Rapid acceptance of foreign feather tradition in Bronze Age Europe

Not only metals, hierarchical societies and fortified settlements: a new food also influenced economic transformation during the Bronze Age about 3,500 years ago. This is evidenced by frequent archaeological discoveries of remnants of bromocorn mill (Panicum miliaceum L.), a grain with small, round grains. A major study by the Collaborative Research Center 1266 at Kiel University (CAU) was published yesterday (August 13) in the journal Scientific reports. It shows how ordinary millet came on the menu in Europe during the Bronze Age. Intensive trade and communications networks made the incredibly rapid spread of this new crop originate from the Far East.

“Wheat, maize and rice now dominate our agriculture. Miletus is considered a niche crop that is particularly suitable for bird seed,” explained Professor Wiebke Kirleis of CRC 1266. As this grain is once again gaining increasing attention as a gluten-free food , however, it makes the results of the study even more exciting, she added.

Miletus was domesticated in Northeast China in about 6000 BC. and was soon grown in staple. It is a drought tolerant, fast growing grain rich in minerals and vitamins. With a growing time of just 60 to 90 days from sowing to harvest, it was grown by both farmers and pastoralists, and was consumed by both humans and pets. Over thousands of years, pastoral groups scattered millet west of East Asia. The first millet in Central Asia comes from archeological sites in Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and the Kashmir Valley and is dated to about 2500 BC.

“In Europe, strangely, bromine corn green has been found in many Neolithic sites, dating between 6500 and 2000 BC, depending on the region,” Kirleis said. Is it possible that millet was domesticated at the same time? Wheat, grass and our pets were only introduced to Europe thousands of years after they became stupid in the ‘Fertile Crescent’ – a region that stretches from the Persian Gulf through northern Syria to Jordan. Has there been a special relationship with China? Doubts about this hypothesis arose following the radiocarbon dating (14C) of a few millet mills in 2013. These small grains had infiltrated older archaeological layers via root canals and earthworm activity. When millet first appeared and was cultivated in Europe remained unknown.

A group of researchers from the Collaborative Research Center “Scale of Transformation” (CRC 1266), led by Wiebke Kirleis, set out to answer this question. They not only examined the spread of millet cultivation in Europe, but also focused their attention on the acceptance by the prehistoric population of these exotic grains and examined what agricultural and social phenomena were associated with this innovation.

When millet ripens in three months after sowing, it can be grown as a catch crop between the summer harvest and the winter sowing of wheat or barley in Central and Southern Europe. Further north, it probably served as a reserve crop as late frosts had destroyed the spring-sown crops. Surplus grain from the extra harvest increased food security and supported a constantly growing population.

Working with nearly thirty research institutes throughout Europe, archaeobotanists Dragana Filipović and Marta Dal Corso of the team led by Wiebke Kirleis, together with John Meadows of the Leibniz Laboratory for Radiometric Dating and Stable Isotope Research at Kiel University and the Center for Baltic and Scandinavian Archeology (ZBSA) in Schleswig, radio-carbon-dated millet of 75 prehistoric sites (6th-1st century BC) The results show that millet cultivation did not begin in the early Stone Age, but was first introduced around 1500 BC, and that the new crop was spreading unhappily fast over much of Central Europe 3500 years ago. “This indicates that there were extensive trade and communications networks during the Bronze Age. But the study also shows that millet was quickly and widely recognized as a versatile addition to the then bucket- and barley-dominated cuisine,” he concluded. Kirleis.

Mill apparently speaks along established trade routes for bronze objects (including weapons), gold and amber. These transformation processes of nutritional strategies and their social dimensions are a major issue for CRC 1266. Future research in CRC 1266 will examine what social dynamics were associated with the introduction of this new food during this distinct period of upheaval in European prehistory, if at all. productive and connected world of the Bronze Age Europe was also a stage for conflict. Evidence of field battles and numerous fortifications are this testimony.