The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory: Why did Foragers become Farmers?

by Graeme Barker

Overview

The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory addresses one of the most debated and least understood revolutions in the history of our species, the change from hunting and gathering to farming. Graeme Barker takes a global view, and integrates a massive array of information from archaeology and many other disciplines, including anthropology, botany, climatology, genetics, linguistics, and zoology. Against current orthodoxy, Barker develops a strong case for the development of agricultural systems in many areas as transformations in the life-ways of the indigenous forager societies, and argues that these were as much changes in social norms and ideologies as in ways of obtaining food. With a large number of helpful line drawings and photographs as well as a comprehensive bibliography, this authoritative study will appeal to a wide general readership as well as to specialists in a variety of fields.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199281091
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	11/30/2006
Pages:	616
Product dimensions:	9.30(w) x 6.10(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

Graeme Barker is Disney Professor of Archaeology, and Director of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge.

Table of Contents

1. Approaches to the origins of agriculture2. Understanding foragers3. Identifying foragers and farmers4. The ‘hearth of domestication'? Transitions to farming in South-West Asia5. Central and South Asia: the wheat/rice frontier6. Rice and forest farming in East and South-East Asia7. Weed, tuber, and maize farming in the Americas8. Africa: Afro-Asiatic pastoralists and Bantu farmers? 9. Transitions to farming in Europe: ex oriente lux? 10. The agricultural revolution in prehistory: why did foragers become farmers?

Editorial Reviews

"Displaying a breathtaking mastery of a vast array of evidence, presented objectively and accurately, Graeme Barker has performed a great service in putting together this global overview of one of archaeology's great questions."—Paul G. Bahn, Times Literary Supplement

"Ideally suited to undergraduates and readers from other disciplines seeking an introduction to this key topic."—British Archaeology

From the Publisher