lunes, 19 de noviembre de 2012

Europe's First Farmers Came, Then Went

The first farmers who swept into Europe 6000 to 7000 years ago may have grown too big for their britches—or animal skins—too fast. A new study of archaeological sites across Western Europe highlights a strikingly consistent pattern in Neolithic farmers' communities: Their populations grew too big, too quickly, and crashed right after they peaked.

"We can see a dramatic history of booms and busts," archaeologist Stephen Shennan of University College London (UCL) reported yesterday in a talk at the 111th meeting of the American Anthropological Association in San Francisco, California.

Researchers have long assumed that as the first farmers settled down in Europe, life was more stable for them than for the nomadic foragers and fishers they had displaced. Cultivated plants and animals were a secure source of food, the reasoning went, allowing the farmers to bear more babies and put down deep roots. An overall picture emerged in which farming populations grew gradually until modern times. "It has been generally assumed that population slowly increased, in line with long-term continental and global trends," Shennan says. [...] ScienceNOW

Actualización 20-11-12. El desarrollo de la agricultura neolítica en Europa estuvo acompañado de un desarrollo demográfico muy inestable
(Traducción del texto en inglés).

2 comentarios:

Maju dijo...

Por lo que yo sé es muy posible que así fuera. No tengo tan claro que "se fueran" pero sí que sus sociedades tendieron a colapsar tras las expansiones iniciales, que incidentalmente suele corresponder con máximos climáticos, períodos particularmente cálidos.

Discutí algo de esto en 2009:

http://leherensuge.blogspot.com/2009/12/demographics-of-central-north-european.html

y

http://leherensuge.blogspot.com/2009/12/demographics-of-british-neolithic-2.html

salaman.es dijo...

Actualización. El desarrollo de la agricultura neolítica en Europa estuvo acompañado de un desarrollo demográfico muy inestable.