Not a Black Flag

Another Pig Study

Another volley in the pig domestication war continues...

Now we have this study on pigs of the Biarzo shelter in Italy, where the authors suggest that the mtdna evidence could suggest pig domestication was a continuous, native process to Europe from the Mesolithic, not necessarily the chattel of farmers from the Near East.  (Their position seems more nuanced than this, but basically that's the gist)

Wild boar are wanderers unlike most vertebrates and don't have a particular routine, territory or migratory route.  This fluidity makes genetic phylogeny-geography analyses a little shaky IMO, never mind that pigs are the most prolific mammal of its size.  I think because of this, you may get results such as:

"We found that a rapid mitochondrial DNA turnover occurred during the Mesolithic, suggesting that substantial changes in the composition of pig mitochondrial lineages can occur naturally across few millennia independently of domestication processes.  Moreover, so-called Near Eastern haplotypes were present here at least two millennia before the arrival of Neolithic package in the same area."

And then sitting up in the coffin he began speaking:

"Consequently, we recommend a re-evaluation of the previous idea that Neolithic farmers introduced pigs domesticated in the Near East, and that Mesolithic communities acquired domestic pigs via cultural exchanges, to include the possibility of a more parsimonious hypothesis of local domestication in Europe."

Sorry, I'm very cynical on the existence of Islands of Excellence.  I don't see anything worthy of parsimonious treatment either.  Certainly there were intellectually curious individuals 50,000 or 100,000 years ago.  Why didn't they domesticate the boar if domesticating the boar is both beneficial and obvious?  Maybe that's because a lot of this comes down to culture and economics, like that of the ancient Near East, and not that of heathen, spear-chucker hunters. [See Also]

A sounder eating BBB's corn!

"...Larson in two seminal papers^10,35, affirms that pigs domesticated in the Near East were introduced into Europe..., but that soon after the genetic legacy of these pigs and their descendants were lost due to constant hybridization with European wild boars, replacement by pigs domesticated in Europe, or both. This hypothesis is based on two pillars: 1) temporal changes of mtDNA lineages in Europe are related to domestication, and 2) NE-Y mtDNA lineages appearing and then disappearing in some sites in Europe are genetic markers of Near Eastern domestic pigs. Clearly, our main results shake these pillars."

Fair enough.  Also, they make reference to a recent paper by Evin et al, 2015 (Ref 40 in the paper) showing a clear East-West division in the dental morphology of boars with Europe/North Africa on a western side and Russia/Near East on the other.  (In the above graphic you see essentially crosses between feral hogs and Russian boars)

Back to the pillars of parsimony.  Parsimony is savages domesticating the pig a hundred thousand years ago in Europe.  I'm being facetious, but seriously, if it is so self-evident to a hunter-gatherer to stockade a wild boar, then why wait?  The simplest explanation is that the husbandry here was done by husbandmen, with fences, knowledge, social structures, economies, etc.  I'll be satisfied to be proved wrong.

A somewhat related topic..


One interesting subject is the abhorrence to pork in the modern Middle East, which is sort of ironic given that this is likely where the pig was domesticated.  

The change in attitudes to pork appears to have been a slow process, first in the polytheistic religions and then followed by Judaism.  I came across Chapter 2 of this book: Eat Not This Flesh by Frederick J. Simoons (free via ebook) 
 

Vai, S. et al. The Biarzo case in northern Italy: is the temporal dynamic of swine mitochondrial DNA lineages in Europe related to domestication? Sci. Rep. 5, 16514; doi: 10.1038/srep16514 (2015). [link]

Interesting Corded Ware Grave

This is the silhouette grave of a Corded Ware person in Twello, Central Netherlands (published Jan 2015).  He or she was buried latitude-wise in a ditched rondelle, except looking North, in the center of a later Urnfield.  The vessel at the feet was Protruding Foot Beaker identified by the authors as a type 1d, after Lanting and VanderWaals (1976).  Here's an example of how this beaker is categorized (within the perspective of the 'Dutch Model', see chart on page 193)

The Twello Silhouette Grave.

After looking at the typo-chronological chart on page 193 of Folkens & Nichols, the following context will show why this as an interesting transitional grave.  Up to this point in the history of the Corded Ware in the Netherlands, the authors explain that daggers are made of Scandinavian flint in the PFB phase, suggesting a culture that is socially oriented to the North and East of Europe along with other things.

The beginning of the Dutch All-Over-Ornamented phase (confusingly interpreted as Bell Beaker, transitional from CW to BB, other times as a hybrid of the two) is typically associated with finer honey-colored flint from below the Paris region, called the Grand Pressigny flint.  The flint blade of this grave is neither, but is a ghost gray flint called Hesbaye flint, that come from a mine near Avennes, Belgian Wallonia.

Type 1d Protruding Foot Beaker after Lanting/VanderWaals 1976

The axe is also abnormal to a typical SGC flint battleaxe.  This one is made from grano-diorite, as they believe coming from the Hautes Fagnes area in eastern Belgian Wallonia.  This windsock change in resourcing prior to the AOO phase may reinvigorate some debate in the genesis of AOO beakers, particularly in the Lowlands.

Harry Folkens mentions in his paper on the "Background to Beakers" on page 19, that type 1d & 1e PFB's often are found among All-Over-Ornamented beakers (AOO he considers to be Bell Beaker as differentiated from many Dutch archaeologists), but AOO and Vlaardigan hillbillly ceramics also co-exist in the marshy lowlands of this transitional phase.

2631 – 2454 cal BC

This grave has the potential to be interpreted in a number of ways.  One group may say that this shows the correctness of Lanting and Van der Waals original evolutionary scheme in the Veluwe region (Central) Netherlands, from the type 1d phase to the AOO phase ushering in the Bell Beakers, expanding throughout the Netherlands.  (This is probably a good time to pause and refer to Harry Folkens simplified narrative of the Dutch Hypothesis to non-Dutchmen, which can illuminate a confusing topic)

Another way to look at this is that the PFB culture, and specifically its late type 1d phase, has come under the influence of outsiders, typified by the AOO Bell Beaker folk who are simultaneously extending their influence upon the Vlaardingen Culture of the North and West as well as the indigenous Corded Ware of the Central and East.  In this scenario, there still may be Corded Ware influence, but not from here.  Either way, this would be evidence of an intrusive network, disrupting an older network.

Or they are simple hybrids, a fission between two different cultures and peoples at the atomic level, possibly Maritime folk and PFB folk?  I think in a number of places we see Beakerized Corded Ware folk, the Lowlands may be one of those places.  I've commented before on the haplogroups of Northeastern Scotland, which may be evidence that some Corded lineages fared better in the West, like the Lowlands, fared better than others.

Finally...
The Dutch were brewing wheat beers even when this Protruding Foot Beaker was buried as it contained a 'primitive wheat beer', which I guess is supposed to mean, un-hopped.* Also interesting is that the interior appears to have been glazed with animal fat.  Glazing the lining beakers with wax and animal fat is noted by (Heron and Evershed 1993; Charters and Evershed 1995).

See also
Dutch Chronology Revisited, Sandra Beckerman (2012)

A Late Neolithic Single Grave Culture burial from Twello (central Netherlands): environmental setting, burial ritual and contextualisation
Lucas Meurkens, Roy van Beek, Marieke Doorenbosch, Harry Fokkens, Eckhart Heunks,
Cynthianne Debono Spiteri, Sebastiaan Knippenberg, Els Meirsman, Erica van Hees and Annemieke Verbaas (2015)  [Link]

* A little more on gruits, Reinheitsgebot,etc.   (I'd roll the dice and guess that a juniperberry-based gruit, such as Finnish Sahti, was common among the Northern Corded Ware**)

Dublin Archaeology Hosts Fitzpatrick* Beaker Seminar (Updated

**Updated**

Thanks to Jean for pointing out that I kept calling Andrew Fitzpatrick, Kirkpatrick.  What's bizarre is that I googled Andrew Fitzpatrick to find his book, then referenced it below as Kirkpatrick's book.
Call it dyslexia I guess!  Anyhow, it is Dr. Andrew Fitzpatrick.

"The Amesbury archer- Migration and Knowledge in the Copper Age"

The UCD blog has a report by Emily Glenn-Farrell of a seminar this last week by Andrew Fitzpatrick (15 Oct 2015).  Most everything is it is fairly straight down the middle, although some points are more controversial.

Fitzpatrick expressed some skepticism about the role of Northern Europe in the Beakerization of the Isles, instead emphasizing Spain and France.

He also mentioned that Beakers must have had peaceful relations with the natives, otherwise they wouldn't have had the mobilty and freedom to interact the way they did.

See UCD blog 

**Update 11/1**
I thought I'd add plug Andrew Fitzpatrick's book:

"The Amesbury Archer and the Boscombe Bowmen: Bell Beaker Burials at Boscombe Down, Amesbury and Wiltshire"

A lot of it is available FREE via the link, the entire book is $16.50

Happy Halloween!