Origin of Wheat Traced Back to 2,000 Years Before Farming Started in Europe
People typically associate the introduction of cereals with farming. However, some findings from Britain seem to suggest otherwise. These discoveries imply that cereals possibly arrived through hunter-gatherers. Details regarding the specimens located in Bouldnor Cliff were published in the journal Science.
The cereal which is the subject of the study is wheat. Past examinations have revealed that farming started in Europe around 10,000 years ago, stated Nature. This practice spread from ancient Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) through the Mediterranean and central Europe. As per archaeologists, crop cultivation reached the British Isles six millenniums ago. Therefore, it was always believed by experts that wheat also arrived in Britain around this time frame. A team of researchers associated with the study announced in 2015 that the assertion was wrong. Wheat was possibly brought to the territory by hunter-gatherers.
The DNA specimens of wheat (Triticum) unearthed from Bouldnor Cliff, a prehistoric site that lies just off the Isle of Wight were noted to have similarities with Near Eastern strains. The remnants were dated back to 2,000 years before the dawn of agriculture in the region. The team did not find any evidence which indicated that wheat was grown at the site during that period. This made researchers conclude that the cereal arrived at the isles from the Balkans or the south of France, where Neolithic farmers had already begun the practice, possibly through trade or some kind of exchange. The discovery raises questions regarding the so-called transformation that happened from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic lifestyle.
The finding proved to experts that assertions regarding Mesolithic Britain having no connection with mainland Europe were not accurate. "Mesolithic Britain was not isolated from culturally more advanced mainland Europe as has been argued," says Robin Allaby, an anthropologist and plant geneticist at the University of Warwick in Coventry, U.K., who was involved in the study. "There was apparently some level of interaction, by trade or warfare or both. In any case, the peoples who frequented Bouldnor Cliff must have been aware of products and techniques developed in distant parts of Europe, and they seem to have imported goods and ideas to Britain."
However, researchers are not rejecting the claim that there could have been a land connection between Britain and Europe, which facilitated the wheat trading. The team believes that the population conducted exchanges with the help of boats. In their opinion, the water was so shallow that there was no need for a landform, primitive boats could do the trick for passage. The claim aligns with the detection of a boat-building yard at the same site.
Despite the DNA evidence, certain researchers are still hesitant to agree with the assertion that hunter-gatherers had such widespread connections. "This seems too far for hunter-gatherer networks to extend," Peter Rowley-Conwy, an archaeologist at Durham University said. "Artefacts such as flint blades and arrowheads that appeared around that time from Portugal to the Urals never made it to Britain — it’s hard to believe that wheat should." In his opinion, more findings from the particular period are needed to verify this postulation.