Ancestral Appetites: Food in Prehistory

Being interested in both prehistory and in food history, I was attracted by the title of this book –  Ancestral Appetites: Food in Prehistory by Kristen J. Gremillion, 2011. This is also my choice for the category Food, in the 2024 Nonfiction Reader Challenge. Gremillion is a Professor of Anthropology at The Ohio State University who specializes in paleoethnobotany.

In the Introduction, Gremillion states, “Like most mammals, and especially as primates, we have a versatile behavioral repertoire; when it comes to inventing ways to catch, harvest, prepare, and consume food, we have no rivals.” And explains that in this book, “I explore how this complex system of dietary adaptation developed to generate the diversity of human foodways present today.”

She doesn’t focus on specific cuisines or “recipes,” but rather the development of hunting, gathering, farming, husbandry as well as techniques of cooking, preparation, fermenting, etc. Although Gremillion doesn’t focus on specific foods, she does describe certain foods that were eaten in Europe and North America in prehistory; for example, wheat, grains, succotash, hominy, maize, tortillas, chapati and fermented dairy products.

She begins millions of years ago with the Australopithecines, and continues through history to the beginning of agriculture in the Neolithic. During this time frame, she includes information about foraging, farming, human adaptation to both hunger and abundance, and finally how foods and ways of gathering and preparing them were shared and spread throughout the world. She ends the book with Final Thoughts about how this background relates to contemporary concerns about human food habits.

It is quite a journey!