domestication

Excavations at the Anciens Arsenaux site in Sion, Switzerland, have changed the way we understand prehistoric agriculture in Europe forever. Compelling evidence has emerged suggesting that Neolithic farmers employed animal traction to operate ploughs between 5,100 and 4,700 years ago, predating the oldest plough marks by a millennium. The parallel furrows and ground impressions consistent with those made by a plough dragged through the soil. Along with the hoofprints also discovered at the site, these point to the domestication of cattle here in the service of agriculture. Prior to this discovery, the most prominent evidence of animals being utilized to pull plough-like tools in European agriculture originated from sites in Denmark and northern Germany, dating back approximately 3,700 years. Rising