II.

The First Farmers and Herders in the Middle East

A.
Environmental Zones and Food Production
1.
In the Middle East, the four environmental zones involved in the origin of food
production were the high plateau, Hilly Flanks, piedmont steppe, and alluvial desert.
a.
In the Hilly Flanks (a subtropical woodland zone), an abundance of wild grains that could
be harvested during much of the year allowed foragers (e.g., the Natufians) to adopt sedentism
sedentary life in villages.
b.
Around 11,000 B.P., the climate became drier and the zone of abundant wild grains
shrank.
c.
Food production probably emerged when people living in marginal areas (such as the
piedmont steppe) attempted to duplicate artificially the dense stands of wheat and barley that
grew in the Hilly Flanks by transferring wild cereals to well-watered areas, where they started
cultivating.
Hunters become herders
Bones unearthed from an ancient mound in Turkey suggest that humans there
shifted their diet from hunting to herding over just a few centuries, findings that
shed light on the dawn of agriculture, scientists say.Agriculture began in
the Neolithic, or New Stone Age, about 11,500 years ago. Once- nomadic groups of
people settled down and began farming and herding, fundamentally changing
human society and how people related to nature.
To discover more about the initial conditions underlying the evolution of villages, an
international team of scientists investigated the site of Akl Hyk, the earliest
known Neolithic mound in Cappadocia, in central Turkey. In this volcanic landscape,
erosion carved soft rock into thin spires known as "fairy chimneys." Settlers also
used this malleable stone to build cave dwellings and underground cities.
The mound, whose name means "ankle bone hill," stands 52 feet (16 meters) high.
The oldest levels of the area span from about 8,200 to 9,000 B.C., predating the
emergence of pottery in the region. The mound formed as the result of people
continually moving materials such as mud and wood to the settlement for buildings,
fires and other purposes. Over centuries, the human-collected debris raised the
height of the settlement, with residents adjusting their buildings accordingly. [Image
Gallery: Stone-Age Burials in Africa]

Village farming and towns

The appearance of village farming in the upper levels at Huaca Prieta and in the
immediately succeeding Guaape phase in surrounding areas is roughly
contemporaneous with the first appearance of this way of life in the Valley of Mexico
at such sites as Zacatenco and El Arbolillo. Here a relatively sophisticated ceramic
tradition (clearly derived from elsewhere) appears in the earliest levels. While
evidence for architecture is not completely clear, it appears that by about
1500 BC there were small villages of wattle-and-daub huts scattered along the
shores of the lakes of the Valley of Mexico, with inhabitants subsisting largely on
cornbeansquash cultivation, supplemented by the meat of game animals and by
various aquatic resources.
Earliest evidences for the next cultural advances are apparent by about 800 BC in
changes in architecture and settlement pattern in several areas of Middle America
and Peru. At this time, fairly extensive public works are represented by temple
structures and large sculptured monuments, which occupy a central position in
towns and villages. Phases as widely separated as the Olmec of Veracruz and the

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Cupisnique of coastal Peru appear to be linked not only in time and patterns of basic
subsistence but in specific ritual practices involving a jaguar orfeline deity.
Throughout Middle America and in the Andean area, this appears to have been a
time of consolidation and establishment of the basic traditions that dominated the
development of high cultures in the New World up to European contact.

List of countries and islands by first human settlement

Though fossils of hominids have been found dating back millions of years, the earliest known Homo
sapiens remains are considered to be a group of bones found at the Omo Kibish Formation, near
the Ethiopian Kibish Mountains. Though believed to be 130,000 years old at their discovery in 1967,
recent studies have dated them as far back as 195,000 years old. [1] From this area, humans spread out to
cover all continents except Antarctica by 14,000 BP. According to a recent theory, humans may have
crossed over into the Arabian Peninsula as early as 125,000 years ago.[2] From the Middle East,
migration continued into India around 70,000 years ago, and Southeast Asia shortly after. Settlers
could have crossed over to Australia and New Guinea that were united as one continent at the time
due to lower sea levels as early as 55,000 years ago. [3] Migration into Europe took somewhat longer
to occur; the first definite evidence of human settlement on this continent has been discovered in
southern Italy, and dates back 43-45,000 years.[4] Settlement of Europe may have occurred as early as
45,000 years ago though, according to genetic research. [5] The Americas were populated by humans at
least as early as 14,800 years ago,[6] though there is great uncertainty about the exact time and manner in
which the Americas were populated.[7] More remote parts of the world, like Iceland, New
Zealand and Madagascar were not populated until the historic era.[8]
The following table shows any geographical region at some point defined as a country not necessarily
a modern-daysovereign state or any geographically distinct area such as an island, with the date of
the first known or hypothesised human settlement. Dates are, unless specifically stated, approximate.
Settlements are not necessarily continuous; settled areas in some cases become depopulated due to
environmental conditions, such as glacial periods or the Toba volcanic eruption.[9] Where
applicable, information is also given on the exact location where the settlement was discovered, and
further information about the discovery. Some dates are based on genetic research (mitochondrial, or
matrilinear DNA), and not on archaeological finds.

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