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Plant and animal domestication: direct versus indirect evidence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 May 2015

Ruben Mendoza
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Extract

The domestication of plants and animals was the byproduct of an evolutionary process in which particular elements in the constellation of potential domesticates were subject to human manipulation as a response to adaptive strategies within diverse ecological habitats (Braidwood, 1971, 238). During the course of this development, patterns of exploitation apparently exerted an external stimulus which eventually resulted in the selective modification of the adaptive attributes of particular species of plants and animals. Such morphological change has been taken as a key criterion in delineating the diagnostic characteristics distinguishing wild from domestic plants and animals (Jarman, 1972, 16). The problem then becomes one of identifying the most reliable indicators in the resultant effects upon the domestication of plants and animals, as well as the inherent limitations stemming from the interpretive potential of such attributes (be they biological or cultural).

Type
Research Article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 60 , Issue 228 , March 1986 , pp. 7 - 14
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1986

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