Upper Palaeolithic and Late Stone Age Human Diet

Abstract

Undoubtedly modern mankind is an omnivorous species. Nevertheless, types of diet changed at the time of anthropogenesis. The Upper Palaeolithic period is the crucial time because of the appearance of anatomically modern humans in Europe. The main goal in this period investigation is to find the Neanderthal man-Upper Palaeolithic man diet distinction. A sharp early Holocene rise in humidity and temperature and melting of the permafrost resulted in the complete destruction of traditional migration routes, campsite losses, and the flora and fauna of inland territories changing. All these factors affected nutrition patterns, too. The comparison of the different Mesolithic and Neolithic groups' diet patterns allow us to discuss problems of the influence of cultural and ecological factors. The bone tissue chemical concentrations (Ca, Zn, Sr, Cu) from Upper Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic burials are considered to reconstruct individual and group patterns of nutrition. The results of the atomic absorption method were used.

Earliest evidence for human consumption of crayfish

“…Therefore, wild animals were hunted selectively according to their fat content in the Neolithic period (Bartosiewicz, 2005). Freshwater crayfish are relatively small in size with low fat content, but they can be hunted readily without tools or weapons (Southgate et al, 1991;Dobrovolskaya, 2005). This is in agreement with the theory that humans began hunting small prey game in the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic (see, e.g., Lupo & Schmitt, 2002;Blasco, 2008).…”

“…Humans are characterized as opportunistic omnivores with diets containing a wide range of animal proteins (Speth, 1989;Southgate et al, 1991;Dobrovolskaya, 2005). In general, the diet of prehistoric humans is reconstructed by identifying plant and animal remains found during archaeological excavations.…”

DHCR7 mutations linked to higher vitamin D status allowed early human migration to Northern latitudes

“…The inhabitants of Europe during this period are thought to have had a diet that was rich in mammal and fish meat, which have a high vitamin D content [19-21]. In East Asia, in contrast, plant foods may have become increasingly important in the human diet with intensive exploitation of certain types of flora [22,23].…”

Fish as diet resource in North Spain during the Upper Paleolithic

“…Although in some cases the presence of fish remains at human sites has been attributed to predation by other mammals like fox and lynx (Rasilla Vives, 1990), studies on bone composition and others have evidenced that modern humans fed on fish (e.g. Flannery, 1969;Richards et al, 2001;Stiner, 2001;Dobrovolskaya, 2005) and other marine resources (Richards et al, 2005) during the Upper Paleolithic. Some authors suggest that massive consumption of fish was caused by the cold period that started with the Gravetian technocomplex (28 kya), as an additional food source besides herbivores (Djindjian et al, 1999;Carbonell, 2005).…”