ciało-człowieka: Domestic pigeon

Evidence: 100 • authority: 72

The domestic pigeon (Columba livia "domestica" or Columba livia forma domestica) is a domesticated bird derived from the rock dove (Columba livia), of which it is also a subspecies. Although often termed a "subspecies", the domesticated pigeon does not constitute an accepted zoological subspecies of the rock dove, but a collection of over 350 breeds. The rock dove is among the world's first birds to be domesticated; Mesopotamian cuneiform tablets mention the domestication of pigeons more than 5,000 years ago, as do Egyptian hieroglyphs. Pigeons have held historical importance to humans as food, pets, symbolic animals, and messengers. Due to their homing ability, pigeons have been used to de…

Evidence: 36 • authority: 80

The botai of Central Asia milked mares more than 5,000 years ago: Hunter‐gatherers left signs of domesticated horses

Evidence: 18 • authority: 90

The antecedent of the pigeons are rock doves ( Columba livia ), which have a long history of relationships with people. At Gorham’s Cave in Gibraltar 67,000 years ago, Neanderthals sustainably harvested rock doves over a period of 40,000 years (Blasco et al. 2014 ). The birds lived in large colonies, and their fast reproduction enabled exploitation for millennia. Hawes ( 1984 ) considers the pigeon to be self-domesticating as the birds were drawn to feed on human fields and settlements. Evidence in the form of dove figurines found at Tell Arpachiyah in Iraq suggests that domestication occurred by around 4500 BC. The birds featured frequently in later Assyrian reliefs (Zeuner 1963 ), but direct zooarchaeological evidence is absent. Ancient Egyptians kept large populations as offerings for ceremonies, and Greek statues and vases dated to the 5th century BC depict the birds held by people (Hawes 1984 ). Dovecotes became common in the first millennium BC as humans began to encourage birds to roost. Pigeon towers facilitated the collection of young birds or squabs for consumption, with numerous archaeological examples including the subterranean dovecote in Amman hewn into the chalky limestone bedrock (Khairy and Kakish 2013 ). The structure was approximately 3 m in diameter and 2.8 m deep and had some 300 small niches for nesting doves; it dates between the late eight to sixth century BC (Kakish 2012 ). Remains of dovecotes are almost certainly underrepresented as it would have been common to build them in the upper stories of structures that are unlikely to survive. Husselman ( 1953 ) provides a description of pigeon keeping in Karanis based on tax records. The site was an agricultural town in the Egyptian Faiyum that was occupied from the third century BC until the sixth century AD. A dovecote at Shivta in the Negev Desert that has been excavated dates to the Byzantine period and was probably abandoned in the middle of the sixth century AD (Ramsay et al. 2016 ). The excavation produced bones from 200 pigeons, many of which were almost complete skeletons. Of these bones, 24% were juvenile and 1% were neonatal (Ramsay et al. 2016 ). The metric data from the pigeon bones show that the birds were similar in morphology to rock pigeons although slightly smaller, perhaps reflecting Bergmann’s rule that in warmer environments animals tend to have a smaller body size to aid thermoregulation (Marom et al. 2018 ). Two dovecotes at Sa‘adon in the Negev Desert include one with a layer of pigeon manure and articulated pigeon skeletons with evidence of sudden destruction in the middle of the sixth century AD (Tepper et al. 2018 ). The tradition of dovecote building, which started in Southwest Asia, is still common in the region. It is especially prevalent at Mit Ghamr in the Egyptian Delta where hundreds of mudbrick pigeon towers line the streets. Ostrich ( Struthio camelus ) eggs have been exploited extensively throughout human history as containers as well as raw materials for items of ornamentation (Collins and Steele 2017 ; Gorzalczany and Rosen 2022 ). Evidence for hunting ostrich is rare with a notable exception at the site of Medjez II in northern Algeria, where ostrich bones date to the earliest phase at about 8000 BC (Merzoug 2011 ). A review of the evidence from the Arabian Peninsula (Potts 2001 ) suggested that ostriches were rarely hunted for meat, but their feathers were desired. Rock art depictions showing ostriches hunted from horseback could date as early as the last centuries BC (Potts 2001 ). Introduction of firearms and motorized vehicles rapidly led to the extinction of the Arabian ostrich ( Struthio camelus syriacus ) in 1966. Siegfreid ( 1984 ) suggests that ostriches were perhaps semidomesticated by Egyptian, Greek, and Roman civilizations with fattened birds incorporated into feasts. Egyptian and Roman women allegedly rode the birds at ceremonies, but no archaeological evidence has been found despite the historical sources. In the 19th century, a high demand for feathers was fulfilled by hunting. Successful artificial hatching first took place in 1857 in Algeria, and in 1869 an artificial incubator for ostrich eggs was invented (Deeming 1999 ), which lead to commercial farming in South Africa (Shanawany 1995 ). By 1913, the number of commercially raised ostriches increased to over 1,000,000 and spread across the globe, with Egypt, Australia, New Zealand, the United States, and Argentina adopting the industry at scale (Shanawany 1995 ). The market for feathers all but disappeared with the First and Second World Wars, so farms expanded into the meat and hide industries, which fueled global growth (Shanawany 1995 ).

Evidence: 0 • authority: 77

Evidence: 0 • authority: 91