ANTH 260 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Tell Halula, Aurochs, Cattle
3 Jun 2018
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Tuesday, April 17, 2018 Lecture Notes
Cattle 1: Domestication and Pastoral Ideology
Neolithic Goat Use
• Neolithic Southern Levant
o Cultivation of cereals led to a change in vegetation at the expense of perennials
and shrubs. This led to erosion and lessened absorption of rainfall.
o Goats don’t do as well with grasses, and need greater mobility. If not moved
around, they will make things worse by eating young shrubs and trees.
o They also are much more difficult to manage, and commonly eat agricultural
fields.
o They may have contributed to deforestation.
• Ain Ghazal: A Neolithic village that slowly became nomadic due to environmental
degradation
• Goats- A Human Partner
o Arid environments
o Hilly environments
o Independent
o Dairy
o Fabric production
o Manure
• What do we use cattle for? What kinds of relationships do people have with cattle?
• Wild Cattle- the Auroch (Bos primigenius)
o They are even-toed ungulates (artiodactyla).
o The Bovidae family appeared in the Miocene, and diversified with the spread of
savanna and grasslands. It lived in Europe, Asia, and N. Africa.
o Bos primigeniou has given rise to two taxa- Bos indicus and Bos Taurus.
o There are 800 breeds today and around 1.3 billion cattle.
• Distributions and Differences
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Document Summary
Neolithic goat use: neolithic southern levant, cultivation of cereals led to a change in vegetation at the expense of perennials and shrubs. This led to erosion and lessened absorption of rainfall: goats don"t do as well with grasses, and need greater mobility. What kinds of relationships do people have with cattle: wild cattle- the auroch (bos primigenius, they are even-toed ungulates (artiodactyla), the bovidae family appeared in the miocene, and diversified with the spread of savanna and grasslands. These are mainly, but not exclusively temperate zones: bos indicus (zebu) are commonly found in the tropics, and particularly dominant in south asia and africa, zebus have a hump, long face, upright horns, and a dewlap. They also have a slower metabolic rate and nutrient requirements- better adapted to droughts and food shortage. The african domestication could be admixture: near eastern domestication (bos taurus, middle euphrates- in the late 9th millennium (ca.
