The Archaeology of Pig Domestication in Eurasia

Abstract

The multifaceted behavioral and ecological flexibility of pigs and wild boar (Sus scrofa) makes study of their domestication both complex and of broad anthropological significance. While recognizing contextual contingency, we propose several "pathways" to pig domestication. We also highlight the diversity of pig management practices. This diversity complicates zooarchaeological detection of management techniques employed by humans in the early steps of domestication, and we stress the need for multiple lines of evidence. Drawing together the evidence, we review early Holocene human-Sus relations in Japan, Cyprus, northern Mesopotamia, and China. Independent pig domestication occurred in northern Mesopotamia by c. 7500 cal. BC and China by c. 6000 cal. BC. In northern Mesopotamia pig domestication followed a combined "commensal and prey" pathway that evolved into loose "extensive" husbandry that persisted as the dominant form of pig management for several millennia. There are not yet enough zooarchaeological data to speculate on the early stages of pig domestication in China, but once that process began, it involved more intensive management (relying on pens and fodder), leading to more rapid selection for phenotypes associated with domestication. Finally, pig domestication "failed" to take off in Japan. We suggest this was related to a number of factors including the lack of domestic crops and, potentially, cultural barriers to conceiving animals as property.

The Ethics of Farm Animal Biotechnology from an Anthropological Perspective

“…This distinctive kind of mutualism that characterizes all three pathways of domestication is not restricted to humans and domestic livestock but is also observed in non-human species as well. There is for example a domestic relationship between leaf cutter ants and fungi that also resulted in behavioral, physiological, and morphological changes in both partners [82], as they are observed in the process of animal domestication by humans.…”

A History of Pigs in China: From Curious Omnivores to Industrial Pork

“…Genetic and zooarchaeological evidence indicates that pigs were domesticated from wild boars in multiple locations across Eurasia (Price and Hongo, forthcoming). This process began with people managing wild boar populations.…”

Dingoes and domestication

“…Yet another example is provided by the rich diversity of human–pig associations in Melanesia. In mainland New Guinea, there is a broad spectrum of pig husbandry regimes, ranging from extensive to intensive (Dwyer 1996; Hide 2003; Price & Hongo 2019; Rosman & Rubel 1989; Townsend 1974; Yen 1991). In the former, evident mostly in lowland regions, village sows breed with feralised, wild‐living boars; in fact, domestic pigs are often not the result of any form of controlled breeding, but are feralised (‘wild') boars that people capture as piglets and hand‐rear in the village (Dwyer 1996).…”

“…The sows also give birth in the forest; hence, the carer of the gravid sow must track her to the well‐concealed birthing nest to retrieve the piglets when they are between 2 and 4 weeks old (Dwyer & Minnegal 2005). Much like dogs, pigs in the genus Sus are intelligent and inquisitive animals whose social behaviour is formed at an early age through filial imprinting (Price & Hongo 2019). After capturing piglets, Kubo women intervene in this imprinting process, isolating them from other wild‐living piglets and nurturing them constantly (including breastfeeding them) for the first 3–4 months, forming a close attachment between pig and caregiver that lasts until the animal is slaughtered (Dwyer & Minnegal 2005).…”