TODA CAVE, UZBEKISTAN—While the development of agriculture is often associated with the Fertile Crescent, past research has shown that farming actually developed independently at different times and places around the world, including Africa, the Americas, and eastern Asia. New evidence from a cave in southern Uzbekistan continues to show that the advent and spread of agricultural technology is more complicated than originally thought, according to a statement released by the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology. Recent archaeological work in Toda Cave uncovered evidence that the region’s inhabitants were already engaging in sophisticated harvesting practices 9,200 years ago. Wear patterns on stone tools found at the site indicate that the community was cutting wild barley, grasses, and other plant material with sickle-type blades. This new research demonstrates that peoples living far north and east of the Fertile Crescent had already developed cultivation techniques similar to those used by farmers in the Middle East. “This discovery should change the way that scientists think about the transition from foraging to farming, as it shows how widespread the transitional behaviors were,” said Xinying Zhou of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology in Beijing. Read the original scholarly article about this research in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. To read about recent reevaluation of an ancient Serbian community that scholars initially believed exhibited evidence of foraging and agricultural traits, go to "Farmers and Foragers."
