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Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

sciencemag.org

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Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#81

Post by bobbylarrybobby »

User23 wrote: post #57
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #3

It doesn't really surprise me much that lactase persistence should be so strongly selected for in a relatively short period of time. Cows and other ungulates possess a rather magical ability to turn something that can't be digested by humans (cellulose) into something that can (milk). Opening up the huge caloric and nutrient resource of cellulose to humans in a relatively replenishable way had to be a giant benefit t…

Bronze Age Europeans aren’t the ancestors of modern day Europeans. Thanks to modern genetic research we know that they were largely exterminated by invaders a few thousand years ago, at least on the yDNA lineages.

Do you know where modern day Europeans came from? Who were these invaders?

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#82

Post by hinkley »

simcop2387 wrote: post #73
hinkley wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Milk production is also a continuum of data samples over the life of the animal. Eating the animal is one data sample and you can’t duplicate the animal after collecting the data. Selecting for milk production would be a lot more accurate than selecting for meat tastiness, longevity or even, to an lesser extent, health.

Actually we select for both depending on the line of the stock and have been doing so for a rather long time. You do lose the animal after killing it of course but we have a huge amount data from cattle breeding charts that lets a branch be trimmed if there's some fault with it that will damage the genetic tree.

You can’t use the lens of modern agriculture and data collection to look at the birth and growth of animal husbandry.

We have enough now that the conversation isn’t about if we can afford to eat our cows but how fast we can eat them. The top of this thread was discussing how we got into milk harvesting so broadly when so few have the genes for it. It was more efficient for people handing down knowledge through oral tradition.

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#83

Post by serf »

tus88 wrote: post #51
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #3

It doesn't really surprise me much that lactase persistence should be so strongly selected for in a relatively short period of time. Cows and other ungulates possess a rather magical ability to turn something that can't be digested by humans (cellulose) into something that can (milk). Opening up the huge caloric and nutrient resource of cellulose to humans in a relatively replenishable way had to be a giant benefit t…

When you put it like that I understand why Indians worship cows.

Hindu folk revere cows, but not all folk from India are Hindu.

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#84

Post by gostsamo »

lordnacho wrote: post #4
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #3

It doesn't really surprise me much that lactase persistence should be so strongly selected for in a relatively short period of time. Cows and other ungulates possess a rather magical ability to turn something that can't be digested by humans (cellulose) into something that can (milk). Opening up the huge caloric and nutrient resource of cellulose to humans in a relatively replenishable way had to be a giant benefit t…

If it's so powerful, why did it not take over the rest of the world, or at least the rest of Eurasia? You'd think just a few people having kids with foreign populations would make the gene conquer the whole planet? They had cows in other places as well, right? One guess might be that winters in Europe were harsher than other population centres (China, India, Middle East), and periodic famines meant that some people w…

Europe, throughout most of its history, was a corner of the world. It was a final destination for tribes that were misplaced by overpopulation, decease, and famine from the Middle East and Central Asia.

My theory is that in order for this mutation to spread it must give a cutting edge advantage in an equal environment. However, the migration pressure was toward Europe, not out of it. What's more, other populations already had their ways to utilize derry products and the advantage might not have been so crucial. Therefore, the gene spread had been dependent mostly on internal migration and local populations mixing together.

Of course, this theory has its weaknesses. It does not account for the effects of Alexander the Great, the Silk Road, the Roman empire or the depopulation of Eastern Europe through slave trade during the middle ages. At the same time, most of these factors would open trade routes and cultural exchange but not the large scale migrations necessary for a significant genetic mix. Slavery might offer something, but it was recent and slaves are usually the most disadvantaged group in a society which does not help their genes being promoted.

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#85

Post by gvjddbnvdrbv »

jonplackett wrote: post #21

Considering how obsessed we are with giving milk to kids because it’s so healthy, it doesn’t seem that crazy it would be a massive advantage to be able to drink it.

Up to the age of around 3 we give cows milk to children because we are replacing the human milk that children up to that age would naturally be drinking...

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#86

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

Spooky23 wrote: post #40
lordnacho wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's so powerful, why did it not take over the rest of the world, or at least the rest of Eurasia? You'd think just a few people having kids with foreign populations would make the gene conquer the whole planet? They had cows in other places as well, right? One guess might be that winters in Europe were harsher than other population centres (China, India, Middle East), and periodic famines meant that some people w…

Milk isn’t dairy. Because it’s a liability in many parts of the world without abundant fodder or cold climate. Milk can be dangerous without refrigeration in hours. Dairy is much more than milk. You can consume cheese, yogurt, butter and many other products where the process of making the dairy product eliminates lactose. Think about things like cooking oil — an impossible thing to manufacture efficiently if you lack…

Let it ferment. Just add https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kefir

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#87

Post by valarauko »

bobobob420 wrote: post #65

Indians (or people present in common day india-pakistan-nepal) were drinking milk before 5500 BC..makes you wonder. And most of that was fermented (cheese (paneer) and yogurt). Makes you wonder if the fermentation made it easier to eat and helped developed the gene.

Do you have a source for the IVC use of milk? I'm not familiar with any direct evidence that the IVC consumed milk or milk products. They did rear animals that can be milked, but it doesn't necessarily follow that the IVC used them for milk rather than meat.

The lactase persistence variant found in India, 13910T, is the same as prevalent in Europe, and likely arrived with Steppe pastoralists - after the fall of the Indus Valley Civilization. If the IVC had widespread lactase persistence mutations developing independently of the Steppe, you'd expect other variants to show up in the population, but it doesn't. Lactase persistence in India also closely tracks Steppe ancestry, suggestive that the IVC were largely lactose intolerant. They did have significant cattle, and were the birthplace of Zebu cattle domestication.

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#88

Post by 29athrowaway »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #3

It doesn't really surprise me much that lactase persistence should be so strongly selected for in a relatively short period of time. Cows and other ungulates possess a rather magical ability to turn something that can't be digested by humans (cellulose) into something that can (milk). Opening up the huge caloric and nutrient resource of cellulose to humans in a relatively replenishable way had to be a giant benefit t…

There are bacteria that can eat nylon, a man-made molecule. Nylon was invented in 1935 and these bacteria were discovered in 1975. The enzymes used by these bacteria only work on nylon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nylon-eating_bacteria

Bacteria have much shorter generations and this facilitates rapid evolution.

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#89

Post by xyzzyz »

bobbylarrybobby wrote: post #81
User23 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bronze Age Europeans aren’t the ancestors of modern day Europeans. Thanks to modern genetic research we know that they were largely exterminated by invaders a few thousand years ago, at least on the yDNA lineages.

Do you know where modern day Europeans came from? Who were these invaders?

You can find answers to these questions in recent David Reich’s book.

Re: Warrior skeletons reveal Bronze Age Europeans couldn’t drink milk

#90

Post by NegativeLatency »

bobbylarrybobby wrote: post #81
User23 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bronze Age Europeans aren’t the ancestors of modern day Europeans. Thanks to modern genetic research we know that they were largely exterminated by invaders a few thousand years ago, at least on the yDNA lineages.

Do you know where modern day Europeans came from? Who were these invaders?

Possibly the celts and prior Indo-Europeans?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celts

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