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Who/What: Earliest dated Homo sapiens remains that are considered Anatomically Modern Humans (AMHs).

Where: Discovered in the southern Omo River Valley of Ethiopia.

Brief Description: The Omo River Valley is home to a large range of early hominid remains, including bones of Homo sapiens discovered in 1967. While their dating is somewhat disputed, some bones may date to nearly 200,000 years ago and represent the earliest example of Homo sapiens that share more or less the same  anatomy as modern humans.

Historical Significance: These early fossil remains, among others, indicate that the fully developed human species originated in Africa.

Links to relevant Secondary Sources:

1. A short article published by the archaeologist who originally discovered the remains: Richard Leakey, "Early Homo sapiens Remains from the Omo River Region of Southwest Ethiopia: Faunal Remains from the Omo Valley," Nature 222 (1969): 1132–1133.

2. This encyclopedia entry gives an overview of the discoveries in the Omo River Valley: https://www.britannica.com/place/Omo

Image Source: Günter Bräuer, "Omo I Cranium," Encyclopedia Britannica, June 3 2020, https://www.britannica.com/place/Omo#/media/1/1231581/36978

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Who/What: One of the earliest fortified Neolithic towns.

Where: Present-day West Bank, Palestine

Brief Description: The site of Tell es-Sultan, identified as the ancient city of Jericho, is home to 23 distinct layers of settlement. The earliest of these evidences a permanent Natufian culture settlement by c. 9,000 BCE, which eventually developed into an agricultural town that was home to perhaps 2,000 - 3,000 inhabitants. The town was notable for its large stone tower and walls, which were built by c. 8,000 BCE.

Historical Significance: Jericho is another example of a site that was inhabited before it started farming, meaning it supplies more evidence that settlement precedes agriculture. It was only after farming began that it had to need to protect its surplus grains with fortifications.

Links to Primary or Secondary Sources:

1. This is the official page of the UNESCO World Heritage Site at Tell es-Sultan: https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/5704/

2. This article, written by influential archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon, discusses several of the key findings from the excavations she led at Jericho in the 1950s: Kathleen Kenyon, "Jericho," Archaeology 20.4 (1967): 268-75.

Image Citation: Reinhard Dietrich, "Tower of Jericho, Tell es-Sultan archaeological site, ca. 7000 BCE," JPEG, 2,592 × 1,944, Wikimedia Commons, June 10 2020khanacademy.org, June 4 2020, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tower_of_Jericho.jpg

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Who/What: The Domestication of cows.

Where: First domesticated in the Ancient Near East, likely in the Fertile Crescent proper.

Brief Description: Cows were domesticated from the now extinct Aurochs and have diffused across the planet since their domestication approximately 10,500 years ago. It is possible that the entire population of modern cows descends from as few as 80 Aurochs that were domesticated and that there may have been several starts and stops to the process of auroch domestication.

Historical Significance: Not only did cattle provide a large, albeit difficult to feed supply of meat, they became a primary source of traction power for millennia to come in the form of oxen (castrated bulls) as well as dairy once those traits began to be elected by humans.

Link(s) to relevant Primary or Secondary Source(s):

1. An article about the initial size of the Auroch population domesticated: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/03/120327124243.htm

2. A Journal article about the possibility of there being multiple domestication episodes: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6304694/

3. This book touches on domestication at several points and some of the impacts they had: Jared Dimond, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies (New York: Norton, 1997)

Image Citation: Peter Herrmann, Untitled, JPEG, 4727×3151, pixabay.com, June 3 2020, https://pixabay.com/photos/beef-aurochs-ox-ur-usus-cattle-3522962/.