Conclusion

The cardinal problems in Western Asia are those of transition among indigenous societies; in Europe, those of the introduction and adoption of an already formed cultural complex in which the domestication of animals and plants, if the decisive economic factor, was not the total content of the new pattern. Our basic evidence for early agriculture is provided by animal and plant remains in archaeological contexts, as organic artifacts side-by-side with the products of material culture in inert substances. Archaeologists on occasion get hooked on pots and take ceramic trips, forgetting that one should not rate the container above the contents, the stew-pot over the stew. Certain parts of animals may be accepted as food, others rejected: we need look no further than our own society to be reminded for instance of ambivalent attitudes towards what we uncompromisingly call Offal, and American cook-books more delicately designate Variety Meats.

Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Computer Science · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology