8 ms·

Oldest Fortresses in the World Discovered

163 points by wglb 3y ago

psiops 3y ago
If you like this sort of stuff, I recommend The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, a 2021 book by anthropologist and activist David Graeber, and archaeologist David Wengrow. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dawn_of_Everything https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dawn_of_Everything
- adolph 3y ago
  The paper cites Graeber and Wingrow: [Findings like this fort] can contribute to the critical re-appraisal of narratives of linear pathways to social change increasingly explored in both scientific and popular debates (e.g. Dan-Cohen Reference Dan-Cohen2020; Graeber & Wengrow Reference Graeber and Wengrow2021). https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/worlds-oldestknown-promontory-fort-amnya-and-the-acceleration-of-huntergatherer-diversity-in-siberia-8000-years-ago/90559E4105F93528A6552B36C7236259 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/wo... edit: on second read this comment came across to me as not supportive of the parent comment, which was not intended. I second the recommendation of reading Graeber and Wengrow, and was happy to see them directly cited. “The Dawn of Everything” does include some lengthy polemical content. Even if the authors point of view isn’t to one’s own aesthetic or political sensibility: skip ahead, it is still worth reading the whole thing.
- maximinus_thrax 3y ago
  I love everything David Graeber wrote, including this book. But this is a book that reliably puts me to sleep. I had trouble finishing it when I first read it, it took me almost two months to read it as I kept falling asleep. I suffer from the occasional insomnia, so I bought this book and whenever I feel like my hypothalamus is not cooperating, I try to read a chapter. Works like a charm.
epolanski 3y ago
I always find it sad that our history knowledge is so incomplete. I wish humans learned to write earlier and more globally. We know virtually nothing of so many civilizations.
- 082349872349872 3y ago
  Having enjoyed Durant & Durant's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Civilization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Civilization in short doses, I once tried to read through multiple volumes of them in a row; after a certain point it just becomes a blur of people being awful to each other. (and that's less than 2% of human history)
  - gostsamo 3y ago
    Blame mainly awful people who liked to brag how awful they were and what awful things they did to other people. When writing down the history of stuff and people, it was too expensive for ordinary folks to engrave on stone how they optimized their crops or how they improved weaving.
    - hellojesus 3y ago
      While awful by today's standards, they recorded their feats because those awful actions allowed their civilization to thrive, even at the cost of others' perishing. Plus, by boasting of your awful deeds, you're more likely to dissuade would-be challengers. It would be lovely if we had knowledge from the common man from throughtout history, but the common man wasn't typically the reason for domminance.
  - arp242 3y ago
    > after a certain point it just becomes a blur of people being awful to each other. I suppose the internet is a fairly accurate reflection of human history. What a depressing thought.
    - bawana 3y ago
EdwardDiego 3y ago
It makes sense that you'd seek to retain occupation of prime spots for harvesting abundant seasonal protein and fats, especially when all the protein and fat is coming to you. I feel like our view of hunter-gatherers tends to be distorted by present day tribes who largely live in the tropics, where food abundance isn't so location dependent, or the San of Southern Africa who have a nomadic lifestyle necessitated by their harsher environment.
- sorokod 3y ago
  Distorted how? From the article: The abundance of natural resources in the Siberian taiga, such as annual fish runs and migrating herds, probably played a crucial role in the emergence of the hunter–gatherer forts
  - graphe 3y ago
    In our public consciousness hunter gatherers don't build anything ever. They just run around women are gathering berries and handling game meat with an aesthetic fire while the 90% muscle Chad hunter came back to his temporary cave with a new kill.
hyperthesis 3y ago
It may be difficult to find settlements older than 16,000 years ago, because sea levels were lower then, so their coastal settlements would now be underwater. Perhaps completely obliterated... or perhaps there is a coming age of discovery of their remnants? So-called "land bridges", connecting places, were huge places in their own right, not narrow "bridges", and (probably) prime land.
- kamaitachi 3y ago
  Very valid point - Doggerland comes to mind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doggerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doggerland
- ranulo 3y ago
  True, but we haven't found anything older than 12000 years, haven't we?
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    That's because people tend to settle near or in coastal plains. Coastal plains from 12000 years ago are ocean today.
  - BirAdam 3y ago
    That would depend upon what you are aiming to find. - The Lomekwi site shows stone tools that around 3 million years old. - Jericho is over 10 thousand years old. - Gobekli Tepe is at least 11 thousand years old with some nearby sites being at least 12 thousand years old. - The Cactus Hill site is at least 16 thousand years old. - Tel al-Qaramel is at least 12 thousand years old. - Theopetra is around 135 thousand years old. Obviously, some of these are more important than others. Theopetra just shows that some people built a wall (most likely to block wind) at a cave entrance, while Qaramel shows people having built large burial mounds. Jericho and the various sites at and near Gobekli show people having built cities. Importantly, the flooding of low coastal areas during glacial melt explains the rather "sudden" appearance of complex construction at both Jericho and Gobekli (and slightly later Sumerian and Indus Valley) sites. People would have fled those now under water areas quickly, and they'd have taken the story of the flood and devastation with them along with their knowledge of construction. Accordingly, we have a flood myth in Semitic culture and a super old city. We do not know the myths and legends of Gobekli, but it doesn't make sense for "primitive" hunter gatherers to have suddenly invented construction, sculpture, city planning, logistics, and so on. It makes far more sense that they'd have fled an older site that was flooded by glacial melt.
drewcoo 3y ago
> The Siberian findings, along with other global examples like Gobekli Tepe in Anatolia, contribute to a broader reassessment of evolutionist notions that suggest a linear development of societies from simple to complex. WARNING: Crazy train off the tracks! Evolution doesn't pretend to tell us about the social sciences. The creationists who call other people "evolutionists" would like us to believe that strawman so that evolution can be wrong.
- bratwurst3000 3y ago
  I Think the article states evolution in a social and not biological sense https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociocultural_evolution https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociocultural_evolution
- arp242 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - Geezus_42 3y ago
    That's not "internet culture war bullshit." Creationist have been finding ways to manipulate scientific discoveries to make it sound like they disprove evolution since Darwin published Origin of Species (1859).
    - arp242 3y ago
      There are no creationists in sight here. Obsessing and bad faith assumptions over the usage of a single word like this that is absolutely is internet culture war bullshit and completely toxic behaviour that's almost exclusively seen on the internet.
- sheepshear 3y ago
  It should be obvious what "evolutionist" means considering that it's explained in the sentence you quoted starting immediately after the word. If anything, it seems like you might actually want creationists to own the word. Crazy warning, indeed.
pulse7 3y ago
Does anybody know the exact GEO location of this?
- defrost 3y ago
  Rough location here: https://static.cambridge.org/binary/version/id/urn:cambridge.org:id:binary:20231130112614517-0192:S0003598X23001643:S0003598X23001643_figU1.png https://static.cambridge.org/binary/version/id/urn:cambridge... 2048x1365 image of exact location here: https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fup_23_291-aelteste-siedlung-amnya-nachgewiesen/aerial-view-amnya.jpg https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fu... Described as: "The fortified settlement sits atop a section of land overlooking the bountiful Amnya River." Google Maps|Earth + rivers layer should get you close. Further clues to be found via: https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fup_23_291-aelteste-siedlung-amnya-nachgewiesen/index.html https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fu...
ftrobro 3y ago
The headline is wrong. The study was not about the oldest fortresses in the world but about the oldest fortresses created by hunter-gatherers. Walls were built around Jericho 10000 years ago, which means those walls are 2000 years older than the fortresses in the study. https://www.britannica.com/place/Jericho-West-Bank https://www.britannica.com/place/Jericho-West-Bank
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- verbify 3y ago
  Is it possible that the walls around Jericho were there to keep out wild animals?
  - SonicScrub 3y ago
    A simple wooden palisade keeps out wildlife just fine. The walls of a Jericho were a fair bit larger to put it mildly. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tell_es-Sultan#Walls https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tell_es-Sultan#Walls Is it really so hard to believe that the wealth and resource concentration that exists in cities would be a tempting target? Especially given the finite and often scarce resources available?The earliest cities almost all have walls. Those that don't usually have some other form of natural fortifications. Large stone walls are as old as our oldest societies
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
jgilias 3y ago
I’ve always found this notion strange: > overturning previous assumptions that competition and conflict were absent in hunter–gatherer societies Chimps have competition, conflict, some even call it ‘warfare’ between neighbouring troops. Groups of human teenagers in modern societies have conflict. But somehow Stone Age humans must’ve lived in some pre-historic la-la-land until some form of modernity spoiled us.
- Mountain_Skies 3y ago
  Might be motivated reasoning connected to the notion that European colonialism was unique in human history.
  - SonicScrub 3y ago
    I don't think this is a serious position held by anyone with even a cursory understanding of history. Loud people on social media maybe.
    - notahacker 3y ago
      tbf, I think the position that hunter gatherer society was relatively idyllic and non-violent until the nasty proto-states came along and forced people into agriculture being argued against here is (whilst largely unrelated to colonial exceptionalism) also a niche one with significantly more currency amongst loud people on social media than in academia
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
- ch4s3 3y ago
  It’s a little more complicated than that. Deeper in the past people could kind of just spread out, and there wasn’t much archeological evidence for conflict between groups. While chimp bands do engage in this behavior, bonobos do not.
  - 3y ago
randomname93857 3y ago
> overturning previous assumptions that competition and conflict were absent in hunter–gatherer societies just a question - could it be that these forts provided defence against wild life? I think mammoth, woolly rhinos, bisons, aurochs, and some big extinct deers may have still been there. As well as siberian tigers, bears, wolves, etc
- tastyfreeze 3y ago
  That is a good point. Native Americans prepared for war to kill a brown bear. Not an easy beast to kill even with a rifle. Having some protection from a predator just roaming in and eating people is a good idea. Roaming predators isn't something most people today even consider. Our predecessors had already killed them all. On the other hand, other humans are far more dangerous than furry carnivores.
garyrob 3y ago
"I have an idea! You know how we make structures to sleep in? How about if we made a REALLY BIG structure where we can go when there's an attack, that would protect us from people just coming into our camp, and that arrows couldn't get through! We could all go there to defend ourselves together, and store all our weapons there so they can't be stolen!!"
throwaway4aday 3y ago
If they were hunter gatherers and nomadic then how did they ensure their fortress was not taken over by whatever enemy they built it to protect against? Kind of a big design flaw.
- readthenotes1 3y ago
  Maybe they had a permanent caretaker? https://youtu.be/CMbI7DmLCNI?feature=shared https://youtu.be/CMbI7DmLCNI?feature=shared
wuliwong 3y ago
> overturning previous assumptions that competition and conflict were absent in hunter–gatherer societies What about Jericho? It has a wall that is older than this. Maybe it doesn't fall into the classification of "fortress" but it still already seems to show there was some sort of conflict or competition going on at that time. There was also a tower but from what I remember, the location of the tower at Jericho would be a little odd as a defensive structure. My point is there are well known structures at Jericho that are considered to be "defensive" and these are largely agreed to predate the findings in this article. So why would these recent findings overturn this thinking of Jericho did not?
- notahacker 3y ago
  Its claim to be "the oldest" appears to be fairly narrowly delineated as "promontory hillfort", whereas Jericho was a full blown town and Tell Qaramel just a single tower. It's also in a completely different world region, of course. The rest seems to be the author hinting at the classic pop science trope of "if it hasn't been discovered before it must be radically challenging an incorrect old paradigm". Whereas "semipermanent structures in defensible positions in the middle of hunting grounds" sounds like exactly what someone that believes in a broader theory of simple hunter-gatherer tribes gradually progressing into complex agricultural societies would expect. (Likewise Gokpeli Tepe is problematic for anyone committed to the idea of "civilisation" having a particular start date, but hunter gatherers establishing some sort of [semi]permanent settlements near plains full of nutritious wild grasses and probably drawing on the labour resources of the surrounding hunting tribes to help with monument-building is entirely consistent with the general notion of hunter gatherers gradually evolving into more complex urban societies) Hunter gatherers needing defensive walls long before their neighbours acquired agriculture-supported armies is pretty bad for the "violent competition didn't emerge until agriculture and large scale organisation" theorists, but I'm not sure this has ever really been a mainstream academic view.
twelve40 3y ago
What i find remarkable is that this place is frozen 8 months out of a year. It takes some special skills just to stay alive there. It's pretty remarkable they found a way to keep themselves heated 24/7 and thrive in that weather 8000 years ago. Nobody wants to live there now.
- gitaarik 3y ago
  Are you sure it was the same temperature back then?
senderista 3y ago
It seems that social stratification and violence can emerge in hunter-gatherer societies where there's enough resource abundance to generate surpluses. Some phenomena normally associated with agricultural societies (e.g., elite conspicuous consumption, slavery, warfare) have been observed in non-agricultural Pacific Northwest tribes like the Tlingit, where abundant salmon runs led to huge surpluses.

163 points by wglb 3y ago

If you like this sort of stuff, I recommend The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, a 2021 book by anthropologist and activist David Graeber, and archaeologist David Wengrow. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dawn_of_Everything https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dawn_of_Everything

adolph 3y ago
The paper cites Graeber and Wingrow: [Findings like this fort] can contribute to the critical re-appraisal of narratives of linear pathways to social change increasingly explored in both scientific and popular debates (e.g. Dan-Cohen Reference Dan-Cohen2020; Graeber & Wengrow Reference Graeber and Wengrow2021). https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/worlds-oldestknown-promontory-fort-amnya-and-the-acceleration-of-huntergatherer-diversity-in-siberia-8000-years-ago/90559E4105F93528A6552B36C7236259 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/wo... edit: on second read this comment came across to me as not supportive of the parent comment, which was not intended. I second the recommendation of reading Graeber and Wengrow, and was happy to see them directly cited. “The Dawn of Everything” does include some lengthy polemical content. Even if the authors point of view isn’t to one’s own aesthetic or political sensibility: skip ahead, it is still worth reading the whole thing.
maximinus_thrax 3y ago
I love everything David Graeber wrote, including this book. But this is a book that reliably puts me to sleep. I had trouble finishing it when I first read it, it took me almost two months to read it as I kept falling asleep. I suffer from the occasional insomnia, so I bought this book and whenever I feel like my hypothalamus is not cooperating, I try to read a chapter. Works like a charm.

epolanski 3y ago

I always find it sad that our history knowledge is so incomplete. I wish humans learned to write earlier and more globally. We know virtually nothing of so many civilizations.

082349872349872 3y ago
Having enjoyed Durant & Durant's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Civilization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Civilization in short doses, I once tried to read through multiple volumes of them in a row; after a certain point it just becomes a blur of people being awful to each other. (and that's less than 2% of human history)
- gostsamo 3y ago
  Blame mainly awful people who liked to brag how awful they were and what awful things they did to other people. When writing down the history of stuff and people, it was too expensive for ordinary folks to engrave on stone how they optimized their crops or how they improved weaving.
  - hellojesus 3y ago
    While awful by today's standards, they recorded their feats because those awful actions allowed their civilization to thrive, even at the cost of others' perishing. Plus, by boasting of your awful deeds, you're more likely to dissuade would-be challengers. It would be lovely if we had knowledge from the common man from throughtout history, but the common man wasn't typically the reason for domminance.
- arp242 3y ago
  > after a certain point it just becomes a blur of people being awful to each other. I suppose the internet is a fairly accurate reflection of human history. What a depressing thought.
  - bawana 3y ago

EdwardDiego 3y ago

It makes sense that you'd seek to retain occupation of prime spots for harvesting abundant seasonal protein and fats, especially when all the protein and fat is coming to you. I feel like our view of hunter-gatherers tends to be distorted by present day tribes who largely live in the tropics, where food abundance isn't so location dependent, or the San of Southern Africa who have a nomadic lifestyle necessitated by their harsher environment.

sorokod 3y ago
Distorted how? From the article: The abundance of natural resources in the Siberian taiga, such as annual fish runs and migrating herds, probably played a crucial role in the emergence of the hunter–gatherer forts
- graphe 3y ago
  In our public consciousness hunter gatherers don't build anything ever. They just run around women are gathering berries and handling game meat with an aesthetic fire while the 90% muscle Chad hunter came back to his temporary cave with a new kill.

hyperthesis 3y ago

It may be difficult to find settlements older than 16,000 years ago, because sea levels were lower then, so their coastal settlements would now be underwater. Perhaps completely obliterated... or perhaps there is a coming age of discovery of their remnants? So-called "land bridges", connecting places, were huge places in their own right, not narrow "bridges", and (probably) prime land.

kamaitachi 3y ago
Very valid point - Doggerland comes to mind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doggerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doggerland
ranulo 3y ago
True, but we haven't found anything older than 12000 years, haven't we?
- jacquesm 3y ago
  That's because people tend to settle near or in coastal plains. Coastal plains from 12000 years ago are ocean today.
- BirAdam 3y ago
  That would depend upon what you are aiming to find. - The Lomekwi site shows stone tools that around 3 million years old. - Jericho is over 10 thousand years old. - Gobekli Tepe is at least 11 thousand years old with some nearby sites being at least 12 thousand years old. - The Cactus Hill site is at least 16 thousand years old. - Tel al-Qaramel is at least 12 thousand years old. - Theopetra is around 135 thousand years old. Obviously, some of these are more important than others. Theopetra just shows that some people built a wall (most likely to block wind) at a cave entrance, while Qaramel shows people having built large burial mounds. Jericho and the various sites at and near Gobekli show people having built cities. Importantly, the flooding of low coastal areas during glacial melt explains the rather "sudden" appearance of complex construction at both Jericho and Gobekli (and slightly later Sumerian and Indus Valley) sites. People would have fled those now under water areas quickly, and they'd have taken the story of the flood and devastation with them along with their knowledge of construction. Accordingly, we have a flood myth in Semitic culture and a super old city. We do not know the myths and legends of Gobekli, but it doesn't make sense for "primitive" hunter gatherers to have suddenly invented construction, sculpture, city planning, logistics, and so on. It makes far more sense that they'd have fled an older site that was flooded by glacial melt.

drewcoo 3y ago

> The Siberian findings, along with other global examples like Gobekli Tepe in Anatolia, contribute to a broader reassessment of evolutionist notions that suggest a linear development of societies from simple to complex. WARNING: Crazy train off the tracks! Evolution doesn't pretend to tell us about the social sciences. The creationists who call other people "evolutionists" would like us to believe that strawman so that evolution can be wrong.

bratwurst3000 3y ago
I Think the article states evolution in a social and not biological sense https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociocultural_evolution https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociocultural_evolution
arp242 3y ago
[flagged]
- Geezus_42 3y ago
  That's not "internet culture war bullshit." Creationist have been finding ways to manipulate scientific discoveries to make it sound like they disprove evolution since Darwin published Origin of Species (1859).
  - arp242 3y ago
    There are no creationists in sight here. Obsessing and bad faith assumptions over the usage of a single word like this that is absolutely is internet culture war bullshit and completely toxic behaviour that's almost exclusively seen on the internet.
sheepshear 3y ago
It should be obvious what "evolutionist" means considering that it's explained in the sentence you quoted starting immediately after the word. If anything, it seems like you might actually want creationists to own the word. Crazy warning, indeed.

pulse7 3y ago

Does anybody know the exact GEO location of this?

defrost 3y ago
Rough location here: https://static.cambridge.org/binary/version/id/urn:cambridge.org:id:binary:20231130112614517-0192:S0003598X23001643:S0003598X23001643_figU1.png https://static.cambridge.org/binary/version/id/urn:cambridge... 2048x1365 image of exact location here: https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fup_23_291-aelteste-siedlung-amnya-nachgewiesen/aerial-view-amnya.jpg https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fu... Described as: "The fortified settlement sits atop a section of land overlooking the bountiful Amnya River." Google Maps|Earth + rivers layer should get you close. Further clues to be found via: https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fup_23_291-aelteste-siedlung-amnya-nachgewiesen/index.html https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/presse/informationen/fup/2023/fu...

ftrobro 3y ago

The headline is wrong. The study was not about the oldest fortresses in the world but about the oldest fortresses created by hunter-gatherers. Walls were built around Jericho 10000 years ago, which means those walls are 2000 years older than the fortresses in the study. https://www.britannica.com/place/Jericho-West-Bank https://www.britannica.com/place/Jericho-West-Bank

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
verbify 3y ago
Is it possible that the walls around Jericho were there to keep out wild animals?
- SonicScrub 3y ago
  A simple wooden palisade keeps out wildlife just fine. The walls of a Jericho were a fair bit larger to put it mildly. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tell_es-Sultan#Walls https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tell_es-Sultan#Walls Is it really so hard to believe that the wealth and resource concentration that exists in cities would be a tempting target? Especially given the finite and often scarce resources available?The earliest cities almost all have walls. Those that don't usually have some other form of natural fortifications. Large stone walls are as old as our oldest societies

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

jgilias 3y ago

I’ve always found this notion strange: > overturning previous assumptions that competition and conflict were absent in hunter–gatherer societies Chimps have competition, conflict, some even call it ‘warfare’ between neighbouring troops. Groups of human teenagers in modern societies have conflict. But somehow Stone Age humans must’ve lived in some pre-historic la-la-land until some form of modernity spoiled us.

Mountain_Skies 3y ago
Might be motivated reasoning connected to the notion that European colonialism was unique in human history.
- SonicScrub 3y ago
  I don't think this is a serious position held by anyone with even a cursory understanding of history. Loud people on social media maybe.
  - notahacker 3y ago
    tbf, I think the position that hunter gatherer society was relatively idyllic and non-violent until the nasty proto-states came along and forced people into agriculture being argued against here is (whilst largely unrelated to colonial exceptionalism) also a niche one with significantly more currency amongst loud people on social media than in academia
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
ch4s3 3y ago
It’s a little more complicated than that. Deeper in the past people could kind of just spread out, and there wasn’t much archeological evidence for conflict between groups. While chimp bands do engage in this behavior, bonobos do not.
- 3y ago

randomname93857 3y ago

> overturning previous assumptions that competition and conflict were absent in hunter–gatherer societies just a question - could it be that these forts provided defence against wild life? I think mammoth, woolly rhinos, bisons, aurochs, and some big extinct deers may have still been there. As well as siberian tigers, bears, wolves, etc

tastyfreeze 3y ago
That is a good point. Native Americans prepared for war to kill a brown bear. Not an easy beast to kill even with a rifle. Having some protection from a predator just roaming in and eating people is a good idea. Roaming predators isn't something most people today even consider. Our predecessors had already killed them all. On the other hand, other humans are far more dangerous than furry carnivores.

garyrob 3y ago

"I have an idea! You know how we make structures to sleep in? How about if we made a REALLY BIG structure where we can go when there's an attack, that would protect us from people just coming into our camp, and that arrows couldn't get through! We could all go there to defend ourselves together, and store all our weapons there so they can't be stolen!!"

throwaway4aday 3y ago

If they were hunter gatherers and nomadic then how did they ensure their fortress was not taken over by whatever enemy they built it to protect against? Kind of a big design flaw.

readthenotes1 3y ago
Maybe they had a permanent caretaker? https://youtu.be/CMbI7DmLCNI?feature=shared https://youtu.be/CMbI7DmLCNI?feature=shared

wuliwong 3y ago

> overturning previous assumptions that competition and conflict were absent in hunter–gatherer societies What about Jericho? It has a wall that is older than this. Maybe it doesn't fall into the classification of "fortress" but it still already seems to show there was some sort of conflict or competition going on at that time. There was also a tower but from what I remember, the location of the tower at Jericho would be a little odd as a defensive structure. My point is there are well known structures at Jericho that are considered to be "defensive" and these are largely agreed to predate the findings in this article. So why would these recent findings overturn this thinking of Jericho did not?

notahacker 3y ago
Its claim to be "the oldest" appears to be fairly narrowly delineated as "promontory hillfort", whereas Jericho was a full blown town and Tell Qaramel just a single tower. It's also in a completely different world region, of course. The rest seems to be the author hinting at the classic pop science trope of "if it hasn't been discovered before it must be radically challenging an incorrect old paradigm". Whereas "semipermanent structures in defensible positions in the middle of hunting grounds" sounds like exactly what someone that believes in a broader theory of simple hunter-gatherer tribes gradually progressing into complex agricultural societies would expect. (Likewise Gokpeli Tepe is problematic for anyone committed to the idea of "civilisation" having a particular start date, but hunter gatherers establishing some sort of [semi]permanent settlements near plains full of nutritious wild grasses and probably drawing on the labour resources of the surrounding hunting tribes to help with monument-building is entirely consistent with the general notion of hunter gatherers gradually evolving into more complex urban societies) Hunter gatherers needing defensive walls long before their neighbours acquired agriculture-supported armies is pretty bad for the "violent competition didn't emerge until agriculture and large scale organisation" theorists, but I'm not sure this has ever really been a mainstream academic view.

twelve40 3y ago

What i find remarkable is that this place is frozen 8 months out of a year. It takes some special skills just to stay alive there. It's pretty remarkable they found a way to keep themselves heated 24/7 and thrive in that weather 8000 years ago. Nobody wants to live there now.

gitaarik 3y ago
Are you sure it was the same temperature back then?

senderista 3y ago

It seems that social stratification and violence can emerge in hunter-gatherer societies where there's enough resource abundance to generate surpluses. Some phenomena normally associated with agricultural societies (e.g., elite conspicuous consumption, slavery, warfare) have been observed in non-agricultural Pacific Northwest tribes like the Tlingit, where abundant salmon runs led to huge surpluses.