How Did Animal Domestication Start?

As a massive turning point in human history, plant and animal domestication has influenced our present-day lifestyle from the foods we eat to the languages we speak. Starting from its earliest ground, the Fertile Crescent, the act of domesticating plants and animals has been so ingrained in our modern world that the origins of domestication come unexpectedly.
Although domestication is a widespread process today, it was rather unpopular with early peoples. Farmers back then had no model of domestication, and the very few who did, disapproved. The dismal outcomes—higher disease factors, nutrition loss, and shorter builds confirmed that. So then how did domestication ever start? The answer lies in the alterations of these two very connected …show more content…
Some species were also easier to tame than others. Zebras, known for their feisty manner and sharper eyesight, were given up in favor of horses, a milder and less acute creature. Then there’s the concern of a manageable diet. Animals like anteaters were not domesticated. Slow growth and extensive birth periods—elephants and gorillas—were also not tolerated. Nasty temperaments (like bears and the zebras mentioned above), unwillingness to breed while captured (pandas), those lacking a principal hierarchy system (antelope), and inclinations of fright in confined areas or in front of predators (deer) were all decided against. Very few species passed all the requirements. Indeed, despite all these difficulties, domestication actually spread throughout the various areas fit for farming. So did, of course, the domesticators. Many hunter-gatherers were subsequently evacuated from their homelands, where agricultural societies then occupied. Though the spread of domestication was apparent, the origin areas of food production did not follow. Developed in separate regions of the world, these agricultural hearths remained at the number of no more than nine. That brings about an enigma. Furthermore, the domains of active food production then and now barely resemble …show more content…
From food production was the change of lifestyle: nomadic to settled, which impacted a wide array of activity. Breaks between childbirth shortened, and edible plants and animals were readily available, resulting in an altogether boost of human population. And technology. Tools that could not previously be carried could now be collected and workers could be fed with the stock of surplus food. Social structure, political centralization, and a fixed military were formed, to which, ultimately, farmers dislodged foragers. A more serious dislodgement occurred with peoples--diseased people. Epidemic diseases that survive in sizable, dense populations arrived after agriculture started, where similar epidemics from herd animals had evolved into human ones. Greater densities and contact with domesticates in human populations allowed for the spread of these diseases. People who were exposed, however, could receive immunity, and hereditary opposition to these diseases appeared. But distribution wasn’t equal. Eurasia had all the large mammal domesticates, save for one, and as a result, became a rich disease region. And a potent force. The spread of Eurasian disease to the western and eastern continents greatly diminished the native populations, and became one their most deadly instruments. Domestication can also be seen as an instrument—one that, when played, brought upon several advantages to the players that were