DOCSLIB.ORG

The Neolithic Demographic Transition and Its Consequences Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel · Ofer Bar-Yosef Editors

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Neolithic Demographic Transition and Its Consequences Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel · Ofer Bar-Yosef Editors The Neolithic Demographic Transition and its Consequences Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel · Ofer Bar-Yosef Editors The Neolithic Demographic Transition and its Consequences 123 Editors Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel Ofer Bar-Yosef National Centre for Scientific Harvard University Research (CNRS) Department of Anthropology UPR2147 Peabody Museum 44 rue de L’Amiral Mouchez 11 Divinity 75014 Paris Cambridge, MA 02138 France USA [email protected] [email protected] ISBN: 978-1-4020-8538-3 e-ISBN: 978-1-4020-8539-0 Library of Congress Control Number: 2008931585 c 2008 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception of any material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. Printed on acid-free paper 987654321 springer.com Contents Prehistoric Demography in a Time of Globalization .................... 1 Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel and Ofer Bar-Yosef Part I Demographic and Economic Dimensions of the NDT The Expansions of Farming Societies and the Role of the Neolithic Demographic Transition ............................................ 13 Peter Bellwood and Marc Oxenham Explaining the Neolithic Demographic Transition ...................... 35 Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel The Signal of the Neolithic Demographic Transition in the Levant ....... 57 Emma Guerrero, Stephan Naji and Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel The Nature and Timing of the Neolithic Demographic Transition in the North American Southwest .......................................... 81 Timothy A. Kohler and Matt Glaude The Neolithic Demographic Transition in Mesoamerica? Larger Implications of the Strategy of Relative Chronology ....................107 Richard G. Lesure An Alternative Approach in Tracing Changes in Demographic Composition .......................................................139 Mehmet Ozdo¨ gan˘ Zooarchaeological Aspects of the Neolithic Diet Transition in the Near East and Europe, and Their Putative Relationships with the Neolithic Demographic Transition ............................179 Jean-Denis Vigne v vi Contents Impacts of the Neolithic Demographic Transition on Linear Pottery Culture Settlement .................................................207 Jer´ omeˆ Dubouloz Part II Settlement and Village Practices A Roof Over One’s Head: Developments in Near Eastern Residential Architecture Across the Epipalaeolithic–Neolithic Transition ............239 A. Nigel Goring-Morris and Anna Belfer-Cohen Demography and Storage Systems During the Southern Levantine Neolithic Demographic Transition ....................................287 Ian Kuijt Population Processes and Their Consequences in Early Neolithic Central Europe ....................................................315 Stephen Shennan Part III Community Size and Social Organization Global Patterns of Early Village Development .........................333 Matthew Bandy Centralized Communities, Population, and Social Complexity After Sedentarization ....................................................359 Robert D. Drennan and Christian E. Peterson Charming Lives: Human and Animal Figurines in the Late Epipaleolithic and Early Neolithic Periods in the Greater Levant and Eastern Anatolia ...............................................387 Gary O. Rollefson Evaluating the Emergence of Early Villages in the North American Southwest in Light of the Proposed Neolithic Demographic Transition....417 Richard H. Wilshusen and Elizabeth M. Perry Part IV Population Growth and Health Demographic, Biological and Cultural Aspects of the Neolithic Revolution: A View from the Southern Levant .........................441 Israel Hershkovitz and Avi Gopher Contents vii Implications of the NDT for World Wide Health and Mortality in Prehistory .........................................................481 Mark Nathan Cohen From Health to Civilization Stress? In Search for Traces of a Health Transition During the Early Neolithic in Europe .......................501 Ursula Wittwer-Backofen and Nicolas Tomo Index .............................................................539 Contributors Matthew Bandy CNRS UPR2147, 44 rue de l’Amiral Mouchez, 75014 Paris, France, [email protected] Ofer Bar Yosef Department of Anthropology, Divinity Avenve, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA, [email protected] Anna Belfer-Cohen Department of Prehistory, Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 91905, Israel, [email protected] Peter Bellwood School of Archaeology and Anthropology, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, Australia, [email protected] Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), UPR2147, 44, rue de l’Amiral Mouchez – 75014 Paris, France, [email protected] Mark Nathan Cohen Department of Anthropology, SUNY at Plattsburgh, 101 Broad St, Plattsburgh, NY 12901, USA, [email protected], [email protected] Robert D. Drennan Department of Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA, [email protected] Jer´ omeˆ Dubouloz Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), UMR 7041, European Protohistory, Rene´ Ginouves` Center for Archaeology and Ethnology (MAE), 2 allee´ de l’Universite,´ 92023 Nanterre, France, [email protected] Matt Glaude Department of Anthropology, WSU, Pullman, Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, Santa Fe Institute, Pullman, WA 99164, USA, [email protected] ix x Contributors Avi Gopher The Sonia and Marco Nadler Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel, [email protected] A. Nigel Goring-Morris Department of Prehistory, Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 91905, Israel, [email protected] Emma Guerrero Seminari d’Arqueologia Prehistorica` del Proxim` Orient –SAPPO, Universitat Autonoma` de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain, [email protected] Israel Hershkovitz Department of Anatomy and Anthropology, Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, The Tassia and Dr. Joseph Meychan Chair of the History and Philosophy of Medicine, Tel Aviv, Israel, [email protected] Timothy A. Kohler Department of Anthropology, WSU, Pullman, WA 99164-4910, USA, Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, Santa Fe Institute, [email protected] Ian Kuijt Department of Anthropology, The University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556, USA, [email protected] Richard G. Lesure UCLA Department of Anthropology, 341 Haines Hall - Box 951553, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1553, USA, [email protected] Stephan Naji CNRS UPR2147, 44 rue de l’Amiral Mouchez, 75014 Paris, France, [email protected] Marc Oxenham School of Archaeology and Anthropology, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, Australia, [email protected] Mehmet Ozdo¨ gan˘ Prehistory Department, stanbul University, 34134 Istanbul, Turkey, [email protected] Elizabeth M. Perry SWCA, Salt Lake City, Utah 84111, [email protected] Christian E. Peterson Department of Anthropology, University of Hawai’i at Manoa, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA, [email protected] Gary Rollefson Department of Anthropology, Whitman College, 345 Boyer Ave., Walla Walla, WA 99362, USA, [email protected] Contributors xi Stephen Shennan Director, Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31-34 Gordon Sq., London WC1H 0PY, UK, [email protected] Nicolas Tomo Dept. of Human Genetics and Anthropology, Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg, c/o Institute of Legal Medicine, Albertstr. 9, D- 79110 Freiburg, Germany, [email protected] Jean-Denis Vigne CNRS UMR 5197, Museum´ national Histoire national, Paris, France, [email protected] Richard H. Wilshusen Department of Anthropology, Colorado College, Colorado Springs 80903, USA, [email protected] Ursula Wittwer-Backofen Department of Human Genetics and Anthropology, Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg, c/o Institute of Legal Medicine, Albertstr. 9, D- 79110 Freiburg, Germany, [email protected] Prehistoric Demography in a Time of Globalization Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel and Ofer Bar-Yosef Abstract The signal of a relatively abrupt increase, in the immature proportion of skeleton is observed in cemeteries during the foraging-farming transition. This signal is interpreted as the signature of a major demographic shift in human history, now known as the Neolithic Demographic Transition (NDT). How can population growth be explained?’ Was population increase gradual or abrupt? Was it related to the stability in food provisioning due to building and maintaining storage facilities? Or was it just annual cultivation and harvesting under favorable climatic conditions that allowed the number of humans to increase? The volume presented here is di- vided into four parts. Part 1 concerns the demographic and economic aspects of the NDT. Part 2 focuses on settlement and village practices. The relatively rapid growth of human populations during the NDT radically transformed settlement behaviour. In this part, we consider the varied implications of the NDT for settlement and village practices at both regional and local or intra-village scales. Part 3 is con- cerned with community size and social organization. The growth of larger commu- nities gave rise to unprecedented stresses within these expanding
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Demographic Uniformitarianism: the Theoretical Basis of Prehistoric Demographic Research 5 and Its Cross-Disciplinary Challenges
    1 Accepted for publication 16/03/2020 at Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B (Special 2 Issue: Cross-Disciplinary Approaches to Prehistoric Demography) 3 4 Demographic uniformitarianism: the theoretical basis of prehistoric demographic research 5 and its cross-disciplinary challenges 6 Jennifer C. French1 & Andrew T. Chamberlain2 7 1 UCL Institute of Archaeology, 31-34 Gordon Square, London WC1H 0PY UK 8 [email protected] 9 2 Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Manchester, Stopford Building, 10 Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PT, [email protected] 11 12 13 Abstract 14 A principle of demographic uniformitarianism underpins all research into prehistoric demography 15 (palaeodemography). This principle—which argues for continuity in the evolved mechanisms 16 underlying modern human demographic processes and their response to environmental stimuli 17 between past and present— provides the cross-disciplinary basis for palaeodemographic 18 reconstruction and analysis. Prompted by the recent growth and interest in the field of prehistoric 19 demography, this paper reviews the principle of demographic uniformitarianism, evaluates how it 20 relates to two key debates in palaeodemographic research and seeks to delimit its range of 21 applicability to past human and hominin populations. 22 23 Keywords: Prehistoric demography; Uniformitarianism; Population dynamics; Life History; Archaic 24 hominins 25 1. Introduction 26 Like many historical sciences, prehistoric demography relies on a doctrine of uniformitarianism for 27 some of its foundational principles. Uniformitarianism is the adherence to the axiom that processes 28 that occurred in the past (and so cannot be directly experienced) were nonetheless likely to 29 resemble those that are observable in the present day.
    [Show full text]
  • Climate and Demography in Early Prehistory: Using Calibrated 14C Dates As Population Proxies Felix Riede University College London, [email protected]
    Human Biology Volume 81 Issue 2 Special Issue on Demography and Cultural Article 11 Macroevolution 2009 Climate and Demography in Early Prehistory: Using Calibrated 14C Dates as Population Proxies Felix Riede University College London, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/humbiol Recommended Citation Riede, Felix (2009) "Climate and Demography in Early Prehistory: Using Calibrated 14C Dates as Population Proxies," Human Biology: Vol. 81: Iss. 2-3, Article 11. Available at: http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/humbiol/vol81/iss2/11 Climate and Demography in Early Prehistory: Using Calibrated 14C Dates as Population Proxies Abstract Although difficult to estimate for prehistoric hunter-gatherer populations, demographic variables—population size, density, and the connectedness of demes—are critical for a better understanding of the processes of material culture change, especially in deep prehistory. Demography is the middle-range link between climatic changes and both biological and cultural evolutionary trajectories of human populations. Much of human material culture functions as a buffer against climatic changes, and the study of prehistoric population dynamics, estimated through changing frequencies of calibrated radiocarbon dates, therefore affords insights into how effectively such buffers operated and when they failed. In reviewing a number of case studies (Mesolithic Ireland, the origin of the Bromme culture, and the earliest late glacial human recolonization of southern Scandinavia), I suggest that a greater awareness of demographic processes, and in particular of demographic declines, provides many fresh insights into what structured the archaeological record. I argue that we cannot sideline climatic and environmental factors or extreme geophysical events in our reconstructions of prehistoric culture change.
    [Show full text]
  • Cross-Disciplinary Approaches to Prehistoric 3 Demogr
    1 Accepted for publication 07/10/2020 2 3 Contribution to special issue “Cross-Disciplinary Approaches to Prehistoric 4 Demography” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 5 6 7 8 A Manifesto for Palaeodemography in the 21st Century 9 10 Jennifer C. French1 11 Philip Riris2 12 Javier Fernandéz-López de Pablo3 13 Sergi Lozano4 14 Fabio Silva2 15 16 1. Department of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool; UCL 17 Institute of Archaeology ([email protected]) 18 2. Institute for the Modelling of Socio-Environmental Transitions, Bournemouth University 19 3. I.U. de Investigación en Arqueología y Patrimonio Histórico, University of Alicante 20 4. University of Barcelona 21 22 23 24 1. Defining palaeodemography: aims and scope 25 26 Demography is the study of human populations and their structure, i.e. the composition of 27 populations, and the subdivision of the metapopulation into smaller subunits. Palaeodemography 28 refers to the study of the demography of ancient populations for which there are no written sources 29 (broadly synonymous with ‘prehistoric demography’) [1]. Palaeodemography shares the core 30 aims of its present-day counterpart; namely, to document and explain changes within, and 31 variations between, the size and structure of human populations. However, by definition, no direct 32 demographic data–equivalent to modern-day censuses or registration forms–exist for prehistoric 33 populations. Instead, palaeodemographic information is derived from a wide range of proxies, 34 which only indirectly inform on demographic processes and parameters. 35 1 36 Accordingly, at present we consider palaeodemography to be less an independent field akin to 37 demography proper, and more an interlinked set of cross-disciplinary interests sharing the 38 common aims of reconstructing and analysing prehistoric population histories.
    [Show full text]
  • PRECONTACT POPULATION DECLINE and COALESCENCE in the SOUTHERN SOUTHWEST the Phoenix Basin Was the Heartland of the Hohokam Regional System for Nearly a Millennium
    PRECONTACT POPULATION DECLINE AND COALESCENCE IN THE SOUTHERN SOUTHWEST The Phoenix Basin was the heartland of the Hohokam regional system for nearly a millennium. Hundreds of miles of irrigation canals supported more than 20,000 people during the early 1300s, but the valley was devoid of inhabitants when the first Jesuit missionary visited the area in the 1690s (note all dates are A.D.). The magnitude of this population loss has been a topic of research for more than a century, yet there is still no widely accepted explanation. Furthermore, recent research has shown that the entire southern Southwest experienced a severe reduction in population prior to the arrival of Spaniards in the New World in 1540. Over the long term the American Southwest experienced population growth. What can account for such a dramatic reversal of this trend, and why is the decline so great in the southern Southwest? This proposal requests funding to investigate evidence of precontact population decline in the Phoenix Basin and three other areas in the southern Southwest. This research builds directly on work partly funded by NSF in the San Pedro Valley of southeastern Arizona. Our San Pedro Valley research revealed a complex demographic history, and we found that a theoretical model of coalescence helped us to understand the interrelationship of late precontact demographic processes. In the American Southeast, a similar coalescent society model has been applied to the early historic period when population decline and related disruptions led to cultural reorganization and formation of aggregated, multi-ethnic and multi-lingual communities. We postulate that a variety of social stresses stimulated the formation of coalescent communities in the Southwest by 1250 to 1300.
    [Show full text]
  • August 10, 2012 CURRICULUM VITAE George J. Armelagos
    August 10, 2012 CURRICULUM VITAE George J. Armelagos I. PERSONAL Department of Anthropology 108 Anthropology Emory University Atlanta, Georgia 30322 Phones: 404-727-2215 (Office) 404-727-2860 (Office FAX) e-mail: [email protected] II. EDUCATION Lincoln Park High School 1950-1954 University of Michigan 1954-1958 B.A. Degree 1958 University of Michigan Medical School 1958-1959 University of Michigan -Rackham Graduate School 1959-1960 University of Colorado 1961-1968 M.A. Degree 1963 Ph.D. Degree 1968 III. PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE Goodrich C. White Professor of Anthropology, 2005- Chair, Department of Anthropology, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, 2003 -2009 Professor, Department of Anthropology, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, 1993-2005 Professor and Chairman, University of Florida, Gainesville 1990-1993 Affiliate Curator, Department of Anthropology, Florida State Museum of Natural History. 1991- 1993 Professor, Anthropology, University of Massachusetts, 1978-1990. Professor Emeritus, 1991 Visiting Professor, University of Colorado, summer 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988 Associate Professor, Anthropology, University of Massachusetts, February 1973-1978 Director, University of Massachusetts Honors Program, 1974-1977 Acting Chair, Department of Anthropology, University of Massachusetts, summer 1971, 1972. Assistant Professor in Anthropology, University of Massachusetts, September 1968-1973 Visiting Professor, National Science Foundation Summer Institute for College Teachers in Anthropology, University of Colorado, summer 1971. Visiting
    [Show full text]
  • Population Dynamics in the Late Glacial Refugium of Southwest France
    Population Dynamics in the Late Glacial Refugium of Southwest France C.M. Collins PhD November 2012 University of Sheffield Acknowledgements I would first of all like to thank my supervisor Andrew Chamberlain for ad- vising me throughout my PhD. In addition many people aided me through- out the three years of my PhD. I am grateful to Pierre-Yves Demars for giving me access to his archaeological database. I am also grateful to Matt Grove for allowing me to utilize his method for working with radiocarbon dates and assisting me in doing so. As well as providing help with Matlab and LATEX, James Hook also joined me in many interesting conversations. I would also like to thank the following people for general useful discus- sions and advice: Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel, Paul Mellars, Michael White, Caitlin Buck, Rob Dinnis, Jenni French, Tom O'Mahoney, Tom Booth and Isabelle Heyerdahl-King. Tom Hannan was kind enough to read a draft of my thesis and provide detailed feedback. I am also grateful to Bob John- ston for taking me on as a PhD student after the departure of Andrew from Sheffield in my final weeks of study. The University of Sheffield provided me with a scholarship that supported this endeavour. Thanks also go to my parents and friends for supporting me over the past years. Abstract In this thesis I explore population processes in the Upper Palaeolithic of Southwest France. Traditionally, prehistorians have regarded the region as a `refugium' during the Last Glacial Maximum, into which populations contracted during periods of climatic deterioration in Europe.
    [Show full text]
  • Post-Invasion Demography of Prehistoric Humans in South America Amy Goldberg1*, Alexis M
    LETTER doi:10.1038/nature17176 Post-invasion demography of prehistoric humans in South America Amy Goldberg1*, Alexis M. Mychajliw1* & Elizabeth A. Hadly1,2 As the last habitable continent colonized by humans, the site of Archaeological evidence of the initial peopling of South America multiple domestication hotspots, and the location of the largest is scarce, with many of the earliest sites found in Patagonia, despite Pleistocene megafaunal extinction, South America is central to geographic constraints and genetic data suggesting a north-to-south human prehistory1–7. Yet remarkably little is known about human colonization route1–6. Indeed, once there is evidence of occupation, population dynamics during colonization, subsequent expansions, humans were already dispersed throughout the continent. Although and domestication2–5. Here we reconstruct the spatiotemporal humans are geographically widespread, initial site and date densities patterns of human population growth in South America using a suggest low overall population sizes (Fig. 2a and Extended Data newly aggregated database of 1,147 archaeological sites and 5,464 Figs 1 and 2). However, because sea levels were ~ 100 m lower during calibrated radiocarbon dates spanning fourteen thousand to the interval of colonization and a coastal route of migration has been two thousand years ago (ka). We demonstrate that, rather than a hypothesized, the earliest archaeological sites may be on the continental steady exponential expansion, the demographic history of South shelf that is now underwater3–6. Americans is characterized by two distinct phases. First, humans Small human population sizes are almost immediately followed by spread rapidly throughout the continent, but remained at low a rapid increase in the density of radiocarbon dates and the number population sizes for 8,000 years, including a 4,000-year period of of occupied sites from 13 ka to 9 ka (Figs 2 and 3).
    [Show full text]
  • Demography of the Ðerdap Mesolithic–Neolithic Transition
    Demography of the Đerdap Mesolithic–Neolithic transition Mary Jackes, Mirjana Roksandić and Christopher Meiklejohn Abstract: Models for the Mesolithic–Neolithic transition are critically dependent on demographic variables. A major issue has been whether Mesolithic populations were stationary or increasing in demographic terms. The development of methods allowing for palaeodemographic comparison among archaeological skeletal samples provides the opportunity to test assumptions about the adequacy of samples and about changes in fertility during the European Late Mesolithic and Early Neolithic. Previous work has suggested that the Mesolithic was a period of stationary population in the far west and north of Europe, while the Neolithic brought with it a significant increase in fertility. We apply our standardized palaeodemographic methods to data from Ðerdap skeletal samples to examine whether period assignments need reassessment, and whether the Neolithic brought increased fertility to the Iron Gates region. Our conclusions indicate that continuing reassessment of the assignment of Lepenski Vir skeletons to archaeological periods is needed, that Mesolithic populations were stationary, and that there is a high probability for increased fertility rates in the Neolithic at Lepenski Vir. Keywords: Đerdap, demography, Mesolithic, Neolithic, transition, Lepenski Vir Introduction A key element of osteological work relates to the accurate determination of demographic variables. Problems involved The shift to food production and the Neolithic is one of the in the determination of skeletal age, especially in adults, are great transitions in human history. In this paper we will ex- important here (Jackes 1992, 1994, 2000). Whereas markers amine the evidence provided by skeletons excavated from the of sex in adult skeletons are relatively consistent throughout Đerdap sites in order to test whether, prior to the introduction the life span, age markers are dependent on the process of of agriculture, the Đerdap Mesolithic population was in- ageing itself.
    [Show full text]
  • The Demography of the Upper Palaeolithic Hunterâ
    Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 39 (2015) 193–209 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Anthropological Archaeology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jaa The demography of the Upper Palaeolithic hunter–gatherers of Southwestern France: A multi-proxy approach using archaeological data Jennifer C. French McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3ER, UK article info abstract Article history: Demographic change is increasingly cited as an explanation for many of the patterns seen in the Received 15 July 2014 Palaeolithic archaeological record, following the assumption of a relationship between population size Revision received 2 April 2015 and material culture espoused by dual inheritance theory. However, the empirical testing of this relation- ship relies on the ability to extract information about past population patterns from the archaeological record. Using the extensive and well-studied record of the Upper Palaeolithic (39,500–11,500 cal BP) Keywords: hunter–gatherers of Southwestern France as a case-study, this paper compares the evidence for changes Archaeological demography in relative population size as seen in three popular archaeological proxies for demographic change (site Upper Palaeolithic counts, site sizes, and occupation intensity estimates). These proxies present conflicting results across the Southwestern France Hunter–gatherers sequence; a finding which is explored through the impact of taphonomic biases and past research agen- das. Numbers of sheltered sites and quantities of retouched stone tools are suggested to be the most reli- able demographic proxies. The problem of equifinality of interpretation in archaeological proxies for demography is examined for the Aurignacian and Gravettian periods in the region, with changes in lithic raw material, faunal acquisition strategies, and hunter–gatherer mobility all potentially contributing to the patterns documented.
    [Show full text]
  • Archaeology, Demography and Life History Theory Together Can Help Us
    Archaeology, demography and life history theory together can help us explain past and present population patterns Stephen Shennan and Rebecca Sear Published in ‘‘Cross-disciplinary approaches to prehistoric demography’ issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, Series B, 2020 https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2019.0711 Abstract Population matters. Demography is both a cause and a consequence of human behaviour in other important domains, such as subsistence, cooperation, politics and culture. Demographers interested in contemporary and recent historical populations have rich data at their fingertips; the importance of demography means many interested parties have gathered demographic data, much of which is now readily available for all to explore. Those interested in the demography of the distant past are not so fortunate, given the lack of written records. Nevertheless, the emergence in recent years of a new interest in the demography of ancient populations has seen the development of a range of new methods for piecing together archaeological, skeletal and DNA evidence to reconstruct past population patterns. These efforts have found evidence in support of the view that the relatively low long-term population growth rates of prehistoric human populations, albeit ultimately conditioned by carrying capacities, may have been due to ‘boom-bust’ cycles at the regional level; rapid population growth, followed by population decline. In fact, this archaeological research may have come to the same conclusion as some contemporary demographers: that demography can be remarkably hard to predict, at least in the short term. It also fits with evidence from biology that primates, and particularly humans, may be adapted to environmental variability, leading to associated demographic stochasticity.
    [Show full text]
  • Reconstructing Prehistoric Demography: What Role for Extant Hunter-Gatherers?
    Received: 3 October 2019 Revised: 17 February 2020 Accepted: 6 October 2020 DOI: 10.1002/evan.21869 REVIEW ARTICLE Reconstructing prehistoric demography: What role for extant hunter-gatherers? Abigail E. Page1 | Jennifer C. French2 1Department of Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Abstract London, UK Demography is central to biological, behavioral, and cultural evolution. Knowledge of 2 Department of Archaeology, Classics and the demography of prehistoric populations of both Homo sapiens and earlier mem- Egyptology, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK bers of the genus Homo is, therefore, key to the study of human evolution. Unfortu- nately, demographic processes (fertility, mortality, migration) leave little mark on the Correspondence Abigail E. Page, Department of Population archeological and paleoanthropological records. One common solution to this issue is Health, London School of Hygiene and the application of demographic data from extant hunter-gatherers to prehistory. Tropical Medicine, London, UK. Email: [email protected] With the aim of strengthening this line of enquiry, here we outline some pitfalls and their interpretative implications. In doing so, we provide recommendations about the Funding information Leverhulme Trust, Grant/Award Number: ECF- application of hunter-gatherer data to the study of demographic trends throughout 2016-128; Medical Research Council, Grant/ human evolution. We use published demographic data from extant hunter-gatherers Award Number: MR/P014216/1; Wenner- Gren Foundation, Grant/Award Number: 9862 to show that it is the diversity seen among extant hunter-gatherers—both intra- and inter-population variability—that is most relevant and useful for understanding past hunter-gatherer demography. KEYWORDS demography, fertility, hunter-gatherers, life history, prehistory 1 | INTRODUCTION Our knowledge of demography in prehistory, however, faces one fundamental obstacle: the lack of direct data.
    [Show full text]
  • Demography and the Palaeolithic Archaeological Record
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Apollo Demography and the Palaeolithic archaeological record Jennifer C. French McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3DZ, UK Email: [email protected] Telephone: +44 (0)1223 338256 Abstract Demographic change has recently re-emerged as a key explanation for socio-cultural changes documented in the prehistoric archaeological record. While the majority of studies of Pleistocene demography have been conducted by geneticists, the archaeological records of the Palaeolithic should not be ignored as a source of data on past population trends. This paper forms both a comprehensive synthesis and the first critical review of current archaeological research into Palaeolithic demography. Within prevailing archaeological frameworks of dual inheritance theory and human behavioural ecology, I review the ways in which demographic change has been used as an explanatory concept within Palaeolithic archaeology. I identify and discuss three main research areas which have benefitted from a demographic approach to socio-cultural change; 1) technological stasis in the Lower Palaeolithic; 2) the Neanderthal-Homo sapiens transition in Europe, and; 3) the emergence of behavioural modernity. I then address the ways in which palaeodemographic methods have been applied to Palaeolithic data-sets, considering both general methodological concerns and the challenges specific to this time period. Finally, I discuss the ability of ethnographic analogy to aid research into Palaeolithic demography. Key words: Demography, Palaeolithic, hunter-gatherers, behavioural ecology, cultural evolution Introduction “Un des problèmes les plus irritants de la préhistoire paléolithique est celui qui est lié aux factuers démographiques” (Bordes et al.
    [Show full text]