The Neolithic Revolution, which began approximately 10,000 years ago in the Fertile Crescent of the Middle East, marked a significant turning point in human history. This time inspired the first big human revolution, as nomadic hunter-gatherer communities consolidated into large agricultural communities. Consequently, the new farming practices radiated far and wide across Europe. This demographic change, according to the latest research, was critically fueled by migration, more than local cultural adoption.
Led by principal investigator Troy M. LaPolice, Matthew Williams, and Christian Huber, this team of interdisciplinary researchers began a long-term, multi-faceted research adventure. Their aim was to study the dynamics underlying the spread of farming across Europe. Their discoveries made it to print in Nature Communications on August 25th. Together, they show that the migration of farming communities was the primary catalyst for spreading agriculture. To start, cultural adoption by local hunter-gatherers played a very small role in this process, barely 0.5% of the spread.
In getting to these conclusions, the researchers used complex models that replicate how populations migrate, expand, and acquire new cultures. During the preliminary calibration phase of modeling, the models were calibrated to observed rates of farming expansion. They included genetic data from 618 ancient European Neolithic individuals, obtained from ancient DNA. The examination found some integration occurring via “between-group mating.” This event was literally one in a hundred million, estimated at below 3%.
The research emphasizes that some hunter-gatherers maintained their foraging ways of life despite agriculture growing up all around them. This gradual displacement indicates that the transition to farming was not as smooth an affair as historians had previously thought.
“This research highlights the power of combining genetic data with archaeological models to uncover the complex behavioral mechanisms of our past.” – Matthew Williams
Williams further noted the implications of this research for understanding other significant prehistoric cultural shifts: “Looking forward, I see this paving the way for a re-evaluation of other major prehistoric cultural shifts.”
Christian Huber emphasized the importance of collaborative approaches in this field: “Archaeology and genetics offer complementary windows onto this transition.” He pointed out that the assimilation rate—the rate at which hunter-gatherers were integrated into farming communities—was surprisingly low: “Only about one in 1,000 farmers converted a hunter-gatherer to farming each year.”
This study uncovers the scaling self-organization of the Neolithic Revolution. Perhaps even more excitingly, it greatly improves our understanding of early European ancestry.
“It’s really interesting to be able to understand a time period before any written or oral history.” – Troy LaPolice