Fort Joaquim
J R Soc Interface. 2015 May 6;12(106). doi: 10.1098/rsif.2015.0166.
The Neolithic transition is the shift from hunting–gathering into farming. About 9000 years ago, the Neolithic transition began to spread from the Near East into Europe, until it reached Northern Europe about 5500 years ago. There are two main models of this spread. The demic model assumes that it was mainly due to the reproduction and dispersal of farmers. The cultural model assumes that European hunter-gatherers become farmers by acquiring domestic plants and animals, as well as knowledge, from neighbouring farmers. Here we use the dates of about 900 archaeological sites to compute a speed map of the spread of the Neolithic transition in Europe. We compare the speed map to the speed ranges predicted by purely demic, demic-cultural and purely cultural models. The comparison indicates that the transition was cultural in Northern Europe, the Alpine region and west of the Black Sea. But demic diffusion was at work in other regions such as the Balkans and Central Europe. Our models can be applied to many other cultural traits. We also propose that genetic data could be gathered and used to measure the demic kernels of Early Neolithic populations. This would lead to an enormous advance in Neolithic spread modelling.
新石器时代转型是指从狩猎采集社会向农耕社会的转变。大约9000年前，新石器时代转型开始从近东地区传播至欧洲，直至约5500年前抵达北欧。关于这种传播主要有两种模式。人口扩散模式认为，这主要是由于农民的繁衍和迁徙。文化传播模式则认为，欧洲的狩猎采集者通过从邻近农民那里获取驯化的动植物以及知识而成为农民。在此，我们利用约900个考古遗址的年代数据来绘制欧洲新石器时代转型传播的速度图。我们将该速度图与纯人口扩散、人口扩散-文化传播以及纯文化传播模式所预测的速度范围进行比较。比较结果表明，在北欧、阿尔卑斯地区以及黑海以西地区，这种转型是文化传播型的。但在巴尔干半岛和中欧等其他地区，人口扩散发挥了作用。我们的模型可应用于许多其他文化特征。我们还提议，可以收集基因数据并用于测量新石器时代早期人口的人口扩散核心区域。这将给新石器时代传播模型带来巨大进展。
