revolution of symbols" which led to new beliefs about the world and shared community rituals embodied in corpulent female figurines and the methodical assembly of aurochs horns.

The Age of Discovery

In his book Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond argues that Europeans' advantageous geographical location, near a number of easily domesticable plant and animal species, afforded them a head start in the Neolithic Revolution. Being among the first to adopt agriculture and sedentary lifestyles, and neighboring other early agricultural societies with whom they could compete and trade, Europeans were also among the first to benefit from technologies such as firearms and steel swords. In addition, Europeans developed resistances to infectious diseases, such as smallpox, due to their close relationship with domesticated animals. Groups of people who had not lived in proximity with other large mammals, such as the Australian Aborigines, were more vulnerable to infection.

During and after the Age of Discovery, European explorers, such as the Spanish conquistadors, encountered other groups of people which had never or only recently adopted agriculture. Due in part to their head start in the Neolithic Revolution, the Europeans were able to use their technology and endemic diseases, to which indigenous populations had never been exposed, to colonize most of the globe.

See also

Further reading

  • Balter, Michael (2005). The Goddess and the Bull: Catalhoyuk, An Archaeological Journey to the Dawn of Civilization. New York: Free Press. ISBN 0743243609.
  • Bellwood, Peter. (2004). First Farmers: The Origins of Agricultural Societies. Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 0631205667
  • Cohen, Mark Nathan (1977)The Food Crisis in Prehistory: Overpopulation and the Origins of Agriculture. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-02016-3.
  • Diamond, Jared (1999). Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. New York: Norton Press. ISBN 0393317552.

Agriculture | Archaeological theory | Methods and principles in archaeology | Neolithic | History of technology | Revolutions

Neolitická revoluce | Neolithische Revolution | Νεολιθική επανάσταση | Révolution néolithique | המהפכה הניאוליתית | Neolitikus forradalom | Neolithische revolutie | Rewolucja neolityczna | Неолитическая революция | Neoliittinen vallankumous | Neolitiska revolutionen

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Neolithic Revolution".

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