The Neolithic Revolution

Angus Chu and Pietro F. Peretto

Chapter 5 in Human Origins and Evolution in a Malthusian Economy, 2025, pp 43-56 from World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.

Abstract: In Chapter 4, we explore how Homo sapiens became the only surviving human species. For most of their history, early modern humans were hunter-gatherers. The Neolithic Revolution (the transition from hunting-gathering to agriculture) occurred in the Fertile Crescent, with the cultivation of wheat and barley and the domestication of sheep and goats about 12,000 years ago, and then independently in other parts of the world. For example, rice cultivation and domestication occurred in ancient China as early as 9,400 years ago in the Yangtze River Valley, and this agricultural transition planted the seed of the birth of the Chinese civilization. “The Neolithic Revolution had an enduring effect on humanity. In a matter of only a few thousand years, the majority of humans abandoned their nomadic lifestyle.” Was this agricultural transition of human society inevitable? If not, what are the different conditions that could have potentially made the agricultural transition more or less likely to occur?…

Keywords: Human Origins; Human Evolution; Malthusian Growth Theory; Natural Selection; Human Brain Size Evolution; Prehistoric Human Migration; Migration Out of Africa; Extinction of Archaic Humans; Neolithic Revolution; Political Fragmentation and Unification; Industrial Revolution; Technological Progress; Innovation; Education (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D64 J11 N10 O10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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