New Archaeological Discoveries Now Show Our Palaeolithic Ancestors had Largely Plant Based Diets
The Plant-Based Origins of Human Diets
Recent archaeological discoveries have shed new light on the dietary habits of our Paleolithic ancestors, challenging the popular notion that they subsisted primarily on meat and fish. The evidence suggests that plants were not only a significant part of their diets but may have been the staple foods that fueled human evolution.
Excavations at the 780,000-year-old Gesher Benot Ya’aqov site in Israel have uncovered an astonishing diversity of plant remains, including nuts, fruits, seeds, and underground stems from at least 55 different species. This finding contradicts the assumption that early humans were predominantly meat-eaters and reveals a remarkably varied plant-based diet.
Researchers like Amanda Henry from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology argue that hominins were “probably predominantly vegetarians,” relying on plant-derived nutrients like vitamin C and fiber, with only a small…
