Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
12.3
A Long and Prickly Start of Predecessors of Soil
Science
We can fi nd the fi rst notes about soils already at the start of written documents of
great civilizations. It is without doubt that the people had a certain knowledge about
quality of soils at the stage of nomad lifestyle and that the great revolution of the
beginning of agriculture was closely related to understanding which soils would
bring the best “harvests.” After some members of a tribe practicing gathering and
hunting had accidentally and just by chance spilled a handful of seeds, they later
“harvested” there more than just from the natural vegetation in an alluvial soil near
a river. When similar incidences were repeating and happening for several years, the
nomads started to gain basic knowledge about seeding, providing that it happened
on fertile soil. The importance of that provision during times when the greatest
revolution in mankind was rooting cannot be overestimated today nor fully appreci-
ated. They “harvested” much more than in the practice of gathering, and they were
less menaced by famine again and again provided that they recognized fertile soils
from those of low fertility. Their successful recognition of fertile soils is indeed only
our speculation derived from the archeological discoveries at Abu Hureyra in
today's Syria on the bank of Euphrates near the blind meander of the river formed
between 13,000 and 9,500 years ago and generally in the Fertile Crescent. We are
not dealing with the various factors accelerating the start of farming such as climate
instability that allowed human survival under conditions of planting the fi rst sorts of
hay and barley. About 1,000-2,000 years later, other centers of primitive farming
appeared independent of Fertile Crescent under different environmental conditions
in Yangtze and Yellow River basins, again on fertile soils. Here we wish to concen-
trate only on the simple, intuitive recognition of fertile soils in Neolithic times.
The simple roots of agriculture appeared about 14,000-13,000 years ago when
the glacial (called Wisconsin in the USA, Würm or Weichselian in Europe, etc.) was
approaching its end. It could be even stated that some signs of the glacial disappear-
ance occurred 1,000-2,000 years earlier. Because the warming did not show the
same intensity in various regions, the same is valid for the start of agriculture. The
warming had not the same intensity in various regions and the same is valid for its
start. In today's mild zone people used the benefi t of increased quantities of food-
stuffs - both plants and game - as a result of climate warming. Desert zones were
losing their extreme aridity typical for glacial periods, and during the warming tran-
sition, the rains arrived regularly each year. Specialized plants together with sheep
and followed by goats and probably chickens were coming back. They were arriving
together with beasts of pray like big cats.
The transition into our recent interglacial (the period between two glacials)
called Holocene was not smooth at all even in the same region. It looked like a cli-
matic stuttering. The climate change had different intensities and lengths in various
regions. There were two stages when extreme cooling interrupted the gradual warm-
ing, as if the hard climate of glacial was coming back. These two returns are called
Dryas
. The Older
Dryas
was the stadial, or cold period between the two warmer
