In a cave 12,000 years ago, a group of people settled down to a dinner that has rarely been matched: 71 tortoises that had been roasted in their shells.
The discovery of the shells shows that feasting occurred 2500 years earlier than previously thought, at a critical stage in the transition from hunter-gathering to settled farming.
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The remains of the feast were found in Hilazon Tachtit cave (see picture) in Israel by of the University of Connecticut in Storrs and of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. It is a burial ground that contains the bones of 28 people.
The tortoise shells (see picture) were buried in 12,000-year-old pit lined with limestone slabs, along with the body of an elderly woman (see picture). 鈥淪he had a lot of health problems and probably limped,鈥� Munro says. 鈥淪he was buried with a collection of unusual animal parts such as a leopard pelvis.鈥� These items were probably symbols of status and may indicate that she was a shaman. Munro thinks that the tortoises were eaten during the woman鈥檚 funeral.
Funeral feasts
In a second pit of the same age they found another burial, this one accompanied by the bones of three wild cattle (see picture). This suggests there may have been two separate funeral feasts.
At the time the region was inhabited by the Natufian people, who were beginning to settle down in fixed communities. 鈥淪uddenly you have hundreds of people living in the same place for most of the year, and that creates friction,鈥� says of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Feasts may have helped smooth things over and brought communities together, he says.
However, archaeologist of Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada, argues that feasting tends to be used by political leaders to cement their power. 鈥淚t converts surplus food production into useful things, like debts and political support,鈥� he says.
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