Reconstructing Early Hominin Diets

The elevated health risks associated with high-fat, energy-dense, and possibly protein-dense diets underscore the need to determine the natural diet for humans (Gaulin and Konner, 1977; Eaton, Shostak, and Konner, 1988), if one actually exists. The fossil record indicates that our early apelike ancestors ate largely fruit and leaves (Milton, 1984). By 1.8 million years ago, however, Homo erectus looked similar to us from the neck down and was hunting/scavenging significant quantities of meat from large animals in addition to gathering plant foods and, when available, seasonally, smaller fauna such as insects (Shipman and Walker, 1989). This change involves a transition from diets based largely on simple sugars, complex carbohydrates, and plant proteins to diets that include animal fat and protein (Schoeninger et al., 2001b). As other chapters in this volume indicate, data from living primates, fossil primates, modern human foragers, and bone chemistry all have been used to elucidate when various dietary changes occurred throughout human evolution. For each of these approaches, however, we must assess the quality of the data and, based on that assessment, clearly identify what we know versus what is, perhaps, unknown but knowable.

Archaeology · Biology · Fauna · Geography · Homo erectus · Human health · Zoology · Diet and metabolism studies · Ecology

• Revised Energy Conversion Factor for Inulin-Type Fructans and Implications for Resource Ranking in Optimal Foraging Theory

  Open Access•Jeff Leach, Jeff D Leach•North American Archaeologist•2009

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