Lecture 9: MilkHarpending Anth 4234 Spring 2000

Herero live off of cattle and goat products, which they may sell. They also plant small gardens and hunt and gather.

Clarified butter is saved for the dry season when there is no cow’s milk

The fat is stored in cowhides and sealed

with dung

Weaning Technology

Milk Energetics

• 1 liter of cow milk has

• 250 Cal from lactose

• 300 Cal from fat

• 170 Cal from protein

Milk to Cheese

• 1 liter of milk yields 100 g. cheddar cheese

• 400 Cal of energy vs.

• 720 in the original milk

• 45% energy loss

Temple Frieze from Iraq 2500 BCE

39 Milking (right) and milk-processing (left) depicted on a temple frieze, c. 2500 BC,from Tell al-’Ubaid, Iraq.

Dairy farming was an easy way to ensure a constant input ofprotein into the diet. Pastoralists adapted to it. Natural selectionfavoured those whose ability to digest milk was not switched offafter weaning. Several different genes for lactose tolerance havebeen discovered. As we shall see in Chapter 9, their spreadacross Europe is a key piece of evidence for the important role ofmigrations later than those of the early farmers.

Farming had gradually spread west across Anatolia. After asparse sprinkling of pre-ceramic sites, Fikir Tepe and similarsettlements were established by the Sea of Marmara between7000 BC and 6400 BC.2 Cattle were not predominant in the earlystages. Domestic sheep and goats seem to have spread acrossAnatolia first, followed by cattle in about 6500 BC.3 The highrainfall and greener grazing of the coastal lowland favouredcattle-keeping.

Sites on both the European and Anatolian coasts of the Sea ofMarmara have revealed evidence of frequent milking and apreference for cattle over other domesticated animals, though notall were keeping animals primarily for milking, as many cattlewere killed young. Yet the addition of cow’s milk to the menu ona regular basis seems to have started here. Then the rich pasturesbeside the Danube attracted cattle farmers. Milk residues, though

First Signs of Dairying• From milk residues in pottery

• Around sea of Marmara

• Spread up the Danube, quickly to Britain and Scandinavia

• By 4000 BCE intense dairying in central Europe

• Spread east into steppes, not past Urals

Early Farming

40 The spread of dairy farming. The cultures marked in colour show evidence ofdairy farming.

Pastoralism was adopted from their Balkan neighbours byforagers north of the Black and Caspian seas in two stages. Thefirst did not involve dairy farming. In the forest-steppe zone theDnieper-Donets I foragers transformed themselves into Dnieper-Donets II cattle farmers around 5000 BC.11 Craniometric studieslink Dnieper-Donets people to other hunter-gatherers acrossEurope.12 Ancient mtDNA reveals a more complex picture.Along with the U5a1a which we expect in European foragerswere the H and U3 found at European Neolithic sites, as well ashaplogroups normally found in East or Central Asia (C and

41 Cucuteni toy ox on wheels. Cattle were important in this culture for meat, milk andtraction. Oxen pulled ploughs, sledges and, later, wheeled wagons.

One clue to the importance of the Danube route for dairyfarming lies in the genes of modern European breeds of dairycattle. All have their origins in cattle first domesticated in theNear East. The parent haplogroup has been found in ancientDNA there. Yet there is a genetic distinction between northernand southern European cattle. The present breeds are the result ofconsiderable movement in historic times, yet even with that inmind, a more ancient pattern can be detected. Two Y-DNAsignatures predominate. Y2 seems to be the earlier haplogroup toarrive in Europe, with the first farmers from the Levant. It isfound in cattle bred for mixed use and dominates the EuropeanMediterranean region. Y1 appears to be a later arrival, found inthe pied and red dairy breeds of the North Sea and Baltic coasts.We can picture Y1 among cattle bred for milk along the Danubeand moving northwards in the late Neolithic, reinforced by laterwaves from the same direction. Interestingly, both Y1 and Y2 arefound in Britain and in Iberia, but Y1 overwhelmingly dominates

Funnel Beaker People• Dairying into North European Plain, Scandinavia

• Heavy clay soils not very suitable for farming

• until Middle Ages, ox-drawn plows

• Wheeled vehicles, sorry plows, spinning wool

• Foragers on the coasts

43 The arrival of the Neolithic in the British Isles from the Continent, fromradiocarbon dates.

The Michelsberg culture (MK) appeared c. 4300 BC besidethe Rhine. MK is thought to have its roots in the Bischheimgroup of sites, in the Bas-Rhin department of Alsace, France.Some see this group as a form of Late Rössen. Certainly itsprings from Rössen territory.45 So dairy farming seems likely.MK had a dramatic impact on the landscape. The density of its

Spread across Britain: Note speed of spread

So dairy farming seems likely. MK had a dramatic impact on the landscape. The density of its population is estimated to be ten times that of the LBK.46 It could muster the numbers to create communal centres, dotting causewayed enclosures down the Rhine valley from 4200 to 4000 BC. These enigmatic circular bank and ditch structures may have functioned as meeting places for an expanding community.

Cf.

Crickley Hill, a Neolithic Fortress in England

Early Indo-Europeans were Horse People

• One Kg of Mare’s Milk has

• 190 Calories of Fat and Protein

• 250 Calories of Lactose

• With 5 Kg. per day yield one mare feeds

• Two LP Children

• Less than one non-LP Child

Delacroix, Ovid among the Scythians

Delacroix, Ovid among the Scythians