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The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory: Why did Foragers become Farmers?
The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory addresses one of the most debated and least understood revolutions in the history of our species, the change from hunting and gathering to farming. Graeme Barker takes a global view, and integrates a massive array of information from archaeology and many other disciplines, including anthropology, botany, climatology, genetics, linguistics, and zoology. Against current orthodoxy, Barker develops a strong case for the development of agricultural systems in many areas as transformations in the life-ways of the indigenous forager societies, and argues that these were as much changes in social norms and ideologies as in ways of obtaining food. With a large number of helpful line drawings and photographs as well as a comprehensive bibliography, this authoritative study will appeal to a wide general readership as well as to specialists in a variety of fields.
Hardcover
First published July 1, 2006
About the author
Graeme Barker
27 books3 followersGraeme Barker is Disney Professor of Archaeology at the University of Cambridge and Director of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research. His research focuses on the relationships between past human societies and their environments and how they have transformed each other. He has worked in many different ecologies and with societies at different levels of complexity from the emergence of our species to Roman farmers and, currently in Borneo, present-day rainforest farmers and foragers.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 2, 2026
Paleolithic agriculture's origin was a single, worldwide revolution realized through innumerable local decisions by hunter-gatherers already practicing husbandry-like behaviors.
Graeme William Walter Barker, CBE, FBA (born 23 October 1946) is a British archaeologist, notable for his work on the Italian Bronze Age, the Roman occupation of Libya, and landscape archaeology. Having taught at the University of Sheffield and the University of Leicester, he was Disney Professor of Archaeology at the University of Cambridge from 2004 to 2014. He retired in 2014. [1]
A Cambridge undergraduate, he took Eric Higgs's option course on the early history of agriculture, then completed his doctorate under Higgs on the forager–farmer transition in central Italy. His career reflects the Cambridge "palaeoeconomy" school founded by Higgs. [2]
Barker argues that agriculture's origin was neither an invention nor a diffusion from a few "hearths of domestication"[3] but was a single, worldwide revolution realized through innumerable local decisions by foragers already practicing "husbandry-like behaviours."[4] Regional transitions, not a single event, produced agriculture: each region adopted farming for different reasons: risk management, status competition, or climatic change forcing, and a new developing human cognition were common enablers. Chronologically, the work begins around 50,000 BCE and extends into the modern era, centered on the Pleistocene/Holocene boundary. Conceptually, Barker stresses change in the dimensions of society, human psychology, and ideology, all causing the change in humans from subsistence foraging.
Methodologically, Barker used a comparative synthesis of six global regions. It was archaeologically weighted and integrated methods from archaeobotany, zooarchaeology, and ethnoarchaeology, rather than previously used environmental or cultural-historical methods. The book's organization is as follows: historiographical (Chapter 1), operational (Chapters 2–3), and evidential (Chapters 4–9, organized by region), with a final synthesizing chapter (Chapter 10 on the book's seven overarching themes). In Chapter 2, Barker establishes what forager life is actually like. It is affluent rather than the commonly perceived desperate. Chapter 3 describes modern archeological methods. In the nine regionally oriented evidentiary chapters, he circumvents the canon described in Chapter 1 by focusing on the Late Pleistocene forager's agriculture rather than the pre- and immediate post-Younger Dryas Event of the Early Pleistocene. On his presentist bias, Barker is self-aware. He explicitly warns against evaluating Paleolithic foragers' decisions from "the perspective of the supermarket check-out counter,"[5]. He concedes that by treating climate change as "a key driver" of subsistence change works, "however uncomfortably, that fits” with the post-modern tendency to privilege individual human agency.[6] This balanced the environmental determinism of climate change with the presentist human agency.
Evidence is cited from modern (at the time of publication) archaeological science, including plant and animal residues, phytoliths, starch grains, coprolites, bone isotope chemistry, aDNA, and burial isotopes for the evidentiary regions. Ethnographic analogies from contemporary and historical sources are used in the supportive behavioral models. Secondary sources are documented in a 110-page bibliography of a 598-page book. Sources range from the Victorian (1872) through modern (2003). Originality of sources includes the evidentiary global-regional frame, the redefinition of plant and animal domestication as mutualism [7], and the vivid "punctuated explosive dispersal" [8] description of migrating farmers dramatically shifting an 'agricultural frontier' forward.
Barker's argument works by examining six independent regional case studies that converge on native adoption, punctuated explosive dispersal, and long coexistence between foragers and farmers to refute the hearth theory. I found the description and distribution of regional domesticates very interesting. I have a background in biology and a keen interest in regionally differentiated agricultural commodities (coffee, tea, cacao, etc.). The Paleolithic agronomy of plant domestication was excellent. The animal husbandry of the domesticates was as detailed. However, I am not qualified to comment on its technical aspects. Source integration is complete, with scientific archaeological backing. The main contributions include the redefinition of plant and animal domestication as mutualism rather than human invention, and recognizing that domesticated food sources were first acquired as prestige goods before eventually becoming common staples.
Structurally, Europe receives the longest treatment (58 pages), despite having the least domesticated diversity. The western hemisphere, containing both North and South America, with the largest number of domesticated foodstuffs, received only 43 pages. Barker concedes that key demographic timelines from 10,000 years ago are too imprecise, even with modern methods for quantitatively distinguishing cause from consequence. Defending an anti-hearth position on thin Paleolithic regional data amounts to much the same argument Barker used to cast doubt on the original hearth-seekers.
Barker's thesis works. Its rejection of the hearths-of-domestication-and-diffusion model of agriculture is justified by six regional, archeological science-based case studies from the Late Paleolithic. The Preface, Chapters 1, 2, 3, and 10 constitute the argumentative spine and can almost stand alone. The Chapter 10 justification of a "Revolution" as the unintended result of independent but contingent decisions, through Layton's "chance coincidence of events" [9] and human cognitive inevitability, may be a bit of a reach. However, the book challenged established ideas by presenting foraging as affluence and domestication as bilateral mutualism.
This book is recommended for upper-level students with a background in archaeology, anthropology, and prehistory. It is both a synthesis of a century's debate and an entry for the next.
Notes
1. "Graeme Barker", Wikipedia, accessed September 1, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graeme_....
2. Graeme Barker, The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory: Why Did Foragers Become Farmers? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), iv.
3. Barker, 25.
4. Barker, 147
5. Barker, 392
6. Barker, 398
7. Barker, 393.
8. Barker, 400.
9. Barker, 412.
Barker, Graeme. The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory: Why Did Foragers Become Farmers?;Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.
Graeme William Walter Barker, CBE, FBA (born 23 October 1946) is a British archaeologist, notable for his work on the Italian Bronze Age, the Roman occupation of Libya, and landscape archaeology. Having taught at the University of Sheffield and the University of Leicester, he was Disney Professor of Archaeology at the University of Cambridge from 2004 to 2014. He retired in 2014. [1]
A Cambridge undergraduate, he took Eric Higgs's option course on the early history of agriculture, then completed his doctorate under Higgs on the forager–farmer transition in central Italy. His career reflects the Cambridge "palaeoeconomy" school founded by Higgs. [2]
Barker argues that agriculture's origin was neither an invention nor a diffusion from a few "hearths of domestication"[3] but was a single, worldwide revolution realized through innumerable local decisions by foragers already practicing "husbandry-like behaviours."[4] Regional transitions, not a single event, produced agriculture: each region adopted farming for different reasons: risk management, status competition, or climatic change forcing, and a new developing human cognition were common enablers. Chronologically, the work begins around 50,000 BCE and extends into the modern era, centered on the Pleistocene/Holocene boundary. Conceptually, Barker stresses change in the dimensions of society, human psychology, and ideology, all causing the change in humans from subsistence foraging.
Methodologically, Barker used a comparative synthesis of six global regions. It was archaeologically weighted and integrated methods from archaeobotany, zooarchaeology, and ethnoarchaeology, rather than previously used environmental or cultural-historical methods. The book's organization is as follows: historiographical (Chapter 1), operational (Chapters 2–3), and evidential (Chapters 4–9, organized by region), with a final synthesizing chapter (Chapter 10 on the book's seven overarching themes). In Chapter 2, Barker establishes what forager life is actually like. It is affluent rather than the commonly perceived desperate. Chapter 3 describes modern archeological methods. In the nine regionally oriented evidentiary chapters, he circumvents the canon described in Chapter 1 by focusing on the Late Pleistocene forager's agriculture rather than the pre- and immediate post-Younger Dryas Event of the Early Pleistocene. On his presentist bias, Barker is self-aware. He explicitly warns against evaluating Paleolithic foragers' decisions from "the perspective of the supermarket check-out counter,"[5]. He concedes that by treating climate change as "a key driver" of subsistence change works, "however uncomfortably, that fits” with the post-modern tendency to privilege individual human agency.[6] This balanced the environmental determinism of climate change with the presentist human agency.
Evidence is cited from modern (at the time of publication) archaeological science, including plant and animal residues, phytoliths, starch grains, coprolites, bone isotope chemistry, aDNA, and burial isotopes for the evidentiary regions. Ethnographic analogies from contemporary and historical sources are used in the supportive behavioral models. Secondary sources are documented in a 110-page bibliography of a 598-page book. Sources range from the Victorian (1872) through modern (2003). Originality of sources includes the evidentiary global-regional frame, the redefinition of plant and animal domestication as mutualism [7], and the vivid "punctuated explosive dispersal" [8] description of migrating farmers dramatically shifting an 'agricultural frontier' forward.
Barker's argument works by examining six independent regional case studies that converge on native adoption, punctuated explosive dispersal, and long coexistence between foragers and farmers to refute the hearth theory. I found the description and distribution of regional domesticates very interesting. I have a background in biology and a keen interest in regionally differentiated agricultural commodities (coffee, tea, cacao, etc.). The Paleolithic agronomy of plant domestication was excellent. The animal husbandry of the domesticates was as detailed. However, I am not qualified to comment on its technical aspects. Source integration is complete, with scientific archaeological backing. The main contributions include the redefinition of plant and animal domestication as mutualism rather than human invention, and recognizing that domesticated food sources were first acquired as prestige goods before eventually becoming common staples.
Structurally, Europe receives the longest treatment (58 pages), despite having the least domesticated diversity. The western hemisphere, containing both North and South America, with the largest number of domesticated foodstuffs, received only 43 pages. Barker concedes that key demographic timelines from 10,000 years ago are too imprecise, even with modern methods for quantitatively distinguishing cause from consequence. Defending an anti-hearth position on thin Paleolithic regional data amounts to much the same argument Barker used to cast doubt on the original hearth-seekers.
Barker's thesis works. Its rejection of the hearths-of-domestication-and-diffusion model of agriculture is justified by six regional, archeological science-based case studies from the Late Paleolithic. The Preface, Chapters 1, 2, 3, and 10 constitute the argumentative spine and can almost stand alone. The Chapter 10 justification of a "Revolution" as the unintended result of independent but contingent decisions, through Layton's "chance coincidence of events" [9] and human cognitive inevitability, may be a bit of a reach. However, the book challenged established ideas by presenting foraging as affluence and domestication as bilateral mutualism.
This book is recommended for upper-level students with a background in archaeology, anthropology, and prehistory. It is both a synthesis of a century's debate and an entry for the next.
Notes
1. "Graeme Barker", Wikipedia, accessed September 1, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graeme_....
2. Graeme Barker, The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory: Why Did Foragers Become Farmers? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), iv.
3. Barker, 25.
4. Barker, 147
5. Barker, 392
6. Barker, 398
7. Barker, 393.
8. Barker, 400.
9. Barker, 412.
Barker, Graeme. The Agricultural Revolution in Prehistory: Why Did Foragers Become Farmers?;Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.
March 5, 2020
The implications agriculture has had on our world since its inception are fascinating. Understanding the reasons why foragers and hunters transitioned to agriculture provides valuable insights to our day to day lives and our future. This book does an outstanding job at outlining all the possible factors on why humanity transitioned to agriculture. This is an extremely well researched and highly academic book.
I read this in hopes of finding what drove the agricultural revolution in detail. This book does that and more as the author takes a deep dive into different geographical regions where foragers transitioned to agriculture. The book provides a well-defined and scientific overview of foragers and hunters. The book also does a great job at giving an overview of approaches utilized by researchers to come to conclusions as it relates to findings in the field.
The reason I gave the book four and not five stars is because throughout the book, the author throws out a bunch of facts and data. However, he fails to give the reader more information and provide more commentary from a non-science / anthropology standpoint of what it all means. As I read the chapters on the different geographical regions, I felt the author could have done a much better job at providing a bigger story to bring everything together. I found the conclusions at the end of every chapter extremely valuable. I wish most of the book read in a similar fashion to the conclusions.
I read this in hopes of finding what drove the agricultural revolution in detail. This book does that and more as the author takes a deep dive into different geographical regions where foragers transitioned to agriculture. The book provides a well-defined and scientific overview of foragers and hunters. The book also does a great job at giving an overview of approaches utilized by researchers to come to conclusions as it relates to findings in the field.
The reason I gave the book four and not five stars is because throughout the book, the author throws out a bunch of facts and data. However, he fails to give the reader more information and provide more commentary from a non-science / anthropology standpoint of what it all means. As I read the chapters on the different geographical regions, I felt the author could have done a much better job at providing a bigger story to bring everything together. I found the conclusions at the end of every chapter extremely valuable. I wish most of the book read in a similar fashion to the conclusions.
May 8, 2018
I've long been interested in humanity's transition from hunter-gatherer to farmer. This academic book explores this in detail. I also interviewed the author.
Read
April 15, 2025Very interesting! Barker unpacks not only how we arrive at our current understanding of the development of agriculture, but also how our previous understanding came about and how we have disproven that (thinking, particularly, about how researchers sorta just decided that African agriculture was developed in a certain way despite not having any evidence). He hints at some interesting discussions regarding the shift in mindset/our understanding of the world that came along with the transition from hunting to gathering and I both would have liked to hear more about that and also understand that it's beyond the scope of this book.
One part that wasn't new to me but that I think Barker illustrated really well was how the shift from foraging to farming is a spectrum and a gradual process, that it's not a linear/straight-forward "progression," though he does not put into question the implications this may have for our current society. Again, that is beyond the scope of this book, seeing as he is looking at "ancient history" and I'm thinking about "the 21st century" but just think about foraging practices in urban areas and produce that can only be foraged and are not cultivated/domesticated.
Overall, just a very cool book! And neat! (For me, specifically.)
One part that wasn't new to me but that I think Barker illustrated really well was how the shift from foraging to farming is a spectrum and a gradual process, that it's not a linear/straight-forward "progression," though he does not put into question the implications this may have for our current society. Again, that is beyond the scope of this book, seeing as he is looking at "ancient history" and I'm thinking about "the 21st century" but just think about foraging practices in urban areas and produce that can only be foraged and are not cultivated/domesticated.
Overall, just a very cool book! And neat! (For me, specifically.)
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews