First direct evidence of dairy consumption

Angela

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Direct as in found on remains, in this case from Neolithic Britain. All prior conclusions were based on the presence of dairy residue on pottery, but this proof is in their teeth.

When I think how wrong almost everyone was about this! The perceived wisdom was that steppe people, since they were steppe herders, must have selected for some sort of LP gene and brought it to Europe. Not. :) Woe to you when you questioned that orthodoxy.

The authors are assuming that it must all have been consumed in the form of cheese or yoghurt, since none of them carried any known LP gene.

Perhaps the possibility should be held out that there's one we don't know about? I can personally attest that despite carrying two copies of the LP gene I suddenly, in my thirties, started having products with dairy consumption. Yes, cheese is better than actually drinking milk, which is now a disaster, but still...

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smar...utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=socialmedia
 
It's just the first evidence on teeth. The first evidence of dairy processing is way back in the Anatolian Neolithic.
 
dairy production got a boost from ceramics

nature11698-f1.2.jpg


first pottery appeared 9,1 ka in Jarmo, northern Zagros
from there it spread very rapidly along with cattle and sheep to the Aegean and across to SE Greece, without affecting the central Neolithic farmers
(remember Diros cave farmers with Iran neolithic admixture)

before ca 8,5 ka the central neolithic farmers didn't have cattle nor pottery - they were still in PPNB with only goat and sheep
ca 8,5 ka they all of a sudden got both and they spread to NW Anatolia (Mentese - Barcin .. )
 
See:
https://www.researchgate.net/public..._Southeastern_Europe_Linked_to_Cattle_Herding

"The domestication of cattle, sheep and goats had already taken place in the Near East by the eighth millennium BC. Although there would have been considerable economic and nutritional gains from using these animals for their milk and other products from living animals-that is, traction and wool-the first clear evidence for these appears much later, from the late fifth and fourth millennia BC. Hence, the timing and region in which milking was first practised remain unknown. Organic residues preserved in archaeological pottery have provided direct evidence for the use of milk in the fourth millennium in Britain, and in the sixth millennium in eastern Europe, based on the δ13C values of the major fatty acids of milk fat. Here we apply this approach to more than 2,200 pottery vessels from sites in the Near East and southeastern Europe dating from the fifth to the seventh millennia BC. We show that milk was in use by the seventh millennium; this is the earliest direct evidence to date. Milking was particularly important in northwestern Anatolia, pointing to regional differences linked with conditions more favourable to cattle compared to other regions, where sheep and goats were relatively common and milk use less important. The latter is supported by correlations between the fat type and animal bone evidence."

Also:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332292476_The_evolution_of_lactose_digestion



And:
https://www.livescience.com/56904-ancient-people-consumed-dairy.html

"
Humankind has gulped down mouthfuls of milk and other dairy products from animals, such as sheep, goats and cows, for at least 9,000 years, a new study suggests.Researchers made the discovery after analyzing and dating more than 500 prehistoric pottery vessels discovered in the northern Mediterranean region, which includes the modern-day countries of Spain France, Italy, Greece and Turkey. During each examination, they looked for remnants of milk, which indicated that people had used animal dairy products.
The scientists also examined the ceramic pots for residue from animal fat and other evidence, such as skeletal remains, that would suggest Neolithic people slaughtered domesticated animals for meat; they examined these bony remains from 82 sites around the Mediterranean dating from the seventh to fifth millennia B.C."

"The eastern and western parts of the northern Mediterranean, including parts of modern-day Spain, France and Turkey, commonly practiced dairying, but northern Greece did not, they said. Rather, "lipids from pots and the animal bones tell the same story: Meat production [in northern Greece] was the main activity, not dairying," they said.

The new analysis supports the team's earlier work showing "that milk use was highly regionalized in the Near East in the seventh millennium B.C.," study researchers Mélanie Roffet-Salque and Richard Evershed, chemists at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom, said in a statement. "This new multidisciplinary study further emphasizes the existence of diverse use of animal products in the northern Mediterranean Neolithic."
The varying landscape in the northern Mediterranean likely influenced what sort of animals the Neolithic people domesticated, the researchers added."

See also:
https://phys.org/news/2018-09-earliest-mediterranean-cheese-production-revealed.html

"Analysis of fatty residue in pottery from the Dalmatian Coast of Croatia revealed evidence of fermented dairy products—soft cheeses and yogurts—from about 7,200 years ago, according to an international team of researchers.



"This pushes back cheese-making by 4,000 years," said Sarah B. McClure, associate professor of anthropology.
The presence of milk in pottery in this area is seen as early as 7,700 years ago, 500 years earlier than fermented products, said the researchers. DNA analysis of the populations in this area indicate that the adults were lactose-intolerant, but the children remained able to consume milk comfortably up to the age of ten."


"Cheese production is important enough that people are making new types of kitchenware," said McClure. "We are seeing that cultural shift."
When only meat, fish and some milk residue is found in pottery, during the Early Neolithic, the pottery is a style called "Impressed Ware" found throughout the area.


500 years later, in the Middle Neolithic, another pottery style using different technology existed—Danilo pottery—which defines the era in this area and includes plates and bowls. There are three subtypes of Danilo pottery.
Figulina makes up five percent of this type and is highly fired and buff-colored, often slipped and decorated. All this pottery contained milk residue. The other Danilo wares contained animal fats and fresh water fish residue."

"The third category of Danilo ware is sieves, which are often used in cheese-making to strain treated milk when it separates into curds and whey. Three of the four sieves in the sample showed evidence of secondary milk processing into either cheese or other fermented dairy products."

So, it was present since Impressed Ware, but increased in the Middle Neolithic.

"According to the researchers, dairying—and especially cheese and fermented milk products—may have opened northern European areas for farming because it reduced infant mortality and allowed for earlier weaning, decreasing the birth interval and potentially increasing population. It also supplied a storable form of nutrition for adults, because the fermentation of cheese and yogurt reduce the lactose content of milk products, making it palatable for adults as well as children.

With a food source that could buffer the risk of farming in colder northern climates, farmers could expand their territories."




 

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