Deck 8: After the Ice: The Food-Producing Revolution

Question 1

The geological epoch that follows the Pleistocene is called the:

A) Holocene
B) Miocene
C) Pliocene
D) Oligocene

Answer 1

A

Question 2

The Pleistocene ended and the Holocene began:

A) 10,000 years ago
B) 20,000 years ago
C) 30,000 years ago
D) 100,000 years ago

Answer 2

A

Question 3

The beginning of the Holocene presented what sort of conditions to which human groups needed to adapt:

A) a steady warming of the climate
B) a stable climate
C) an increasingly humid climate
D) relatively rapid oscillation between warmer and colder

Answer 3

D

Question 4

The Holocene is best characterized as having:

A) warmer temperatures than the Pleistocene
B) colder temperatures than the Pleistocene
C) a fluctuating climate with warmer periods interrupted by "little ice ages"
D) a loss of all glacial ice on Earth

Question 5

The Holocene most likely is an interglacial period. Using the previous interglacial as a guide, this means that:

A) the Ice Age is actually over
B) in another 10,000 years, a period of glacial expansion and colder temperatures will return
C) a period of glacial expansion and colder temperatures will return in the next few decades
D) the next glacial expansion has already begun

Question 6

The last Neo-Borea or "Little Ice Age" lasted from:

A) 12,000-10,000 years ago
B) 10,000-8,000 years ago
C) 2,000-200 years ago
D) 850-150 years ago

Question 7

The Younger Dryas was:

A) an interval at the end of the Pleistocene characterized by a rapid shift back to glacial conditions during a general period of warming
B) the period during which some cultures in northern Europe adapted an agricultural way of life
C) the so-called Little Ice Age that lasted from the mid-twelfth through the mid-nineteenth centuries
D) a centuries-long drought that preceded the adoption of agriculture in the Middle East

Question 8

The Younger Dryas lasted from:

A) 35,000 years ago to 11,500 years ago
B) 17,000 years ago to 14,000 years ago
C) 12,900 years ago to 11,300 years ago
D) 7,000 years ago to 5,400 years ago

Question 9

Ice cores taken in Greenland indicate that, between 10,300 and 10,100 years ago, the world experienced:

A) a sudden and dramatic return to colder temperatures during a period of warming
B) rapid sea level rise and resulting catastrophic flooding of coastal regions
C) massive volcanic activity and a resulting "nuclear winter"
D) all of the above

Question 10

The archaeological record shows that human groups adapted to the changed climatic conditions of the Holocene by:

A) inventing tailored clothing
B) living in caves and other natural shelters
C) shifting their subsistence focus
D) migrating north

Question 11

The shift in subsistence experienced by many cultures at the end of the Holocene is characterized by:

A) the adoption of an agricultural mode of life
B) a replacement of megafauna in the diet to smaller animals, fish, shellfish, and birds
C) a shift from hunting small game to megafauna
D) an initial shift from hunting to scavenging the many animals that died when glacial conditions changed

Question 12

The subsistence shift at the end of the Pleistocene included:

A) a broadening of the food quest
B) the intensive exploitation of a few highly productive resources
C) a movement away from self-sufficiency
D) a broadening of the food quest in some areas and a narrowing to focus on just a few highly productive resources in other areas

Question 13

The early Holocene is marked by:

A) a standardization of cultures across broad regions
B) cultural collapse until the invention of agriculture-a "dark age" of the ancient world
C) increasing cultural diversity as people in different regions adapt to the diverse conditions of the post-Pleistocene world
D) warfare-the first archaeological evidence for this practice in all human prehistory

Question 14

In archaeologist Michael Jochim's study of Mesolithic sites in Germany, he notes:

A) a continuing reliance on the large game animals hunted in the Upper Paleolithic
B) the beginning of an agricultural subsistence system
C) a shift in settlement from river valleys to lakesides
D) a significant increase in subsistence diversity

Question 15

The cultural period of the early Holocene in Europe is called the:

A) Mesolithic
B) epi-Paleolithic
C) Hololithic
D) Chalcolithic

Question 16

Modern climatic conditions became established in Europe about:

A) 8,500 years ago
B) 10,000 years ago
C) 12,500 years ago
D) 5,000 years ago

Question 17

In the early Holocene of central and southern Europe:

A) Pleistocene red deer, roe deer, and wild pig were replaced by woolly mammoth, rhinoceros, wild cattle, horse, and reindeer
B) Pleistocene woolly mammoth, rhinoceros, wild cattle, horse, and reindeer were replaced by red deer, roe deer, and wild pig
C) virtually all mammal populations dropped to very low levels
D) fresh water fish became the only reliable source of protein

Question 18

The Maglemosian culture of Mesolithic Europe is characterized by:

A) a subsistence focus on remnant populations of Pleistocene megafauna surviving at higher elevations-the Alps, for example
B) early evidence of the domestication of plants and animals
C) a subsistence focus on large post-Pleistocene lakes in northern Europe
D) all of the above

Question 19

Subsistence in the European Mesolithic is characterized by:

A) an intensive focus on just a few extremely rich food sources
B) an extremely broad food base including small mammals, fish, birds, and plant foods
C) the corralling of wild animals, the first step toward their domestication
D) fishing

Question 20

The Hamburgian culture of the Upper Paleolithic in northern Europe can be divided into three distinct stone tool traditions. Compared to this, Mesolithic stone tool traditions in the same regions are:

A) twice as numerous
B) five times as numerous
C) ten times as numerous
D) less diverse; there is only one Mesolithic stone tool tradition in northern Europe

Question 21

Mesolithic sites in southern Germany show evidence of a subsistence base that included:

A) primarily large game animals
B) early examples of domesticated crops
C) a wide array of large and small mammals, nut foods, and seeds
D) a diet focused almost entirely on fish.

Question 22

Archaeologist T. Douglas Price estimates that individual cultural regions or territories in the Upper Paleolithic of northern Europe cover areas of about 100,000 km². Compared to this, individual cultural regions in the Mesolithic of northern Europe are:

A) about half as big (50,000 km²)
B) twice as large (200,000 km²)
C) one tenth the size (10,000 km²)
D) one one-hundredth the size (1,000km²)

Question 23

When compared to the situation seen for the Upper Paleolithic, the movement of lithic raw materials through trade during the European Mesolithic can be characterized in this way:

A) materials didn't move as far, but more of it was being traded
B) materials moved across much greater distances, but less of it was traded
C) materials moved across much greater distances, and much more of it was traded
D) only raw materials used in ceremonies were traded for, while in the Paleolithic, utilitarian raw materials were the focus of trade

Question 24

The period following the Paleoindian in the New World is called the:

A) Woodland
B) Indian
C) Archaic
D) Cretaceous

Question 25

In the term "Mast Forest Archaic," the "mast" refers to the:

A) large trees that later were to provide masts for the tall ships of the more recent past
B) forest of Massachusetts
C) forests of the areas around the Great Lakes
D) acorns and other nut foods that accumulate on the ground of the forest

Question 26

The three archaic cultures of New York, New England, and southeastern Canada are called by archaeologist Dean Snow:

A) Eastern Archaic, Central Archaic, Western Archaic
B) Maritime Archaic, Lake Forest Archaic, Mast Forest Archaic
C) Mast Forest Archaic, Coniferous Archaic, Deciduous Archaic
D) River Archaic, Mast Forest Archaic, Coast Archaic

Question 27

In the Mast Forest Archaic:

A) like in the Maglemosian culture of northern Europe, subsistence focused on the large, post-Pleistocene lakes that dotted the landscape
B) subsistence focused on deep-sea fishing
C) subsistence focused on piñon nuts
D) subsistence focused on the plant and animal life available in the deciduous forests of central and southern New England

Question 28

In faunal remains as well as in the art they produced, it is apparent that the people of the Maritime Archaic:

A) relied on resources of the sea for a significant proportion of their subsistence
B) relied on shellfish collecting-oysters, soft-shell clam, and mussels-for their subsistence
C) were hunters of the caribou that inhabited the Maritime Provinces of Canada in the early post-Pleistocene
D) are the ancestors of the Inuit (Eskimo) people who later migrated north, following the shrinking glacials

Question 29

Subsistence in the Shell Mound Archaic of the American Southeast was based largely on:

A) saltwater shellfish
B) freshwater shellfish
C) agriculture
D) all of the above

Question 30

Burials of the Shell Mound Archaic reflect:

A) the egalitarian nature of the social system
B) the superior position of children in the social system
C) the ravages of a subsistence system too highly focused on a single food source (shellfish)
D) social and economic differentiation

Question 31

The Koster site in Illinois is significant because:

A) it produced the earliest evidence in North America of the domestication of local crops
B) it reflects the semi-permanent occupation by Native Americans of the rich post-Pleistocene habitat of the Illinois River beginning about 7,000 years ago
C) it has produced the earliest evidence of the use of maize, a Mesoamerican domesticate that would later become the key crop for most Native Americans
D) all of the above

Question 32

Human internments found at Shell Mound Archaic sites as well as at the Koster site in Illinois reflect the:

A) development of social and economic differentiation before the development of an agricultural subsistence base
B) impacts of diffusion from the complex societies of Mesoamerica
C) impacts of a shift in subsistence focus from the broad food base of the Archaic to the more focused food base of the Woodland period
D) egalitarian nature of the social system of Archaic peoples

Question 33

The people at Koster had domesticated:

A) maize
B) squash
C) beans
D) dog

Question 34

In its focus on the oasis lake habitats, the Mesolithic culture of Mongolia is similar to:

A) the Lake Forest Archaic of northeastern North America
B) the littoral tradition of post-Pleistocene South America
C) the Desert Archaic of the North American West
D) the Maglemosian culture of northern Europe

Question 35

The Hoabinhian was:

A) a chipped pebble tool-making tradition of southeast Asia
B) the first agricultural society of east Asia, centered in the Yellow River of China
C) a blade and flake industry of the forests of Manchuria
D) a stone tool tradition of making leaf-shaped projectile points

Question 36

The people who occupied Spirit Cave in Thailand subsisted on:

A) agricultural foods, especially rice, which was a crop they had domesticated
B) monkey meat
C) domesticated animals, especially dog, which they had domesticated as a source of food
D) a broad range of wild plant and animal foods

Question 37

In Greater Australia, probably the most significant change caused by the shrinking of the glaciers at the end of the Pleistocene was the:

A) opening up of formerly glaciated mountainous regions for human occupation
B) breaking of the land connections between Australia, New Guinea, and Tasmania
C) massive extinction of the placental mammals, opening up ecological niches for the marsupials
D) inundation of the Wallace Trench

Question 38

About how much did mean temperature rise in Australia during the Holocene Warm Maximum:

A) about 10ºC (18ºF)
B) between 5ºC (9ºF) and 8ºC (14.4ºF)
C) between 0.5ºC (.9ºF) and 3ºC (5.4ºF)
D) only about 1ºC (1.8ºF)

Question 39

Following the Holocene Warm Maximum, modern cooler and drier conditions were established in Australia by about:

A) 10,000 years ago
B) 6,000 years ago
C) 4,500 years ago
D) 1,000 years ago

Question 40

The Australian Small Tool Phase is characterized by the production of:

A) finely made, unifacially, and bifacially retouched spear points
B) diminutive handaxes
C) waisted axes
D) ground stone tools

Question 41

The Australian Small Tool Phase dates to:

A) 10,000 years ago
B) 6,000 years ago
C) 4,500 years ago
D) 1,000 years ago

Question 42

The Roonka Flat site in post-Pleistocene Australia is characterized by the presence of:

A) elaborate human burials
B) the bones of domesticated kangaroos
C) remains of a domesticated root crop called macrozamia
D) all of the above

Question 43

In Australia, the cultural diversity that characterized much of the rest of the world in the post-Pleistocene is most clearly reflected in:

A) geographic variation in raw materials used to make tools
B) the use of domesticated plants and animals
C) a broad array of different art styles
D) differing social patterns

Question 44

Social complexity in Australia in the post-Pleistocene is reflected in:

A) the construction of pyramidal monuments in southwest Australia
B) differences in the sized of permanent structures with wealthier individuals having larger, more elaborate houses
C) the concentration of gold objects in the house remains of a small fraction of individuals
D) differences in the size and elaborateness of burials

Question 45

The littoral adaptational focus in post-Pleistocene South America was on the resources of the:

A) mountains
B) coast
C) deserts
D) river valleys

Question 46

Subsistence data recovered at the late Pleistocene sites of Quebrada Tacahua and Quebrada Jaguay in South America shows that:

A) big game hunting was a common element of Paleoindian economy
B) the domestication of ancient llamas and alpacas can be traced to more than 10,000 years ago
C) maritime economies are traceable the period before 10,000 years ago in the New World
D) all of the above

Question 47

Among the South American wild camelids are the:

A) dromedary and bachtrian
B) mammoth and mastodon
C) llama and alpaca
D) vicuña and guanaco

Question 48

The Capsian culture of post-Pleistocene Africa is characterized by the production of:

A) fluted points
B) that continent's first fired pottery
C) microblades
D) the world's most recent Acheulean handaxes

Question 49

The late Pleistocene Iberomaurusians of northwest Africa had as their subsistence base:

A) the hunting of wild cattle, gazelle, hartebeest, and Barbary sheep
B) the planting of tef, fonio, ground nuts, and oil palm
C) the planting of maize, beans, and squash
D) shellfish collecting

Question 50

Paleoclimatological data indicates that climate change at the Pleistocene/Holocene boundary was:

A) steady and predictable
B) not discernable within an individual's lifetime
C) rapid and unpredictable
D) not as great as once was thought

Question 51

The food-producing revolution can be best described as a:

A) period of rapid replacement of a hunting and gathering existence with an agricultural way of life
B) lengthy "evolutionary" process of change from a foraging to an agricultural mode of subsistence
C) violent struggle on the part of overpopulated societies more than 10,000 years ago to change the way in which they fed themselves
D) process in which the Neolithic culture of the Middle East violently imposed their agricultural way of life on those in surrounding territories

Question 52

In both the Old and New Worlds, the delay between the initial domestication of plants and animals and the evolution fully agricultural societies is measured in:

A) decades
B) centuries
C) millennia
D) eons

Question 53

Artificial selection is best defined as:

A) the way in which nature produces domesticated species that humans then can use
B) the guiding principle behind human biological evolution
C) the manipulation by people of the reproduction of economically important plant and animal species
D) the way in which archaeologists select certain physical attributes of plants and animals to define their point along a continuum from wild to domesticated

Question 54

When, through the process of artificial selection, plants or animals have been so altered from their natural state that they can no longer be considered the same species as their wild ancestors, they are said to have been:

A) tamed
B) selected
C) domesticated
D) horticultural

Question 55

The remains of a domesticated species may be distinguishable from a wild species by reference to:

A) size
B) geographic distribution
C) morphology
D) all of the above

Question 56

The population characteristics of a tamed, tended, or domesticated animal species used in the diet of an ancient people often reflect the fact that:

A) the animals live to a ripe old age because they are cared for by people
B) most males are slaughtered at a young age, and most females live to adulthood
C) the animals live short lives compared to their wild ancestors because of inbreeding under human control
D) the animal population curve varied drastically through time

Question 57

In the case of the domesticated dog, the characteristic ancient people selected for initially seems to have been:

A) smaller size
B) a longer coat
C) more palatable meat
D) larger size

Question 58

An ongoing experiment in domestication conducted in Russia involves which animal:

A) deer
B) beaver
C) fox
D) tiger

Question 59

In the domestication of the fox, wild animals have been selected for breeding that, when measured along a behavioral continuum, have:

A) thicker fur
B) bushier tails
C) more colorful coats
D) less fear of human beings

Question 60

The seeds of domesticated or tended species are different from those of the wild ancestors of these plants in being:

A) larger and with thinner seed coats
B) larger and with thicker seed coats
C) smaller and with thinner seeds coats
D) smaller and with thicker seed coats

Question 61

The domestication of plants occurred independently in which world area(s):

A) the Middle East, East Asia
B) the Middle East, East Asia, Mesoamerica
C) the Middle East, East Asia, Mesoamerica, North America
D) the Middle East, East Asia, Mesoamerica, North America, Africa

Question 62

The domestication of animals occurred independently in which world areas:

A) the Middle East, East Asia
B) the Middle East, East Asia, Mesoamerica
C) the Middle East, East Asia, Mesoamerica, North America
D) the Middle East, East Asia, Mesoamerica, North America, Africa

Question 63

A heavy reliance on the plants that later would become agricultural staples has been found at the Ohalo II site in Israel dating to as much as:

A) 40,000 years ago
B) 19,000 years ago
C) 10,000 years ago
D) 5,000 years ago

Question 64

Paleobotanist Dolores Piperno and her team found the following evidence at Ohalo II in Israel relating to the origins of agriculture and domestication:

A) very early dog burials
B) tesosinte plants that produced exposed kernels
C) sorghum and millet, neither of which are native to the area in which the site was found
D) starch grains of emmer and wild barley found on the surface of a grinding stone

Question 65

Highly mobile people who rely on a broad range of wild plant and animal resources are said to be:

A) simple foragers
B) complex foragers
C) horticulturists
D) pastoralists

Question 66

In complex foraging:

A) highly mobile people rely on a broad range of wild plant and animal resources
B) people rely for their subsistence on a complex combination of wild and domesticated plant and animal species
C) people rely for their subsistence on domesticated plants and animals
D) subsistence is based on the intensive collection of a few productive resources

Question 67

In terms of their subsistence, the Natufian people were:

A) simple foragers
B) complex foragers
C) horticulturists
D) pastoralists

Question 68

The Natufian shift from simple to complex foraging is dated to about:

A) 20,000 years ago
B) 14,000 years ago
C) 10,800 years ago
D) 9,500 years ago

Question 69

The presence of extensive sickle sheen on microblades found at Natufian sites is evidence there for the:

A) hunting of small game animals
B) making of bone tools
C) harvesting of cereal grains
D) domestication of plants

Question 70

The development of domesticated crops in the Middle East occurred during a period of:

A) colder and drier conditions
B) tropical conditions
C) glaciation to the north
D) desertification

Question 71

A legume is a plant that produces:

A) cereal grains
B) thick, edible roots
C) nuts
D) pods with seeds

Question 72

The significance of the discovery of einkorn at Mureybit and Abu Hureyra in Syria rests in the fact that:

A) chemical analysis of the kernels indicates that the wheat was domesticated
B) this shows that corn (maize) was not restricted to the Americas in prehistory
C) these sites are located outside of the region where wild wheat grows today, indicating that the plants may have been moved by people
D) though einkorn cannot be eaten by people, it is valuable food for sheep; its presence at the site implies that people were tending and feeding wild sheep, a step along the continuum leading to their domestication

Question 73

The heavy wear exhibited on human teeth found in Natufian burials has been interpreted as evidence of:

A) the use of grinding stones in food preparation
B) an increase in periodontal disease resulting from an agricultural diet high in carbohydrates
C) use of the jaw in hide preparation
D) their having filed down their teeth to provide flat surfaces for eating tough cereal grains

Question 74

The domesticated barley grains recovered at Netiv Hagdud, Gilgal, and Ganj Dareh are about how old:

A) 13,000 years
B) 11,000 years
C) 10,000 years
D) 8,500 years

Question 75

Evidence from the chronological sequence of occupation of Ali Kosh shows quite clearly that:

A) domesticated crops were so superior they quickly eclipsed the significance of wild crops in the diet
B) domesticated crops obviously were introduced to the site's inhabitants from elsewhere; there is no evidence of domestication actually occurring at the site
C) einkorn wheat replaced emmer in the diet
D) domesticated crops only very slowly eclipsed the significance of wild foods in the diet

Question 76

It has been suggested that the inhabitants of Zawi Shanidar tended and controlled a population of sheep on which their subsistence was based. What evidence supports this:

A) the sheep bones recovered were different from the bones of wild sheep
B) the remains of corals have been found in which the sheep were kept
C) the species of sheep found lacked the ability to survive in the wild
D) the age-mortality profile of the archaeological faunal assemblage-almost entirely young animals-is dissimilar to that of a wild population

Question 77

The goat remains found at Ganj Dareh:

A) are bigger than their wild ancestors
B) are smaller than their wild ancestors
C) are disproportionately those of sub-adult males
D) are not as strong as their wild ancestors, the result of being penned up

Question 78

At the 10,200-year-old Asikli Höyük site in Turkey, researchers suggested that wild sheep had been corralled in the village because they found a concentration of:

A) sheep bones
B) tools for shearing sheep
C) the bones of only very young male sheep
D) sheep dung

Question 79

The earliest remains of what appear to be domesticated dogs date to about how long ago:

A) 18,000 years
B) 12,000 years
C) 6,000 years
D) 4,000 years

Question 80

The wild ancestor of the domesticated dog was the:

A) wolf
B) wild dog of Africa
C) fox
D) hyena