Background
The very first farmers
Wednesday 26 September 2012

In the Journal of Archaeological Science, Leiden archaeologist Corrie Bakels tells the story of the rise of agriculture in Europe. Agriculture developed some ten thousand years ago on different continents, and spread from there. European agriculture came from the Middle East and started with eight plants: legumes, grain that you can only buy at organic shops nowadays and flax. As thousands of years past and agriculture advanced slowly towards the northwest, some plants disappeared from this selection: lentils, chick peas and another legume, bitter vetch. Another crop was added: the poppy – perhaps prehistoric farmers liked a little opium now and then. There is adequate evidence for the presence of the crops, explains Bakels, but we do not know on what sort of land they were grown. Did the farmers set fire to the fields before using them for cultivation for a few years and then move on, or was it a more permanent situation?

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