Earliest planted crops.

[TeeDee]

One for the ethnobotanists , so what from historical records do we believe were the mainstay intentional crops ?

So intentionally replanted and havested as part of a strategy between hunter gathers to farmer.
What evidence do we have fro this and do we have an idea of what other crops in other parts of the world were the first to be intentionally cultivated?

 

[Broch]

Do you mean in Britain or worldwide?

 

[Glow_worm]

You're likely meaning arable crops, but I have a feeling that hunter gathers would likely have been increasing the abundance of other useful plants- such as hazlenut trees- long before the rise of 'farming'.

 

[Pattree]

Globally and making a few assumptions I can conjecture:

By the transition from Mesolithic to Neolithic various hominids had spread beyond Africa and recent study of the migration of homo sapiens has become complicated. However it is generally agreed that we walked out of the Horn of Africa.

That being the case I’d guess that one of the earliest crops would have injara. It’s a cereal like a very fine grass seed grown in the Horn. Sorghum (false banana) and plantain is also still common there.
Millet and maize might have been grown but the ones that I’ve seen are modern cultivars.

I have no idea when the first root crops were planted rather than foraged. I remember film (1960’s) of traditional cultures in both Africa and the Malay archipelago that still foraged yams rather than cultivate them.

 

[Toddy]

It's known of in the Mesolithic, and there are good evidences for earlier too.
Read an article not so long along with claims that the Neanderthals gardened.

Hunter gatherers who wander do so along 'traditional routes', and they will preferentially favour through areas where seasonal abundance is available.

We still gather and scatter seed as we walk today; our ancestors were no different.

Munch some fruit, throw the seeds further away kind of thing must have been so common.

Do you mean actual farming, or just the random 'guerilla gardening' that we still do ?

Small patches of something particularly desirious ? that I can see folks doing.

Choosing the best and deliberately planting it in a chosen spot, that's another step along the way to actual crop production.
It's how we went from tiny wee grains to decent sized ones worth grinding.

We know that there are many centres of this kind of development, from China to the South Americas, from Africa through India, the Fertile crescent, the Balkans.....Western Europe doesn't seem to develop this much though, good fruit varieties apart.
No idea why, we had easy growing in the loess soils along all the rivers.

 

[Tengu]

There would be forest gardening, practiced by many cultures to this day.

But that is quite different to the idea of clearing a patch of land and sowing it with seed.

 

[Toddy]

One for the ethnobotanists , so what from historical records do we believe were the mainstay intentional crops ?

So intentionally replanted and havested as part of a strategy between hunter gathers to farmer.
What evidence do we have fro this and do we have an idea of what other crops in other parts of the world were the first to be intentionally cultivated?

You asked from 'historical records' though.

You need to look at the Chinese, Korean and Fertile Crescent areas for those. South America's carving are probably the best we can do there, but their tally strings are a gold mine of information if they can be deciphered.

 

[haptalaon]

I have just been reading After the Ice which certainly has the answer to your question, but my memory is very poor.

I know that in the historic record, the emergence of wheat or rice as demonstrated by either wheat grinding tools or ceramic boiling pots is seen as a significant marker for a switch to settled communities. But apparently wheat self-domesticated (can't quite remember the details. modern wheat waits for the farmer, whereas ancient wheat would have a range of behaviours. The way ancient people used wild wheat selected for that behaviour over time.)

 

[TeeDee]

To clarify
In the Europe area ( as a primary question ) what would have been planted in intentionally cleared areas.

I get what you are saying about accidental guerrilla type gardening so I suppose what I'm asking is what crop was the first for having an expected and anticipated outcome from. I plant this to get this type thing.

 

[Pattree]

The historical record won’t be much use as the practice long predates writing in Europe. You’re into some very patchy archeology.

 

[Toddy]

Here you go.....it's a start to what is an enormous field of literature, research and on-going discussions.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0305440312004736#:~:text=Cereals%20were%20present%20at%20many,wheat%2C%20einkorn%20wheat%20and%20flax.

 

[Broch]

Whereas the evidence is that emmer wheat was probably the first farmed crop in Britain (it is more suited to Britain's wet and cold climate) I'm with Glow_Worm - we shouldn't ignore hazel. It almost certainly didn't arrive in Britain on its own. As a heavy seeded plant it shouldn't have been here until a thousand or so years later and yet it was a major food crop for the Mesolithic as well as the Neolithic. So, it was probably brought here when man returned after the ice age and spread as a food source that could be preserved to survive through winter.

 

[TLM]

In Finland barley, buckwheat, wheat, rye, hemp. First finds around 5300 BC.

 

[Toddy]

Whereas the evidence is that emmer wheat was probably the first farmed crop in Britain (it is more suited to Britain's wet and cold climate) I'm with Glow_Worm - we shouldn't ignore hazel. It almost certainly didn't arrive in Britain on its own. As a heavy seeded plant it shouldn't have been here until a thousand or so years later and yet it was a major food crop for the Mesolithic as well as the Neolithic. So, it was probably brought here when man returned after the ice age and spread as a food source that could be preserved to survive through winter.

It keeps well too. If you roast the nuts in their shells they won't sprout, but they'll last right through the years nice and safe and ready to be eaten when needed. There are lots of examples in archaeology of this with the hazels.

 

[Glow_worm]

Yes, hazelnuts must have been a hugely important part of diet in the more northern climes, as the archeological record hints. An important food supply for anyone journeying in those times too, the original trail mix ingredient!

Hemp is a curious one, it almost seems to have been deliberately erased from history. It has been part of our diet for a long time, and we are likely unhealthier now we are distanced from it. Ancient and nutritionally powerful stuff- with seeds containing all the amino acids and an ideal omega 3:6 ratio for humans. But any references to it are disproportionately small even in more recent centuries when it was grown in huge quantities.

 

[Broch]

Yes, hazelnuts must have been a hugely important part of diet in the more northern climes, as the archeological record hints. An important food supply for anyone journeying in those times too, the original trail mix ingredient!

Hemp is a curious one, it almost seems to have been deliberately erased from history. It has been part of our diet for a long time, and we are likely unhealthier now we are distanced from it. Ancient and nutritionally powerful stuff- with seeds containing all the amino acids and an ideal omega 3:6 ratio for humans. But any references to it are disproportionately small even in more recent centuries when it was grown in huge quantities.

Hemp isn't native to the UK; it is thought to have been brought by the Romans.

 

[TLM]

Pollen traces of hemp earliest about 4800 BC, direct evidence of cultivation around 400 BC here. As a guess it came from the east.

 

[Toddy]

The British bit split off from the continent around 6,500 bce, so before it could seed here.

 

[demented dale]

Yes, hazelnuts must have been a hugely important part of diet in the more northern climes, as the archeological record hints. An important food supply for anyone journeying in those times too, the original trail mix ingredient!

Hemp is a curious one, it almost seems to have been deliberately erased from history. It has been part of our diet for a long time, and we are likely unhealthier now we are distanced from it. Ancient and nutritionally powerful stuff- with seeds containing all the amino acids and an ideal omega 3:6 ratio for humans. But any references to it are disproportionately small even in more recent centuries when it was grown in huge quantities.

Is hemp edible then as a food source? I didn't know that. Have you got any info on that please? x

 

[Glow_worm]

Hemp seeds without the shell (hemp hearts) are incredibly nutritious, as is cold pressed hemp oil, both available these days from health food shops, online and often even in supermarkets. Going back to the seeds, the shells contain compounds which block the absorption of nutrients so hemp hearts are the better bet

The foliage was used for feeding livestock in the past, and the stems produced fibre which clothed people and provided ship's rigging in the days of sail- Nelson's navy for example used mind boggling amounts of hemp rope.

Current thinking is hemp spread from China through Asia into Europe.

It's amazing stuff, grows on poor land and doesn't need to be drowned in toxic pesticides. But despite not having any psychoactive compounds, there is still a stupid stigma around growing industrial hemp for the fibre or seeds- lots of regulation and licences required etc. Perhaps it's dangerously healthy? Anyway, there are a lot of individuals and organisations working hard to promote the stuff and get it grown on a large scale again, which is reassuring to see.