PPN Conclusions

5.6 Pre-Pottery Neolithic - Conclusions

From the Last Glacial Maximum the following plant species contributed to the human diet, at first by fully mobile hunter-gatherers and then from the mid 11^th millennium bc:

Grasses
Pulses
Fruits
Nuts

The PPNA in the southern Levant begins at around 10,300-10,200BP (10,000-9900 cal BC) but at Mureybet in the northern Levant it appears earlier at c.10,600-10,500bp (c.10,500 cal BC): “Hence there is no evidence for synchroneity for the onset of the Neolithic between the northern and southern Levant” (Tchernov in Horwitz et al 1999, p.65). According to Tchernov, this correlates with

Increased collection and cultivation of wild barley and emmer wheat and vegetal sources including legumes, seeds an fruits
Specialized hunting of diverse vertebrates. In the Mediterranean belt this was mainly gazelle. In the Arid Zone this was mainly ibex and gazelle. These species were mainly supplemented by small vertebrates, fish and reptiles, which were significant components of the diet. Less important was big game, but included Bos primigenus and Sus scorfa. Small species have not been recovered, but this is probably due more to recovery techniques than subsistence strategies.

From the mid 11^th millennium bc semi-sedentism corresponds to more intensive plant processing and, in the Natufian, possibly storage practices

The precise character of the PPNB in the south and central Levant in the earliest period is obscure. In the northern Levant agricultural resources were supplemented by hunting, in a pattern that was similar to that of the PPNA. During the Mid PPNB differences emerge. There is an increase in goat at the expense of gazelle. These were probably wild goats, possibly hunted to address problems caused by over-exploitation of gazelle.

The wild progenitors of the key founder crops have been identified. All are self-pollinating (autogamous) annuals. Self pollination would lend itself more readily to selective genetic alteration than cross-pollination because they could remain isolated in a genetic sense. Cross-pollination is likely to exchange genetic data over distances and less likely to become genetically isolated.

The earliest domesticated plants appear at Abu Hureyra, where an early experiment in the domestication of rye appears to have failed. The next domesticated forms are found at a small number of sites in the southern Levant during the PPNA - Netiv Hagdud, Gilgal and Jericho in the Jordan Valley and Aswad in the Damascus Basin 12,500-10,500BP (Hole 1996). Domesticated plants continued to spread during the PPNB for 2500 years before pottery appears, and eventually sheep and goat accompanied the domestic assemblage in most villages.

The earliest domesticates consist, in order of importance (Zohary 1996) of emmer, barley and einkorn. By the end of the eighth millennium bc, domesticated cereals were cultivated over a wide area. During the early seventh millennium bc domestic naked 6-row barley in southwest Asia and free threshing wheat in western Turkey and the Levant. Flax was widespread and was probably exploited for its oil-rich seeds and textile fibres. In the mid to late 7^th millennium bc, there is evidence for domesticated peas, lentils, bitter vetch, broad beans, and chick peas. Of these, the key companion plants accompanying cereals were five species – lentil, pea and flax, followed by bitter vetch and chick pea. Zohary believes (1996, p.144) that “these five companion crops were very probably domesticated simultaneously with the wheats and barley, and were taken into cultivation just a short time later”.

Whether or not cereal domestication was a single or isolated event within southwest Asia has been considerably disputed. Zohary has studied the available data with a view to clarifying this issue. In an analysis of genetic polymorphism he concludes that “the richer the genetic or chromosomal polymorphism in the wild and the poorer its representation under cultivation, the stronger is the suspicion that the crop concerned in a product of a single or very few introductions into cultivation and ensuing domestication” (1996, p.145). His analysis of species diversity in situations where the wild background contains several similar candidates for domestication and the domesticate only contains derivatives of one, suggests a single point of domestication, and this is what Zohary’s analysis finds. Zohary concludes that on the basis of available facts, (even though he points out that the data was drawn from experiments that were designed to answer other questions than those he asks), “the available data – fragmentary as they are – appear to support the hypothesis that the development of grain agriculture in southwest Asia was triggered (in each crop) by a single domestication event or at most by very few such events” (1996, p.156). He points out that this does not, however, explain how the ultimate package of specific plants and animals was eventually composed, or whether each plant was domesticated in once place or at different places.

Animal domestication comes later than plant cultivation – there was no evidence of animal husbandry in the PPNA, when animals were still hunted; it only appears for the first time in the PPNB. Uerpmann suggests that “a few successive years of good cereal harvests in only a few of the Proto-Neolithic villages may have been sufficient to establish some productive flocks of captive herbivores” (1996, p.234). Hole points out that no definitive sites have been identified for the earliest domestication of livestock, so it is not possible to discuss either exact location or the exact circumstances under which livestock were domesticated (Hole 1996, p. 263). However, he believes that the intersection of Iraq, Turkey and Iran is the most likely area for the domestication of caprines, as opposed to the Levant where plant cultivation was established.

How animals were domesticated is probably as poorly understood as plant domestication, and this has already been discussed. What is clear in all the suggestions of “why” and “how” is that unlike plants, the relationship between humans and animals was much more a case of symbiotics and synergies.

With regard to the establishment and rollout of animal domestication, Legge comments (1996, p.258) that “if the limited caprine bone samples present a problem in the recognition of early domestication, the published radiocarbon dates offer a similar challenge in establishing its chronology”.

True herding was, according to Ducos (1999) preceded by other activities. For example it is entirely possible that early experiments were focused not on sheep and/or goat but on gazelle and other more familiar species. It is also not certain if goat was introduced from the north, like sheep, or if it represents an autochthonous domestication of local species.

By the mid PPNB Gazella was replaced by wild goat (Capra aegagrus) in the diet. Sheep (Ovis) were not found at these sites and apparently did not appear until later in the southern Levant at around 6500 uncalibrated bc (5500 calibrated BC) – at the site of Ghoraife morphologically domesticated species appear. All others examples are later. Ovis was therefore apparently introduced from the north into the south during mid PPNB (Ducos 1999).

Although goat replaced gazelle as food before the appearance of sheep, it seems that sheep were the first domesticated in the southern Levant, which would be consistent with the character of each – ovis was far easier to heard, whereas capra individuals were more independent.

Legge has summarized the dated/chronological evidence for the cross-over period between the exploitation of wild animals and animal domestication as follows (tabulated from Legge 1996):

Area

Site

Date

Fauna Present

Possible Status wild/domestic

Turkey

Cafer Hoyuk

9^th millennium bp

Sheep & goat (53-63%)

Cattle, pig and deer

All species wild

Asikli Hoyuk

Early 9^th mill bp

Sheep and goat

others

Wild

Cayonu Tepesi

Late 10^th mill bp – early 9^th mill bp

cattle, pig & red deer dominant

caprines (10%)

Wild

Later phases

Caprines > 80%

Domestic

Gritille

9th mill bp

76% caprines

sheep outnumber goat 3:1

Domestic

Iraq & Iran

Tepe Asiab, Iran

c.9755-8700bp

cattle, sheep, goat, pig, onager, red deer, roe deer, fallow deer, gazelle

goat & sheep 36%

red deer 38%

pig 18.6%

cattle 6.5%

Wild

Ganj Dareh

1^st half of the 9^th mill bp

Caprines >90%

Goats outnumber sheep 9:1

Probably wild

Levant

Wadi Judagid

Natufian 11,950+/-800bp,

12,090+/-800bp,

12,793+/-659bp

Sheep and goat

Onager, gazelle, wild cattle

Wild

Tell Aswad (Damascus

9800-8800bp (end PPNA, start PPNB)

Goats and no sheep

Probably domestic (herded)

Ghoraife (Damascus)

Mid-late PPNB

Phase 1

Goat to sheep 3:1

Fully domesticated

Phase 2

Goat to sheep 1:3

Tell Ramad, (Damascus)

Late PPNB

Sheep to goat 3:1

Fully domesticated

Jericho / Tell es-Sultan

PPNA

Caprines <5%

Pig, wild cattle, fox, gazelle, goats and rare sheep

Wild

PPNB

Caprines = 60%

Significantly more goat than sheep

Domestic

‘Ain Ghazal

Late 10th – late 8^th mill bp

50% wild fauna

50% caprines

Domestic

Beidha

PPNB

Goat

Domestic

Basta

Late PPNB, late 9^th mill bp

Sheep and goat

Gazelle 10%

Others uncommon

Sheep and goat domesticated

Jilat 7 (Azraq)

Early-mid PPNB

8810+/-110bp

8520+/-110bp

No caprines

Gazelle

Equids

Hare

Domesticated

Jilat 13 (Azraq)

Late Neolithic

7920+/-100bp

7830+/-100bp

Caprines 30%

Domesticated

Syria

Abu Hureyra

Early Aceramic Neolithic

Domesticated plants and caprines appear at the same time

Domesticated, even when the rest of the fauna is wild

Wild goat (Capra aegagrus), which were native to steep and rocky habitats and had a restricted distribution, found at this time, were good climbers with slow gait, and were therefore attractive for hunting, and were not in Europe or north Africa. Sheep herds lived in undulating areas and had a much wider distribution than goat, and are good runners, making them comparatively unattractive for hunting. They were probably concentrated in the steppes of Central Asia, extending west as far as Central Anatolia and down into the Levant. Only Ovis orientalis is ancestral to the domestic sheep. Cattle may have been domesticated in three or more areas, including the southern Levant, Anatolia, the eastern margins of southwest Asia and Saharan Africa. Ducas (1999) observes that “though it is probable that the southern Levant was not the location where food animals were first domesticated, it is the sole region where al the significant steps in the process can be illustrated” (p.66).

In broad summary, few sites show signs of domesticated animals before 9000bp. Goats were apparently domesticated first in the Levant, followed by sheep in Anatolia. The first evidence for goat and sheep domestication comes from the earlier PPNB, the late eighth and early seventh millennia bc, but no sheep date to this time in the Levant. Sheep were apparently domesticated to the north or east of the Levant. Sheep appear in Damascus by around 8600bp, and were apparently domestic in form at Abu Hureyra. By 6000bc herds of sheep and goat were kept. After this time, the spread of both was rapid – as well as into marginal areas. By the early 6^th millennium bc cattle and pig is well documented from the northern Levant and Turkey. As Bellwood (2005, p.62) concludes “certainly by the end of the PPNB, and probably well before, the full compliment of major domestic animals – goat, sheep, cattle and pig – had been added to the domesticated repertoire as wild species declined in numbers due to intensive hunting”.

Sites had increased in size, enabling the nucleation of populations and possibly the establishment of internalized family units with partners selected from within settlement populations. The new sense of ownership and territoriality experienced by populations may have led to competition between settlements, and this may in turn have lead to conflict. The presence of fortified walls at both big and small settlements suggest that matters were not always perfectly peaceable.

Bellwood (2005, p.61-62) sees two trends in the PPNB – expansion and regional differentiation. As an example of change during the PPN, Beidha (in Jordan) was occupied for 100s of years and during its occupation changed many times. From small semicircular structures in small areas and communal storage, it evolved into large rectangular buildings, some of which were two-storey, which were subdivided into areas where specialization apparently occurred.

Gopher and Gophna (1993, p307) suggest the end of the PPN, at the end of the eighth millennium bp, is visible at PPNC sites, represented, for example, at ‘Ain Ghazal. ‘Ain Ghazal describes a period where settled village life continued, but with an economy responding to climatic change and perhaps local over-exploitation and emphasizing pastoralism over cultivation: “If so, it had significant repercussions on settlement patterns, population density, and relationships with the richer Mediterranean zones”.

Bellwood (2005, p.66) suggests that “A combination of site abandonment in some regions, and a development of a pastoral mobility around the edges of the continuing settled areas, would probably have encouraged two developments”, which were increasing regional interaction and dispersal of population. He sees these as one of the major triggers that led to the dispersal of agriculture as it first reached marginal areas and then extended into new areas entirely.

In so far as the eastern Jordanian areas of Wadi el-Jilat and Azraq are concerned, perhaps the PPN phases may have been characterized by an increasing influx of displaced hunter-gatherers from the fertile regions to the west, creating an imbalance between population and resource: “what is clear is that the Late Neolithic communities in the east Jordanian steppe practiced a life-style quite distinct from those in the Levantine corridor, including seasonal mobility and combinations of hunting, trapping, plant gathering, small-scale cultivation and caprine herding” (Garrard 1998, p.146).