Approximately 12,800 years ago, Earth witnessed a monumental event: a fragmented comet collided with the planet’s atmosphere, causing a huge explosion and triggering major environmental changes.
Due to this event, a new study published in the journal Science Open: Airbursts and Cratering Impacts, suggests that agriculture, the basis of modern civilization, had a cosmic and unexpected origin.
According to a team of international researchers, the impact of this comet forced prehistoric hunter-gatherers residing in Abu Hureyra, located in modern-day Syria, to adopt agricultural practices in an attempt to ensure their existence.
The researchers delved into the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesiswhich postulates that a planetary cooling event that occurred almost 13,000 years ago was the consequence of a cosmic impact.
The cosmic catalyst for agriculture
Professor James Kennett, affiliated with the University of California, Santa Barbara, shed light on this transformative period in the study, stating: “In this general region, there was a change to more humid conditions, with forests and with diverse food sources for hunter-gatherers, to drier and colder conditions when they could no longer subsist solely as hunter-gatherers.”
Abu Hureyra, where this cosmic drama unfolded, is famous among archaeologists for preserving evidence of the earliest known transition from food gathering to agriculture. Professor Kennett highlighted this change and explained: “The villagers began to grow barley, wheat and legumes. This is what the evidence clearly shows.”
Unfortunately, today Abu Hureyra lies beneath Lake Assad, a reservoir formed by the construction of the Taqba Dam on the Euphrates River in the 1970s. However, before the flood, archaeologists managed to extract a large amount of material to examine it further.
Kennett highlighted the treasure trove of information they discovered: “The village’s occupants left an abundant and continuous record of seeds, legumes, and other foodstuffs.”
The researchers used these remains to analyze changes in the inhabitants’ diet, differentiating between the pre-impact period, when the climate was warmer and wetter, and the post-impact period, during the cold phase of the Younger Dryas.
Before the cosmic collision, their diet consisted mainly of legumes and wild grains, along with “small but significant amounts of wild fruits and berries.” However, as the climate became colder and drier, the post-impact era saw the disappearance of fruits and berries from their diet. Instead, they transitioned to domestic-type cereals and lentils, marking their initial foray into farming.
Over the next 1,000 years, Neolithic “founding crops,” including emmer wheat, emmer wheat, hulled barley, rye, peas, lentils, bitter pea, chickpeas, and flax, flourished in the region. now recognized as the Fertile Crescent.
At the same time, drought-resistant plants, both edible and inedible, became more prominent, reflecting the arid climate that followed the abrupt onset of the Younger Dryas period.
The researchers also discovered evidence of a “significant drop” in the area’s population and transformations in the settlement’s architecture, indicative of a more agrarian lifestyle. This included the initial domestication of livestock and other indicators of animal husbandry.
Research evidence includes a “massive” burn layer in the 12,800-year-old strata, signifying a shift from hunting and gathering to agriculture.
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