Читать книгу Muddling Toward Frugality - Warren Johnson - Страница 14

Depending on one’s attitude toward progress, it could be said either that the single greatest achievement of the human race was made by women, or that all our problems can be blamed on them since there is every reason to believe that women invented agriculture over a long period of time. Just as women were prohibited from hunting by taboos, men generally did not gather plant foods. Women must have always been trying to find new ways to use plants since if this could be done the carrying capacity of the environment would be increased, and there could be a respite from the unpleasant task of population control.

The seeds of wild grasses were difficult to utilize. They had husks that had to be removed, in itself a difficult job; and then some way had to be found to cook the hard, nutlike grains so they could be digested. Sometimes they were parched on hot rocks, rather as popcorn is made; and sometimes they were allowed to soak in water, or hot rocks were added to cook them a bit to soften them for easier digestion. It is believed that the making of beer was stumbled onto in this way, and that it preceded the making of bread. But in both cases, the natural yeast in grains, when properly incubated, was adequate to produce beer and bread.⁵

Even though it was slow, time-consuming work to harvest the grains, thresh them, and make them edible, they were a highly nutritious food. If only one food was available to live on, the grains would be the best choice. They are closer to providing a balanced diet than any other single food.⁶ Grain not only contains the embryo of the young plant—the germ—but also all the nutrients and energy the young plant needs until it produces its own leaves and roots that enable it to grow on its own. That which sustains the young plant sustains us also. The grains have one other essential advantage; unlike most other foods they can be stored over long periods of time to provide an assured food supply as a protection against times of scarcity.

But the using of grains did not amount to agriculture. The growing of food probably required several thousand years to develop. The first cultivation of grains seems to have occurred in the Zagros Mountains above the Tigris and the Euphrates valleys, where wild wheat and barley can still be found growing. As with so many other foods, women must have found that if they collected all the grains off the plants there would be no crop the next year; the spirits punished them for being greedy. But even removing part of the crop of seeds gave an advantage to competing nonfood species of plants, so these competing plants were pulled out whenever possible; the first weeding. Perhaps then it was noticed that seeds that happened to get into the refuse heaps at the edge of camp did very well. This suggested that cleared, disturbed ground was good for growing grains and that fertilization was helpful too. The cultivators may have found that areas of loosened, cleared earth could be left around camps. They may have dug camp refuse into the areas and scattered some seeds there, so that when they returned to the camp next time there would be a supply of grain available. The final step was to plant a bigger field, stay by it all the time, watch over it, and build a permanent camp.

The men, of course, would have had nothing to do with this if they had a choice, but their choices became very constricted. As more food was slowly obtained by agriculture and more children could be supported, the men probably found that hunting was deteriorating. More hunters had to share the animals that were available. It became apparent that if animals were to remain a part of men’s lives they had to be protected from other hunters and herded from one feeding place to another. At this stage a very painful decision had to be made; either to settle down to agriculture—in effect to do women’s work—or to attempt to migrate somewhere so that men could continue a way of life based on animals. One theory is that in the splitting of the ways, the spirited ones took their animals and went north to the vast open space of central Asia and became herders. After domesticating the horse, they became the mounted warriors that periodically poured down into settled areas to the south, from Europe to Asia, and raided the people they considered debased, because the men did “women’s work” and deserved such a fate.⁷

But it was agriculture that led to the revolutionary changes. The oldest permanent agricultural settlements that have been found date from around 7000 B.C. in the hills of Iraq.⁸ Living in settlements permitted a number of advances that were not possible for nomads; permanent houses, pottery, and looms all quickly appeared. As the agricultural settlements expanded—for now there was no reason to restrain population growth—they moved farther down the hills. As they moved to the level land of the Tigris River Valley, the weather got hotter and modest irrigation systems became necessary to divert water from streams to the fields; but the result was higher crop yield and reduced risk of crop failure from inadequate rainfall.

However, as agricultural communities appeared, their stored grain supplies became very tempting to bandits who could make an easy living by raiding farmers and taking their grain. The farmers were defenseless against this plague, especially when the raiders were mounted on horses and carried spears with bronze tips. The actual process by which agriculturists lost their freedom is not known, but it is possible that they formed their own defensive units, only to have their own guards—once trained and outfitted—turn on them and demand more and more tribute, forcing the farmers to work harder and harder in order to satisfy their own defenders. Perhaps a chief guard declared himself king, built himself a fortified city, lived off the sweat of the farmers, and occupied himself by making war on neighboring areas. If so, he remained interested in agriculture, however, because if he could increase its productivity there would be a larger surplus to support his activities. He would be able to maintain a larger army and obtain more bronze for weapons and decorations for his women and his palace. He might have also patronized practitioners of science, math, and the arts. Astronomy was especially valuable in order to know the correct time to plant. But as Kenneth Boulding has remarked, early civilization was largely a protection racket. The evidence suggests that civilization originated only in those areas surrounded by hostile environments which did not permit enslaved peoples to escape.⁹

For the common man, the whole process of change from hunting and gathering to agriculture must have been a disaster. He went from being a proud member of an independent band of hunters that was intricately adapted to the environment to being a farmer tied to the soil, doing hard, boring work. Furthermore, he was exploited by tax collectors and mounted warriors. The Biblical legend of the expulsion from the Garden of Eden seems clearly to describe the invention of agriculture. The tree of knowledge was the knowledge of agriculture; “The tree was good for food,” and the woman took the first step—“She took the fruit thereof and did eat” (Genesis 3:60). The penalty was expulsion from the Garden and “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread” (Genesis 3:19). Most important, it was irreversible. Once the knowledge had been gained and populations had risen above the carrying capacity of the environment of the hunter and gatherer, there was no turning back. The expulsion from the Garden was final. “The Lord sent him forth from the Garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken” (Genesis 3:23). Mankind would henceforth live in an intimate relationship with the soil.