The First Farmers

15.5 ka – 1,552 BCE48 items

farminghumans

The excavated enclosures of Göbekli Tepe, south-east Turkey, 2011. Photo: Teomancimit. CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Seven times, at least, from scratch

For almost all of their history people lived on what they could gather and hunt. Then, within a few thousand years of the end of the last ice age, people on several continents began to sow, herd and select, each without knowing the others existed. Wheat and goats in the Fertile Crescent, rice and millet in China, maize and squash in Mexico, potatoes and llamas in the Andes, taro and bananas in New Guinea, cattle and sorghum in the Sahara and Sahel, sunflowers in the eastern woodlands of North America.

How to read it

Centres as bands — each independent centre of domestication runs from its first cultivation to the point where this story leaves it
Sites and crops as events — nested inside their centre, pinned where they were dug up
Context bands — the Natufian foragers, the Younger Dryas cold snap, the green Sahara, and two sites, Göbekli Tepe and Çatalhöyük, that tell their own story

Threads to follow

plants — every crop, from einkorn to sunflower
animals — dogs, goats, sheep, cattle, pigs, llamas
genetics — what DNA says about where and how often
fertile crescent, china, americas, pacific, africa — one centre at a time

Dates are calibrated radiocarbon years before present, where “present” is 1950, and carry the uncertainty the dating studies give. Domestication was slow: a crop is called domesticated when its seeds stop shattering or its bones change shape, often a thousand years or more after people first tended the wild plant or herd, so every date here is a first sign, not a moment.

Items

c. 15 ka – c. 11.6 ka
Natufian culture
3,400 years
c. 14.8 ka – c. 3,552 BCE
Green Sahara (African Humid Period)
9,300 years
c. 14.5 ka
Bread at Shubayqa 1
Shubayqa 1, Black Desert, north-east Jordan
c. 14.2 ka
The Bonn-Oberkassel dog
Quarry at Oberkassel, Bonn
c. 13 ka
Rye at Abu Hureyra
Abu Hureyra, now under Lake Assad, Syria
c. 12.85 ka – c. 11.65 ka
Younger Dryas
1,200 years
c. 11.7 ka – c. 6,552 BCE
Fertile Crescent: wheat, barley and flocks
3,200 years
c. 11.55 ka – c. 10.15 ka
Göbekli Tepe
1,400 years · Göbekli Tepe, near Şanlıurfa
c. 11.65 ka
Holocene begins
c. 11.5 ka
Barley in the Zagros foothills
Chogha Golan, Ilam province, Iran
c. 10.5 ka – c. 2,052 BCE
Sahara and Sahel: cattle, sorghum and millet
6,500 years
c. 11 ka
The tower of Jericho
Tell es-Sultan, Jericho
c. 10.5 ka – c. 2,552 BCE
South America: squash, manioc, potatoes and llamas
6,000 years
c. 10.5 ka – c. 3,052 BCE
Mesoamerica: squash and maize
5,500 years
c. 10.5 ka – c. 4,052 BCE
Yangtze: rice
4,500 years
c. 10.5 ka – c. 5,052 BCE
Yellow River: millets
3,500 years
c. 10.5 ka
Einkorn wheat
Karacadağ mountains, south-east Turkey
c. 10.5 ka
Cattle from the aurochs
c. 10.2 ka – c. 2,052 BCE
New Guinea Highlands: taro and bananas
6,200 years
c. 10.4 ka
Pigs at Çayönü
Çayönü, near Ergani, Diyarbakır
c. 10.35 ka
Forest islands of the Llanos de Moxos
Forest islands, Llanos de Moxos, Bolivia
c. 10.05 ka
Penned sheep at Aşıklı Höyük
Aşıklı Höyük, Aksaray, Turkey
c. 10 ka
Squash, peanut and cotton in the Ñanchoc valley
Ñanchoc valley, upper Zaña, Peru
c. 10 ka
Cattle at Nabta Playa
Nabta Playa, Western Desert, Egypt
c. 10 ka
Rice at Shangshan
Shangshan, Pujiang, Zhejiang
c. 10 ka
Millet pits at Cishan
Cishan, Wu’an, Hebei
c. 10 ka
Squash at Guilá Naquitz
Guilá Naquitz cave, near Mitla, Oaxaca
c. 10 ka
Goats at Ganj Dareh
Ganj Dareh, Kermanshah, Iran
c. 10 ka
First gardens at Kuk Swamp
Kuk Swamp, Wahgi valley, Papua New Guinea
c. 7,552 BCE
A cat buried in Cyprus
Shillourokambos, near Limassol, Cyprus
c. 7,102 BCE – c. 5,952 BCE
Çatalhöyük
1,150 years · Çatalhöyük, Konya plain
c. 6,752 BCE
Mehrgarh
Mehrgarh, Kachi plain, Balochistan
c. 6,752 BCE
Maize from teosinte
Xihuatoxtla rock shelter, Balsas valley
c. 6,652 BCE
Jiahu: flutes and the oldest known fermented drink
Jiahu, Wuyang, Henan
c. 6,552 BCE
Farming reaches Europe
c. 5,052 BCE
Donkeys in eastern Africa
c. 5,052 BCE
Stone circle at Nabta Playa
Nabta Playa, Western Desert, Egypt
c. 4,752 BCE
Domestic rice at Hemudu and Tianluoshan
Hemudu and Tianluoshan, Yuyao, Zhejiang
c. 4,702 BCE
Banana mounds at Kuk
Kuk Swamp, Wahgi valley, Papua New Guinea
c. 4,302 BCE
The oldest maize cobs
Guilá Naquitz cave, near Mitla, Oaxaca
c. 4,052 BCE
Llamas and alpacas at Telarmachay
Telarmachay, Junín puna, Peru
c. 4,002 BCE
Farming reaches Britain
c. 3,302 BCE
Sorghum at KG23
KG23, near Kassala, eastern Sudan
c. 3,052 BCE – c. 1,852 BCE
Eastern North America: seed crops
1,200 years
c. 2,852 BCE
Sunflower at the Hayes site
Hayes site, Duck River, Tennessee
c. 2,752 BCE
Potatoes at Jiskairumoko
Jiskairumoko, Ilave valley, Peru
c. 2,552 BCE
Pearl millet in the Tilemsi valley
Karkarichinkat, Tilemsi valley, Mali
c. 2,252 BCE
Drainage ditches at Kuk
Kuk Swamp, Wahgi valley, Papua New Guinea