Today one can hardly imagine human life without pets. They are a source of food, clothing, fertilizers, household help. For many, pets become true friends. But once our pets lived in the wild, got their own food and avoided strange bipedal creatures. Let's talk about which animal man tamed first.
Let's understand the terms
To tame an animal means to form in it a feeling of attachment to a person, to make a wild beast obedient. Probably, primitive people did not set themselves such tasks. However, having killed the female on the hunt, they took her cubs with them. This, at least, is what modern savages do, bringing young animals into their homes without any ulterior motive.
From this point of view, it is difficult to name the very first animal tamed by man. It could be a deer, or it could be a cave bear cub, a crocodile or a fox. It is known that many emperors, for example,Genghis Khan kept tame cheetahs.
However, it is not enough to raise an animal in captivity to make it a pet. Careful work is needed to select the resulting offspring. Only by selecting the most valuable specimens from each litter (with reduced aggressiveness) and raising them in a circle of people, you can get a domesticated animal.
Dive into history
There is no exact data left about the first domestic animal tamed by man. On the earliest images of the 5th-6th centuries BC. already there are dogs, pigs, cattle. In the most ancient monuments of writing, in prehistoric myths and legends, the main domestic animals appear. Some of them were revered as sacred.
To dig deeper, we'll have to turn to archaeologists for help. Thanks to the remains of camps, bones, cave drawings, they draw conclusions about the life, occupations, nutrition and other features of the life of primitive people. The early sites of the Stone Age show that at that time man had not yet entered into alliances with animals, earning his livelihood through hunting or gathering. However, in the Upper Paleolithic era, when Europe was covered with ice, and reindeer roamed the Crimea, the situation changed.
Friendship with a dog
What animal and why did man tame first? Archaeologists say that a dog or its closest ancestor, a wolf, became a true friend of savages in time immemorial. The remains of these animals are found in sites aged 13-17 millennia. In Israel, a grave was discovered, in which for 12 thousand years they have been resting nearbywoman and her dog. Dog skulls dating back to the 34th and 31st millennia BC have been found in Belgium (Goya) and Altai (the Robber's Cave). Scientists still find it difficult to determine the exact date when the process of domestication of a four-legged friend took place.
It is unlikely that he was targeted. Most likely, the animals came to the cave of the savages, having smelled the food. Receiving bones, they began to visit more often, getting used to unusual neighbors. People, in turn, have discovered that the dog can be an excellent guard dog. Puppies raised by man provided invaluable assistance in hunting, finding wild animals and helping to cope with them. In each family, they tried to keep several dogs, who were trained to track down the beast, to bark in case of danger. People and animals became very close, they lived in the same room and slept together to escape the cold.
Cattle breeding development
The first animal tamed by man proved the undeniable benefits of such unions. With the development of agriculture, our distant ancestors began to lead a sedentary lifestyle. This created the prerequisites for the emergence of cattle breeding.
Sheep and goats were trained at least 10 thousand years ago. This happened in the territories of North America, Africa, Southern Europe, the Middle East. Most likely, after hunting, little lambs were left "in reserve". Soon a person realized that they can give not only meat, but also wool and milk. Goats began to purposefully breed.
The domestication of the tour turned out to be extremely useful,which happened 10 or 9 thousand years ago. This ancestor of the cow was used as a traction force, the females gave milk. It was more difficult to tame the buffaloes and horses. The former became human friends 7.5 thousand years ago, the latter - 6 thousand years ago.
Sacred cat
The first animals tamed by man led a flock or herd lifestyle. Another thing is an independent cat walking at night. For a long time it was believed that the fluffy Muroks were domesticated by the Egyptians in the 4th millennium BC. At least, the oldest cat mummies belong to this time. The graceful animal in Egypt was revered as the embodiment of the goddess Bast, a symbol of the moon and fertility. An Egyptian could have paid with his life for killing a cat.
However, many researchers believed that the animal could have been tamed earlier, along with the emergence of agriculture. After all, cats are indispensable helpers in protecting crops from rodents. In 2004, these guesses were confirmed. The remains of a 9-month-old kitten were found on the island of Crete. He was buried next to the man. The age of the find is 9.5 thousand years. It is significant that there have never been wild cats on the island itself. Therefore, the animal was specially brought there.
Poultry Yard
We talked about the first animals domesticated by man. It's time to think about birds. Initially, man hunted them, but, moving to a settled life, he wanted to have food at hand. According to researchers, geese were the first to be domesticated. Drawings depicting them were found in Egypt and date back to 11 thousand BC
Ducks were originally bred in Mesopotamia and China. They were tamed in the 5th millennium BC. For a long time it was believed that they became the second domesticated bird. Recently, however, paleozoologists have discovered the remains of chickens in northern China. They were dated to the 6th millennium BC
The first animal tamed by man was the beginning of a long process of domestication that continues to this day. Currently, man is actively working on the domestication of zebras and ostriches. Moose, deer, mink, sable are next in line. There are already some successes in taming them.
