The role of plant foods in the evolution and dispersal of early humans: A perspective from across the Wallace Line
View / Open Files
Authors
Journal Title
Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Urgeschichte
Type
Article
This Version
AM
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Florin, A. The role of plant foods in the evolution and dispersal of early humans: A perspective from across the Wallace Line. Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Urgeschichte https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.81288
Abstract
In recent years, new evidence for the early use of plant foods has challenged the stereotype of the meat-eating Palaeolithic. Whilst often making up the smaller component of the diet, plant foods are key to hominin diets, carbohydrates especially providing an efficient energy resource. This paper reviews the current evidence for the role of plant foods in the evolution and dispersal of early modern humans and our closest ancestors, with a focus on new evidence for early diet from Island Southeast Asia, Australia and New Guinea. It demonstrates the importance of plant foods and their processing, to the dietary flexibility and adaptive capacity of our species.
Sponsorship
Australian Research Council Research Training Scholarship; Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering Postgraduate Research Award 11877; Wenner Gren Foundation Dissertation Fieldwork Grant 9260; Dan David Foundation Scholarship; Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage Irinjili Research Training Program Internship for Women
Embargo Lift Date
2100-01-01
Identifiers
This record's DOI: https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.81288
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/333872
Statistics
Total file downloads (since January 2020). For more information on metrics see the
IRUS guide.