What 15,000 Years Of Cooking Fish Tells Us About Humanity
Research published last week in the journal Nature shows that hunter-gatherer people living in Japan 15,000 ago . Chemical analysis of the charred remains in the pots demonstrates that the food items were both marine and freshwater in origin, and almost certainly fish rather than mollusks.
Until recently the invention of pottery-making was linked to the onset of agriculture, around 12,000 years ago. The thinking was that hunter-gatherers — foragers who typically are nomadic, without domesticated crops or animals — were either too mobile or simply too unsophisticated to have made ceramics. And when pottery finally was dated prior to the onset of farming, the function of pots made by hunter-gatherers was unknown. Until now.
So , because it shifts, yet again, our understanding of the behavior of forager peoples. Archaeologist in the UK, is the lead author (of 14 total) on the article, which is entitled "Earliest evidence for the use of pottery." In an email message to me on Tuesday, Craig reflected on this new understanding:
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