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Well, there's no doubt now that Anatolians were consuming dairy from a very early period, from cows as well as sheep and goats, and irrespective of the fact that they didn't have the common, modern LP gene.
Either they cooked it in such a way as to get rid of a lot of the lactase, or they had some other genetic protection against the possible unpleasant side effects.
However, the researchers emphasize that based on the archaeological record, an even greater variety of foods, especially plant foods, was likely eaten at Çatalhöyük. These were either not contained in the vessels they studied, or are not present in the databases they use to identify proteins.
However, just following the section you emphasized:
Lactase persistence in adults would not confer any evolutionary advantage in a sedentary agricultural society relying primarily on grains and legumes for nutrition. That doesn't mean that infants and children weren't fed milk from goats, sheep, and bovines as a supplement to "mother's milk". The advantage, among adults, would only have accrued as part of the development of mobile pastoral societies. It would be logical to assume that dairy production preceded, rather than followed from, the development of wide-scale lactase persistence in adults.
I agree.
For example, the steppe pastoralists, the Yamnaya, whom so many thought would have had and spread the LP gene, didn't have it. Perhaps it was because they weren't farmers first, who would have learned to milk the animals and make cheese? It does show up later in Bell Beaker people
Interestingly, African pastoralists do have some versions of it.
We shouldn't forget the fact that kids can drink milk in pure form with no problems, and most population of villages were kids. It means that having access to milk could feed half of needed calories to the always hungry kids. And this was huge help. Goats can graze on anything, even old dry grass in times of a draught, and give milk. Perhaps this was the main reason of domestication of goats and sheep and not the meat. After all men could hunt for meat, but you can't milk wild animals.
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