Agriculture is born on the islands of the Pacific Ocean

1993/06/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Nekazaritza
• Historia

In the instruments of the Stone Age of 28,000 years ago, microscopic remains of plants have been found in the islands of Solomon, and it seems that theories on the genesis of agriculture will go upside down.

These remains found by Australian researchers Matthew Spriggs and Stephen Wickler of Hawaii indicate that agriculture was not born 12,000 years ago in Mesopotamia.

So far the man works the plants. It is believed to have begun in the X millennium, but the remains found in the Solomon Islands are starch units and property crystals. Analyzing the plants currently cultivated in the Pacific islands, it has been found that these traces belong to two varieties of the plant called taro, the varieties of calocasa and alocasa. They are cultivated and not wild species.

To be able to eat, these plants must be treated, ground and cooked, so they have found remains in the stone tools. Therefore, it should be thought that the inhabitants who emigrated from Southeast Asia to the islands of Solomon carried the Taro plant.