Anth106 essay 2018 PDF

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Agriculture has been around for a long time and is one of the greatest advancements made in human history. This is due to the fact that it has provided the growth of populations, necessary foundations required for the development of social hierarchies as well as a greater access to resources. The big question that archaeologists are still trying to answer however, is how did the development of agriculture take place and why? Why did early humans turn from being nomadic to sedimented as their hunter-gatherer lifestyle had been successful as far as archaeologists could tell. As there are multiple models which propose the development of agriculture, this essay will be taking a closer look at four of them. The four theories that will be covered in this essay are based on the research from different archaeologists and they all tend to play off of one another. I will be discussing Gordon Childe’s Oasis theory and how it relates to climate change. Following up with Braidwood’s Hilly flanks hypothesis. I will discuss how Braidwood acknowledged that climatic change played an effect in the origins of agriculture, however stated that it only played a minor role. Lewis Binford’s Demographic theory had woven pieces of both Childe and Braidwood’s theories of agricultural domestication together and had come to the conclusion that pressure for food sources had increased due to population growth. Lastly, I will be discussing Brian Hayden competition theory which shows the necessity for substance strategies and how they impact social and economic factors of society.

In 1936, Gordon Childe had proposed his ‘Oasis Theory’. Childe’s theory was one of the first theories that coherently explained agriculture in terms of its origins. Childe’s ‘Oasis Theory’ like many other theories, had a big emphasis on environmental change. The adoption of agriculture in Childe’s ‘Oasis Theory’ was referred to as “…the Neolithic revolution, one of those key changes in prehistory that could be likened in their impact to the industrial revolution of 18th-century.” (Scarre, C., 2005).” In other words, it was suggested that the origins of agriculture wasn’t for ease of obtaining food, but rather a forced pressure on humans to domesticate plants and animals due to climate change. Childe had believed that “... at the end of the Pleistocene, a northward shift in the path of the Atlantic depressions (areas of low barometric pressure) from North Africa to Europe led to desiccation (extreme dryness) in countries that were always relatively dry.” (Scarre, C., 2013). This is where the ‘Oasis’ part came in. Childe had argued that the aridity had forced people and animals alike to gather at river banks and oases. This in turn, allowed for a symbiotic arrangement in which wild animals were allowed to graze on the fields after harvest and resulting in them becoming

more accustomed to human contact which eventually led to them being tame. (Scarre, C., 2013). Scarre (2013) states that “selective culling by humans would subsequently have led to full domestication”. It was previously sought out that agriculture came from “marginal environments – areas where severe climatic change forced human populations to find new foods to eat” (Price and Gebauer 7). However, other theories would suggest that it wasn’t in the hunter-gatherer community’s best interest to risk leaving their environment to find new places and ways of obtaining food if their environment was no longer sustainable. This is due to the fact that agriculture requires a bigger energy expenditure as well as a higher work load in comparison to foraging and wouldn’t make sense for an already-suffering community. Gordon Childe’s theory of agricultural development takes into account environmental as well as climatic pressures, however it doesn’t take any cultural factors that may have played a role into account. Robert Braidwood, an American archaeologist, had a theory that suggested more of a cultural approach. Not only does Braidwood claim that his theory better explains the agricultural development, his theory also challenges that of Childe’s.

Robert Braidwood’s theory, the “Nuclear Zone Theory” or more commonly known as the “Hilly Flanks Hypothesis” was developed in 1940. Contrary to Childe’s ‘Oasis Theory’ (1936), Braidwood’s theory suggests that agricultural farming didn’t in fact begin on the “… lowland alluvial plains, but in the hilly flanks of the Fertile Cresent…” (Scarre, C., 2013). Braidwood acknowledged that climatic change played an effect in the origins of agriculture, however stated that it only plays a minor role. In the ‘Hilly Flanks Hypothesis’, Braidwood had included human cultural elements as a factor that lead to the domestication of plants and animals and suggested that the “presence of innovative cultural mechanisms for the introduction of agriculture” (Redman 1978: 96) was vital. Because Braidwood(1957) had stated that agriculture was “..the natural outcome from social and cultural complexities…” he took findings of tools such as grinding stones and living structures as evidence. Braidwood stated that these findings were “related [to] developments of a fixed sedentary life and its permanents architectural forms for both living and storage space” (Braidwood et al 1983: 129). Braidwood had critiqued Childe’s theory of agricultural development and had stated that humans had previously experienced periods of climatic change. “Why did incipient food production not come earlier? Our only answer at the moment is that culture was not ready to achieve it.” (Braidwood and Willey 1962: 342.) In this statement, Braidwood suggests that

125 million years ago, the human cognition wasn’t developed or complex enough to come up with food accumulation methods. Due to agriculture requiring plenty of coordination and management which is controlled by elitists, one could hypothesize that in the presence of social hierarchies, sedentism was in establishment as well. Even though Braidwood had hypothesized that hunter-gatherer’s had to “eventually realize the potential inherent in the local flora and fauna and would exploit that potential by domesticating appropriate species”(Braidwood, 1983) his theory’s weakness was the fact that he never answered the question of why agriculture occurred when it did. In the ‘Hilly Flanks’ hypothesis, Braidwood doesn’t address why agriculture developed independently around the world at the same relative timing, only how it happened. Braidwood hadn’t been shy to criticize Childe’s ‘Oasis Theory’ however, he didn’t provide an alternate theory and only states that “the groups became agricultural villagers because they were ready for it” (Braidwood, 1948) Evidence which can support this is the size increase of the human brain, which isn’t a reliable measure as cognitive capabilities can’t be studied when the person is deceased.

A third hypothesis for the development of agriculture is in direct correlation with population growth. Lewis Binford’s argument had woven pieces of both Childe and Braidwood’s theories of agricultural domestication together and had come to the conclusion that pressure for food sources had increased due to population growth and agriculture being an innovative development had helped to maintain and uphold the growth of hierarchies within societies (Scarre, C., 2013) Binford’s theory suggests that sedentism had happened before agricultural development due to the fact that there had to be hierarchies and systems in place in order for the sedentary lifestyle to work. Binford’s theory stated that groups had moved into optimal zones and as a result, pressure was put on available resources which also caused an imbalance on the group’s environmental carrying capacity. Binford stated huntergatherer’s had “maintained equilibrium between their population size and available resources in order to maintain their environment’s carrying capacity” (Watson, 1983) The imbalance had forced some members of the group to go off and create new groups outside of the optimal zone. This caused for the domestication of drought-resistant plants as well as smaller animals (Watson, 1983) Bindford (1983) stated that “groups intensified their subsistence practices in the direction of domesticating plants and animals”. Brian Hayden’s competition theory shows the necessity for substance strategies and how they impact social and economic factors of society.

Hierarchical systems call for power. Food was very important for hunter-gatherers so thus moving into a sedentary lifestyle food meant power. Therefore, in order for elitists to stay on top, they had to maintain large quantities of food which is where the development of agriculture comes into effect. In his social competition theory, Hayden(2009), proposes that the “…development of agriculture is a result of stress from social competition and the change in the social environment. This change in societal structure is not the result of agriculture but it is more so the cause of agriculture.” Hayden(2009) also stated that “…agriculture can only occur in locations where there is already an abundance of food and where it can be reproduced…”. The reasoning behind this being that large societies not being willing to put the whole community at risk when attempting new methods of food accumulation. Agriculture had also increased trade and encouraged cross cultural relationships due to a surplus of food being present. However, Hayden’s theory fails to explain, very similar to Braidwood’s, why agriculture occurred at the time it did and not sooner.

As stated in the introduction, there are multiple models which propose the development of agriculture and they all tend to play off of one another. Even though the four theories I looked at were by four different archaeologists, they had all interrelations of archaeological, environmental and societal information. We are able to see that Braidwood’s “Hilly Flank” Hypothesis improves on the “Oasis Theory” that was put forward by Gordon Childe. We can also see the connection between Binford’s Demographic theory that had woven pieces of both Childe and Braidwood’s theories of agricultural domestication together and had come to the conclusion that pressure for food sources had increased due to population growth. It can be suggested that the stress theories put forward by Childe and Binford can co-occur with the cultural change theories that were put forward by Braidwood and Brian Hayden. As Braidwood suggests, even if agriculture was made possible accidentally, human cognition would have had to be able to process and recognise that they had to manipulate their environments in order to exploit and produce large surpluses (Braidwood, 1962). By recognizing that there are many cultural and biological aspects within agriculture, we are able to come to the conclusion that all four theories stated in this essay are interrelated....