Religious/Cultural Drivers of Agriculture

Key Insight

While economic and demographic factors are usually cited for historical developments, an alternative theory suggests that Sapiens consciously chose harder lives to pursue other aspirations, possibly religious or cultural. This challenges the materialist school dominant in ancient history due to a lack of written evidence for non-material motivations in preliterate societies.

Telltale clues emerged from the Göbekli Tepe excavation in south-east Turkey, where monumental pillared structures, decorated with spectacular engravings, were discovered. These structures, dating to about 9500 BC, predate agriculture and were built by hunter-gatherers, with pillars weighing up to 7 tons and one half-chiselled pillar weighing 50 tons. This suggests sophisticated cultural complexity among ancient foragers, far beyond previous suspicions.

The massive effort required to build Göbekli Tepe, involving thousands of foragers cooperating over extended periods, indicates a powerful religious or ideological system. The discovery that einkorn wheat, a domesticated variant, originated near Göbekli Tepe, suggests a connection. It is plausible that foragers shifted from gathering to intense wheat cultivation, not to increase their normal food supply, but to support the construction and maintenance of a temple, implying that temple-building might have preceded, and even driven, the formation of permanent agricultural villages.