Research groups such as Hokkaido University have announced that they have found traces of migratory bird cancer companions being bred at archaeological sites in eastern China about 7,000 years ago, the oldest case of human beings domesticating birds. It is said that.
The history of human domestication of birds is often unclear, and it is believed that chickens were bred in South Asia about 4000 years ago, but it has not been clarified before that.
Research groups such as Associate Professor Masaki Eda of Hokkaido University analyzed the bones of a large number of cancer companions excavated from the remains of a Neolithic village about 7,000 years ago in Zhejiang Province, eastern China.
There should have been no young birds in this area because the cancer companions lay eggs and raise chicks in the north, but one young chick bone less than 2 months old was found in the bones. am.
In addition, taking advantage of the fact that the bones of animals reflect slight differences in the ratio of isotopes contained in water in each region, we investigated the places where this cancer companion grew, and found that 25 bones were found. Seven of them are presumed to have grown mainly in this area without migration.
Some of the cancer buddies analyzed are likely to have been bred around the settlement 7,000 years ago, the research group said.
Associate Professor Eda said, "This is the oldest case of a bird being bred at this time. No trace of the bird being bred was found at another archaeological site 8000 years ago, and the first bred was cancer. It may be a companion of. "