IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/nathum/v4y2020i10d10.1038_s41562-020-0897-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Climate shaped how Neolithic farmers and European hunter-gatherers interacted after a major slowdown from 6,100 bce to 4,500 bce

Author

Listed:
  • Lia Betti

    (University of Roehampton)

  • Robert M. Beyer

    (University of Cambridge
    University of Cambridge)

  • Eppie R. Jones

    (University of Cambridge)

  • Anders Eriksson

    (University of Cambridge
    Guys Hospital
    University of Tartu)

  • Francesca Tassi

    (University of Ferrara)

  • Veronika Siska

    (University of Cambridge)

  • Michela Leonardi

    (University of Cambridge)

  • Pierpaolo Maisano Delser

    (University of Cambridge
    Trinity College Dublin)

  • Lily K. Bentley

    (University of Cambridge)

  • Philip R. Nigst

    (University of Cambridge)

  • Jay T. Stock

    (University of Cambridge
    University of Western Ontario
    Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History)

  • Ron Pinhasi

    (University of Vienna)

  • Andrea Manica

    (University of Cambridge)

Abstract

The Neolithic transition in Europe was driven by the rapid dispersal of Near Eastern farmers who, over a period of 3,500 years, brought food production to the furthest corners of the continent. However, this wave of expansion was far from homogeneous, and climatic factors may have driven a marked slowdown observed at higher latitudes. Here, we test this hypothesis by assembling a large database of archaeological dates of first arrival of farming to quantify the expansion dynamics. We identify four axes of expansion and observe a slowdown along three axes when crossing the same climatic threshold. This threshold reflects the quality of the growing season, suggesting that Near Eastern crops might have struggled under more challenging climatic conditions. This same threshold also predicts the mixing of farmers and hunter-gatherers as estimated from ancient DNA, suggesting that unreliable yields in these regions might have favoured the contact between the two groups.

Suggested Citation

  • Lia Betti & Robert M. Beyer & Eppie R. Jones & Anders Eriksson & Francesca Tassi & Veronika Siska & Michela Leonardi & Pierpaolo Maisano Delser & Lily K. Bentley & Philip R. Nigst & Jay T. Stock & Ron, 2020. "Climate shaped how Neolithic farmers and European hunter-gatherers interacted after a major slowdown from 6,100 bce to 4,500 bce," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 4(10), pages 1004-1010, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nathum:v:4:y:2020:i:10:d:10.1038_s41562-020-0897-7
    DOI: 10.1038/s41562-020-0897-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-020-0897-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41562-020-0897-7?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Joaquim Fort & Joaquim Pérez-Losada, 2024. "Interbreeding between farmers and hunter-gatherers along the inland and Mediterranean routes of Neolithic spread in Europe," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-13, December.
    2. Ekaterina Dolbunova & Alexandre Lucquin & T. Rowan McLaughlin & Manon Bondetti & Blandine Courel & Ester Oras & Henny Piezonka & Harry K. Robson & Helen Talbot & Kamil Adamczak & Konstantin Andreev & , 2023. "The transmission of pottery technology among prehistoric European hunter-gatherers," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 7(2), pages 171-183, February.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:nathum:v:4:y:2020:i:10:d:10.1038_s41562-020-0897-7. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.