early farming
Neolithic food production
Early farming refers to the initial development of agriculture, when human societies first began cultivating plants and domesticating animals rather than relying solely on hunting and gathering.
The transition occurred independently in several regions beginning around 10,000 BCE: Early farming in the Fertile Crescent centered on wheat and barley.
The term appears in archaeology, anthropology, and history to discuss this foundational shift in human civilization.
- sowingPlanting for cultivation
- seed savingPreserving plant material for replanting
- wheatCereal crop for flour
- digging sticksPointed tools for soil
- surplusAmount exceeding requirement
soil fertility · irrigation · barley · grinding stones · stone tools · slash-and-burn · land clearing · deforestation · fallowing · terracing · lentils · rituals · social stratification · trade · domestication · water management · Fertile Crescent · village life
- ancient farmingcrops, fields, cultivation, sowing, Fertile Crescent
- Asian PrehistoryPaleolithic, Bronze Age, Chalcolithic, hunter-gatherers, stone tools
- Balkan prehistoryThracians, Dacia
- prehistoric lifedinosaur, dinosaurs, triceratops, Velociraptor, velociraptor
- Irish AntiquitiesTara, standing stones, dolmens, cairns, ogham stones
- Southern African HistoryDutch settlers, indigenous tribes, rock art, cave paintings, Iron Age
early farminghunting and gathering
Nomadic food acquisition method
foraging · gathering · hunting · scavenging · pastoralism
early farmingindustrial farming
Mechanized large-scale agriculture
factory farming · agribusiness · commercial agriculture · intensive agriculture · hydroponics
early, earlier, earliest, farm, farming, farmed, farmer, farmers, farmland