> But there's the question of why someone should sacrifice so many domesticated animals just to discover another food source (after all, they already had animal

> But there's the question of why someone should sacrifice so many domesticated animals just to discover another food source (after all, they already had animals). You aren't necessarily sacrificing the animals, you are putting them at risk with the hope that they will be okay. Discovering more food sources was absolutely critical for subsistence living. The more potential sources for food the more able you were to stave off starvation (or stockpile extra food for hard times or trading). >I mean, how would someone come up with the idea of mixing non-food with ash? There are a variety of ways, even if it wasn't done spontaneously. Maybe the bucket of ash next to the fireplace spilled on some food. Rather than throwing the food away, why not try feeding it to the pig and see if its palatable? Maybe there was a forest fire that left a layer of ash over all the food, and there was no choice but to try to eat some. Over the course of time and the multitudes of people incidents like this were inevitable.