In the middle of the fifth millennium BC, the Middle East had become entirely dotted with farming villages and agriculture had started to spread to Europe, North Africa and the Iranian Plateau. The spread of farming was the first human large scale technological revolution. It had resulted in an explosive growth of population numbers. A great success then.
How had this success been achieved? As we have said before, it was the result of a sexual redistribution deal.
In the Paleolithic, men hunted and women gathered. This strategy was already a vast improvement over other mammal species food procurement strategies as it combined the benefits of both a high-risk/high-return strategy (hunting) and of a low-risk/low-return one (gathering), which is something that no other animal species had ever achieved before.
However, the human paleolithic food procurement strategy had one glaring fault: it left most men unproductive. As we have seen, hunting is a "winner takes all" type of activity where the best performers make the overwhelming majority of kills. This was offset by a sharing obligation according to which the meat obtained through hunting was shared in a feast with the whole tribe. Also, most hunting and gathering human groups seem to have taken great pains to hide the inequality between the best hunters and the rest. For example, ethnologists have noted the following behavior among the !Kung, an African hunter gatherer tribe. In theory, each hunter used arrows bearing distinctive marks meant to identify the man who had dealt the killing shot to the prey. However:
One of the consequence of the hunting/gathering strategy is that although some men (the best hunters) are superior to all women, in terms of kilo-calories brought back to camp, most men are inferior to all women. However, because of masking arrangements such as the one described above, this fact was not apparent. As a result, men and women were considered roughly equal. Only the alpha-male stood out, being placed above both non-alpha men and women.
Farming changed that. Non-alpha males obtained the right to an exclusive wife in exchange for supporting the alpha in prestige-enhancing projects (mostly megaliths). Also, women accepted a demotion in rank (they were now considered inferior to men) in exchange for the added food abundance resulting from agriculture (and the sexual substitute of having their own dedicated "dominant" male). The mediocre hunter men who were previously unproductive had thus been converted to a food gathering strategy that was slightly riskier than gathering (you had to part with seeds that you might otherwise have eaten in order to plant them) but which had an overall yield that was far higher than that of hunting and gathering combined.
The alpha-male of the group, together with a retinue of a few outstanding hunters continued to engage in high-risk/high-return activities. These activities included hunting, of course, but soon also war, with its opportunities for pillage. The latter brought back even greater returns when successful.
As a result, the following hierarchy was put into place:
This is the situation humanity had arrived at before the emergence of cities, which started to appear in the late fifth millennium BC. What happened then will be dealt win in the next threads.
Previous threads:
incels.is
incels.is
@IncelWithHate this is the beginning of my answer. Please be patient. A lot of ground has to be covered.
How had this success been achieved? As we have said before, it was the result of a sexual redistribution deal.
In the Paleolithic, men hunted and women gathered. This strategy was already a vast improvement over other mammal species food procurement strategies as it combined the benefits of both a high-risk/high-return strategy (hunting) and of a low-risk/low-return one (gathering), which is something that no other animal species had ever achieved before.
However, the human paleolithic food procurement strategy had one glaring fault: it left most men unproductive. As we have seen, hunting is a "winner takes all" type of activity where the best performers make the overwhelming majority of kills. This was offset by a sharing obligation according to which the meat obtained through hunting was shared in a feast with the whole tribe. Also, most hunting and gathering human groups seem to have taken great pains to hide the inequality between the best hunters and the rest. For example, ethnologists have noted the following behavior among the !Kung, an African hunter gatherer tribe. In theory, each hunter used arrows bearing distinctive marks meant to identify the man who had dealt the killing shot to the prey. However:
It is notable how hard the !Kung worked to prevent a meritocracy of good hunters from arising. First, using a system of reciprocal gift-giving called hxaro, they exchanged arrows with each other. Richard Lee once examined the quivers of four men who were hunting together. All but one had arrows made by four to six different men, and two men had literally no arrows that they themselves had made. Thus each hunter would eventually have one of his distinctive arrows credited with a kill, whether he himself had fired it or not.
The Creation of Inequality, Kent Flannery and Joyce Marcus, Harvard University Press, 2012
One of the consequence of the hunting/gathering strategy is that although some men (the best hunters) are superior to all women, in terms of kilo-calories brought back to camp, most men are inferior to all women. However, because of masking arrangements such as the one described above, this fact was not apparent. As a result, men and women were considered roughly equal. Only the alpha-male stood out, being placed above both non-alpha men and women.
Farming changed that. Non-alpha males obtained the right to an exclusive wife in exchange for supporting the alpha in prestige-enhancing projects (mostly megaliths). Also, women accepted a demotion in rank (they were now considered inferior to men) in exchange for the added food abundance resulting from agriculture (and the sexual substitute of having their own dedicated "dominant" male). The mediocre hunter men who were previously unproductive had thus been converted to a food gathering strategy that was slightly riskier than gathering (you had to part with seeds that you might otherwise have eaten in order to plant them) but which had an overall yield that was far higher than that of hunting and gathering combined.
The alpha-male of the group, together with a retinue of a few outstanding hunters continued to engage in high-risk/high-return activities. These activities included hunting, of course, but soon also war, with its opportunities for pillage. The latter brought back even greater returns when successful.
As a result, the following hierarchy was put into place:
- The alpha male
- The hunter/warriors
- Farming men
- Women and children
This is the situation humanity had arrived at before the emergence of cities, which started to appear in the late fifth millennium BC. What happened then will be dealt win in the next threads.
Previous threads:
Real Gender Studies 101 - The Paleolithic
From around 2 millions years ago to 10 000 years ago, humans have led roughly the same lifestyle: hunting and gathering. Given the length of time we have lived that way, it is quite clear that it is that lifestyle that determined how we evolved. All of our instincts were shaped by this period...
incels.is
Real Gender Studies 102 - the Neolithic
This is the second installment in the "real gender studies" series. It follows the one below: https://incels.is/threads/real-gender-studies-101-the-paleolithic.316731/#post-7198873 At the start of the Neolithic (around 10 000 years BC), mankind shifted from the hunter-gatherer lifestyle to...
incels.is
@IncelWithHate this is the beginning of my answer. Please be patient. A lot of ground has to be covered.
Last edited:
