The Neolithic artefact that ensured our survival - BBC REEL 

Yet the population growth that having more children resulted in lead directly to war over increasingly rare resources.

@@Shaun.Stephens Good point. Hunger and jealousy have caused many conflicts.

Of course, more people would have more babies and war for resources would increase. But in reality, the human species is very warlike, with males larger than females, indicating male aggression, which is still very common in hunter/gatherer cultures that still survive today. It is refreshing and it happens only because the role of females, in general, did not include making war, but rising babies, I am sure those spoons were made by women, while the men made the spears and knives.

@@Shaun.Stephens Yes , population growth , and beside the war many clever people were born , and possible the first genius like prehistoric Einstain.

@@psicologamarcelacollado5863 Pretty much no current, peer-reviewed, source in the field of anthropology would agree with you, but okay. You're spouting cultural myths, not scientific facts.

Set me thinking the same way. I was also brought up on porridge, but before this, it never occurred to me how that linked me to ancestors 10,000 years ago. Something so simple, yet quite something to think about.

Thanks, I was about to ask.

Yep. Wet soft cooked grains.

Thanks:)

Abso-fricken-lutely!

I read somewhere, honor your father (responsibility for entire household) and mother (caretaker for all who couldn't do so on their own. Elderly and sick as well as very young). And you will live long and prosper!

Nowadays Motherhood and Family are Dirty Words. Government is now Father and Mother.

Parenting is still hard for those who wish their children to succeed. In our modern society there is an ever increasing number of things which we must figure out and be ready to do if we want our children to succeed. Unfortunately, many parents treat their kids like pet humans. They seem to thing that all you need to do is feed it and clothe it, and somehow the rest will automatically follow. This is the primary reason we have so many kids who are failing and getting into trouble.

You must have a hard time eating soup 🤔

Because this is new research. Previously it was unknown what the tiny spoons were used for.

In a nutshell, until not too long ago most archaeologists were men who, by and large, clearly did not look at these artifacts with the eyes of mothers used to feeding their own babies. Also, they worked (and still do in many ways) in patriarchal institutional structures that valued other types of information more. Similar to how seat belts, medicine and much else is made for the average white male often to the detriment of a majority of the world’s population. There are so many examples of this kinda thing out there. This is a particularly fascinating one, though.

@@rdklkje13 😳😳😳 wow!! That's what you saw??? WOW not everything is figured out immediately when people do archeological excavations. Sometimes things take time. Especially stone age things.

@@mysteriousdude280 you are partially right, but partially very wrong. Yes, it can take a long time to decipher something. But it also depends on who is deciphering. Men and women are still largely socialised quite differently, and grow up with different biases in perception. This continues to science as well. So it is only logical that these spoons which were known for many decades were not identified as anything of purpose until more and more women worked in that area and added new theories, one of which proved to be true. Same as with ornithology. It was only recently discovered, and by a woman, that female birds of the ‘singing’ species sing as well as males. Why was this not identified before? Darwin wrote that only males sing, and for decades no ornithologist (who are still mostly men) really cared to check that assumption. As more women came to that area, one finally proved that assumption to be wrong.

@@iz6566 Indeed. Might be worth adding that when you study Archaeology and related fields nowadays this will be pointed out in a first (or second) year History of Archaeology/Anthropology/Sociology etc course if your department is worth its mettle. Same goes for the eurocentricity of these disciplines. Nothing new here if you know the field.

Probably because scientists rarely researched motherhood. I believe that there are many more objects in the archaeological remains that indicate baby care. We just need to start looking for them.

You have zero evidence for your contention, and are viewing these artifacts with the much more informed mind of the 21st century. You’ve never examined the spoons yourself, and you obviously missed the clear grooved marks of the milk teeth on the wood of the spoons in the photos provided. If you look closely at them, you will see some are clearly grooved from the food being repeatedly scraped against milk teeth, yet you can confidently contend that you know better! It’s therefore obvious that you’re not a scientist bc you’re happy to create facts that are clearly not in evidence! If the spoons had been used for teething, there would have been evidence of chewing on them instead of the sliding grooves which are clearly visible. Not only that, but I give the Neolithic mothers credit for not giving wooden implements to their children for the purpose of teething, bc I’m sure they were aware that giving their babies splintering wood objects to alleviate the effects of teething would introduce wooden slivers into their babies’ tongues and esophaguses. I’m opining that bone was used for this purpose.

I think she meant the agricultural revolution made grains available for baby food, which allowed mothers to wean their babies sooner, which in turn allowed them to have more children. The spoons are evidence that they were feeding their babies with this grain based baby food.

@@mh8704 Yes, and 2-3 baby's per woman + child mortality would put the average close or below the 2.1 replacement rate. Add a war or famine and you are looking at a shrinking population. Push the average up by 1 baby per woman and you are at a much better chance of at least a stable population.

Hi, 1=Teeth have rings, like trees. Experiences that change the amount of calcium available in the body can be seen in changes to the rate of calcium accumulation in teeth. Pregnancy requires large amounts of calcium for the growing fetus: slow growth period for teeth. Disease and malnutrition also leave records on teeth. 2= A child’s bones accumulate calcium as they grow. Calcium from different sources will likely have different chemical signatures. The varied diet of a human mother will produce calcium different from the milk of strictly herbivorous domesticated animals or from seafood or other dietary calcium sources.

@@procrastinator41 Amazing. Thank you.

I noticed that too! There are so many things men just wouldn’t think of unless they already had their own family, and maybe not even then! A supreme reason for the education and participation of women in this world. Somebody educate the Afghans please???

@@catherinewilson1079 It's not just the Afghans who need educatin. Look at half of the Americans.

What are you talking about?? m how doyou know that male archeologists didn't consider this?? I am from Serbia and i don't think that our male prophesors do what you crazy american feminist think. It is just new research , and that is it.

@@radepiljov7969 you are quite wrong and I am not American.

It was so called "danube valley civilization" and other rivers through Balkans and eastern Europe to Black sea. I was surprised how they are very well connected in that time.

Having to read the subtitles, I don’t think she means there was no culture prior to sedentary living, simply that this was what cultural developments had led to at this point and place in human existence.

@@rdklkje13 Depends on how you define culture. Today we are settled alright, but far from cultured by any definition.

From what I understand, the current thinking is that semi/nomadic people wouldn’t have had the time or stability for anything extra. No spare time to ponder or create much in the way of anything above feeding and clothing themselves.

@@tara5742 Pretty much, you need to settle down to grow crops, a reliable food source but also one that could create surplus. As such, not every member of that society would have to devote themselves to food production, unlike in hunter gatherers/nomads. This allowed people to specialise in certain skills and for the massive acceleration of cultural development. Of course culture was present before this, it just progressed more slowly. It's still accelerating today as less of the worlds population has to continuously worry about having enough to eat.

Huehuehue

The men did the f*cking, the woman did all the rest of the work.

@@seandepoppe6716 I don't think they would necessarily have had the same backward ass attitude that so many seem to in our century Sean.

@@kimblecheat he's prolly right on tho

tu smo

Likely whatever animal had been killed for food that had the proper sized bones.

@@katrussell6819 WOW ! Really ? You think ? I was interested because all animals have hollow bones. Yet this carving seems to be almost solid.

I feel like this maybe lamb or sheep bones~ what do you guys think?

@@edwardfletcher7790 All animals have [some] hollow bones but not all animal bones are hollow.

@@davidbennett9691 OK , that's my point, which non hollow ones were used.

Million dollar question: Do you still have that paper?

Actually, the trend now is for grandparents to be actively involved in care of their grandchildren, to allow the parents the time to do paid work.

@@daniellamcgee4251 Both trends are happening at once. Many boomer grandparents are not so much "cast off" as too busy with the new normal of "enjoying retirement" to want to mess with child rearing again, or because of the economics they are themselves still working. In the case that grandmothers are rearing young, that is often not a choice so much as the only way the family unit can make the economics work... it is impossible to run the household on one income and daycare is impossibly expensive as well. In fact in the USA, daycare is now so expensive that it doesnt even make economic sense for a mother to go back to work because that extra income wont even pay for daycare. So families with a willing grandmother are really the only ones able to have the mother go back to work.

@@patreekotime4578 Yes, that all makes sense. I don't actually know the statistics, and you would know more about the USA than me. I know that also there are clashes with grandparents over child-rearing, choice of spouse, etc , so there can be rifts in the family. I was just going on the observational trend where I live. There are a lot of grandparents collecting kids from school, etc. etc. I know grandparents in their 60s who look after their grandchildren around their own work hours. With wages so low, and child care so high in the US, I can understand why grandparents supporting with child care would be the only option. But even if not a necessity, it's often the best option. Depending on the grandparent! Some people, in general, aren't fit to be involved in child rearing. Including some parents! I moved away from my family, so ended up single-parenting without that support of extended family to assist in daily life, including financially. But I have no idea how I would have survived in the US! Working in various forms of healthcare, I have met grandparents, and great-grandparents in their 70s, 80s, and 90s who have been, as the OP, put it 'cast off' by family. In some cases, it's the elderly person who disconnected from their children's family. I do understand what the O.P. is writing about. Just the greater trend where I live appears to be involvement with child rearing. But maybe it depends on age, and I haven't seen enough of aged care to see if the trends are equal.. Maybe I am just seeing the grandparents who are out and about, and not on cruises etc! I appreciate your understanding and perspective regarding trends in the USA. Thanks for your comment, which obviously got me thinking! :-)

@@daniellamcgee4251 I don't see that "trend" in the U.S. at all, but I greatly hope to - for a whole variety of reasons. Currently there's still too much geographic mobility and cultural norms of the nuclear family and relatively independent seniors. These aspects of our culture have probably also influenced how compatible people generally are in multi-generational living. There are necessary "people skills" for that. Maybe economic changes will help eventually.

Major fubar to also say the women give birth! Now WHY would they say that?

Yes , we in Serbia are not still lost our mind like Americans and Brits.

I am from Serbia and you are absolutly right. We are mix of slavic people(original Serbs) and old romanized people from Balkans(ilyrians). And of course we got big greek influence too.

source about the diet and disease thing?

I'd rather have that than having to stalk animals in the savanna only to get chomped down by a lion.

The source is Guns Germs and Steel

I agree, that sounded a bit ... problematic and kinda like internalized sexism. Even though the general topic makes sense from a population dynamics point of view. Without that, humans might have had a harder time establishing. Still, how she put it was not very nice.

If they were only having 2 or 3, there is no population increase whatsoever. 2 only replaces the mother and father when they die. 3 is bare minimum because of accidental death. We would not have grown as a species without agriculture and the ability to have more children than just enough to replace us. Of course I think the 10 to 13 of later years is a bit much, but at least there was usually enough food to keep them alive. That’s improvement. We would never have survived any major disasters if we were always living on the edge of extinction.

"Pump out?" How ugly you make sound, a great, privilege, joy & comfort. You indoctrinated feminists are so blinded by hate and rhetoric that it's the most noticeable thing about you.

👍👍👍

Well that would be very sexist of you Olga13, for shame.

Nobody knows for sure ..

Artefact is the British spelling, and this video was produced by the BBC, i.e., BRITISH Broadcasting Corporation.

Yeah it would be more accurate to say something like”how prehistoric European people survived”. Most of the people indigenous to the Americas lived a lifestyle comparable to the Eurasian Neolithic as well as in Africa and Australia as you mentioned. Would like to know if any of those populations had a similar demographic expansion prior to European contact. Archaeology is still pretty Eurocentric, although that’s changing

@@jamessarsgard1342 you do realize most of Africa had iron making knowledge ages before the modern Europeans came to Africa, so life was way advanced than neolithic Europe even before "the coming of Europeans" to Africa. Also it's very hard to find such biodegradable historic things in Africa because of the climate and environment but yeah advancements in agriculture allowed "BANTU" to spread all over subsaharan Africa, which I bet involved baby food

So, they got stuck in this part of the tech tree?

How petty, when ego is involved.

Lol Ok

Reading!?! In this day and age?!? How Daaare they!

@@olorin4317 lol. I just was not in the mood.

How inconvenient of the scientist explaining the artifacts not to have learned English specifically to be able to communicate with you in the way you choose.

Most people watching educational videos can read Apparently some who can't, can somehow still comment