|
Post by Vitor on Aug 5, 2004 0:54:46 GMT -5
Contrary to what some might think, agricultural revolution brought up a lot of nutrition issues. The hunters were a lot more healthy!
With few domesticated crops and animals, there was unbalanced diets. although they were good enough for surviving and for the human population explosion.
Roman society was unbalanced, lots of poverty, that brought the end to the roman empire, it was not the barbaric invasions... For instance, Iberians welcomed the new rulers (sueves and visigoths) with no fight... They displaced the roman decadent system so they were welcomed. The same might be applied to the muslim invasions....
|
|
|
Post by Graeme on Aug 5, 2004 9:08:39 GMT -5
I don't understand why the farmers are thought to be totally dependent on farming for sustenance. Of course they would have added the protein from fish or game. I know wheat farmers who are avid fishers and hunters. The farmers had animals also.
|
|
|
Post by Vitor on Aug 5, 2004 16:56:15 GMT -5
I guess they did, but Graeme, the population explosion (consequence of agriculture) must had irradicated most of the non domesticated animals surrounding the farming area.
Of course were it was possible to hunt, people lived better, but it was not that common on bigger agriculture settlement areas...my oppinion!
|
|
|
Post by Cerdic on Aug 6, 2004 2:20:38 GMT -5
The whole effort to food ratio changes hugely when a population moves from hunter gathering to primitive farming. Farming, before modern times, required very intensive physical effort, whereas hunting didn't it required only sporadic physical effort - lions sleep an average of 20 hrs a day.
From a very early age farming people needed to work very hard on a diet much less rich in protein and fat, no wonder they appeared relatively stunted. Not until the emergence of warrior aristocracies (who ate what others produced) could any considerable portion of the population command a better diet.
|
|
|
Post by Artemidoros on Aug 6, 2004 20:19:01 GMT -5
Although it would be reasonable to assume Neolithic farmers were smaller than hunter-gatherers due to a diet poorer in animal proteins, they were probably nor dark IMO. The people who introduced agriculture to the British Isles had probably little in common genetically with the original Middle Easterners. It appears to me that the dates for the introduction of Celtic languages and agriculture to Britain coinside, while the first megalithic monuments (circles) started to be built a little later.
I am by no means suggesting the Celts were of a singular pigmentation but they were probably much lighter than the Iberian populations. Going by ancient Greek and Roman writers they were quite fair. The hunter-gatherers were IMO darker. Even in the ice age the summers in the southern refugia were extremely hot and the sun merciless. I don't know if the Celts had become fairer in the several thousand years that had allowed them to live in more northern climates but it is a possibility. I have heard it takes 20,000 years to turn a population from black to white (the reverse can happen too).
I think it is ironic that the populations that have retained darker traits to this day are the ones that have retained Celtic speech to a degree. I believe they were the least influenced by the Celts genetically. Incidentally they were the least influenced by later Nordic invasions that altered the phenotype of some areas significantly.
|
|
|
Post by Vitor on Aug 6, 2004 21:50:46 GMT -5
not at all... stonehendge was built many years before the celtic culture arrived. those stone circles are also common in Iberia...
The Iberians arrived there more than 10 000 years ago...
It's enough time to get lighter... don't you think?
I am by no means saying that those ancient Iberians were like present day iberians, we had other genetic inputs after the Ice age...but the majority of us have those ancient genes...like most western europeans...
|
|
|
Post by Artemidoros on Aug 7, 2004 6:32:53 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by Cerdic on Aug 10, 2004 8:16:37 GMT -5
In regards to the writings of the Greeks and Romans, a great deal of scepticism must be exercised when they are describing foreigners. The Greeks and Romans had a well developed cultural and literary concept of "otherness." They liked to make out foreigners as being as unlike themselves as possible. For example the Roman historian (he was ethnically Greek) Ammianus Marcellinus describes the Persians as having "eyes like those of goats." Now Ammianus was an officer in the Roman army and undoubtedly had seen many Persians (he probably knew at least one exiled Persian prince) how could he then describe them as having eyes with a horizontal slit pupil, like goats? The answer is that he was pandering to the Greco-Roman taste for characterizing foreigners as being as "other" as possible. This also applied to the barbarians living to the north, though these people had a somewhat higher incidence of lighter colouring and taller stature than the Greeks and Romans they were udoubtedly not universally blond, blue eyed giants. Though the Greeks and Romans liked to portray them this way. One huge give-away of this was an incident written to discredit (after his death - obviously) the emperor Caligula. In order to grace a completely spurious triumph, Caligula ordered that the tallest Gauls that could be found be rounded up and their hair dyed red, so that they might be passed off as Germans. This tells us many things, Gauls weren't all tall, Gauls did not have red hair, Romans expected Germans to be tall and have red hair and were probably as innaccurate in this expectation as in their expectations of the Gauls themselves. No concept of the physical characteristics of the Celts of the ancient world based on Classical writings can be relied upon. Any physical description of the Ancient Celts found in Classical texts is likely to be inaccurate and biased. All such writers wrote for a home audience and pandered to its prejudices and expectations. So don't automatically assume that the Ancient Celts, or Germans were really like they were described! Or denigrate modern Celts for not looking like their supposed forebears.
|
|
|
Post by One Humanity on Aug 10, 2004 10:17:21 GMT -5
A proved Gaelic custom was brightening and coarsening the hair with calc, giving it a spiky, barbarian look. What would be the reason of this if they all were of Nordic pigmentation anyway? Maybe it was to make them look uniformly because they were diverse. I find it narrow-minded, that those Irish and Britains only speak of their own population, when they mention Kelts. I think the British Isles were only a sediment of the Keltic range. With those Atlantids, Dinarics and Vikings later around, those Insular "Keltic Nodics" probably are much more generalized and distant than the Keltic population was during the Ancient. Just yesterday I read of some American speaking of "pure Keltic Nordics". The continental mainland probably was populated by Dinarics and Alpines besides that Keltic Nords too. I just looked into a book about the Kelts and also found these phenotypes. Here for example, a relief on a caldron from Denmark, Rynkeby showing a round-headed person with a long and beaky nose: Contrary to what some might think, agricultural revolution brought up a lot of nutrition issues. The hunters were a lot more healthy! Go to some guy that studied nutrition science, he will tell you the opposite. Ever heard of skorbut? btw., both of these guys did not eat meat recently before they died and were conserved in the moor: www.king-ed.suffolk.sch.uk/curriclm/hums/history/yr9/bogbody/photos.htmhome.att.net/~edgrenda/pow/pow31.htmI guess they did, but Graeme, the population explosion (consequence of agriculture) must had irradicated most of the non domesticated animals surrounding the farming area. True, everywhere humans went whole species of animals of the big mammals sort were eradicated within ten years. What happened to the forrests around the Mediterranean Sea and in the Middle East? Every human group in history overdrew it's possibilities untill the enviromental system collapsed and humans had to adapt to the worse situation. It may come similar with today's industrial world. In the past, humans had essentially less meat to eat than today. Hunting was not possible on a maximum extent (in the Middle Ages it was even forbidden). Fishing was a thing for the coastal inhabitants but who else? Apart from that the rich denizens of the Roman Empire might have bought things from everywhere. In Rome, a 35 meters high knoll of shards can be found, Monte Testaccio, near to the harbor to the Tiber. This shouldn't be overrated of course - it was not for everyone to buy some pickled fish from Italy (in Pompeji archaeologists found a manufactory of fish sauce. With their Ancient methods - it must have stunk there bestially).
|
|
|
Post by Cerdic on Aug 10, 2004 10:54:17 GMT -5
Cu Chulainn the great hero of the Ulster Cycle is described in the Tain as having hair that was black at the base, red in the middle and yellow at the ends. Obviously he was using hair dye of some sort, most probably lime. Lime-washed hair sticking up in "punkish" spikes is shown on a near contemporary coin portrait of Vercingetorix the Gaulish leader.
|
|
|
Post by pconroy on Aug 10, 2004 13:36:24 GMT -5
Cu Chulainn the great hero of the Ulster Cycle is described in the Tain as having hair that was black at the base, red in the middle and yellow at the ends. Obviously he was using hair dye of some sort, most probably lime. Lime-washed hair sticking up in "punkish" spikes is shown on a near contemporary coin portrait of Vercingetorix the Gaulish leader. Also check out the famous "Dying Gaul" sculpture from 300 BC, originally from Pergamum: This shows the coarse spikey hair, which has been white-washed. It also shows a tall, medium built man, with distinctive features - note the Celtic chin, strong jaw line, long head, straight nose. In fact he looks very like me - except for the hair. Me: Black hair, black/red beard, green eyes, 6' 1", 210 Lbs, skin very fair and heavily freckled - IQ 172
|
|
|
Post by Melnorme on Aug 10, 2004 13:41:14 GMT -5
Me: Black hair, black/red beard, green eyes, 6' 1", 210 Lbs, skin very fair and heavily freckled. Do you really have 'black' hair ( like mine ), or just dark brown?
|
|
|
Post by pconroy on Aug 10, 2004 13:44:07 GMT -5
A proved Gaelic custom was brightening and coarsening the hair with calc, giving it a spiky, barbarian look. What would be the reason of this if they all were of Nordic pigmentation anyway? Maybe it was to make them look uniformly because they were diverse. It could have been to make them look taller and more fearsome, as they were know to charge naked into battle. Plus it would give them group cohesion, and form some sort of uniform, as they were naked. It could also have been for purely hygenic reasons, to kill bugs of all kinds - in Ireland today, farmers still white-wash buildings, both inside and out, to kill bugs and to disinfact. Remember the Celts invented soap and introduced it into the Roman world.
|
|
|
Post by pconroy on Aug 10, 2004 13:46:41 GMT -5
Do you really have 'black' hair ( like mine ), or just dark brown? I have never seen a picture of you, so I wouldn't know. But in Ireland my hair colour is described as black, however it is not the "jet black" of South Asians
|
|
|
Post by Melnorme on Aug 10, 2004 13:49:49 GMT -5
I have never seen a picture of you, so I wouldn't know. But in Ireland my hair colour is described as black, however it is not the "jet black" of South Asians I'm not South Asian, though.
|
|