Agriculture in West Asia can be traced back to the early Neolithic in the Near East, between 10,000 and 8,000 BC, when a series of domestications by human communities took place, primarily involving a few plants (cereals and legumes) and animals (sheep, goats, bos, and pigs). In these regions, this gradually led to the introduction of agriculture and animal husbandry and their expansion to other parts of the world. The Neolithic is commonly defined as the transition from a "predatory" economy of hunter-gatherers (or "collectors") to a "productive" economy of farmer-breeders, which places the question of plant and animal domestication at the heart of the upheavals brought about by this period.

Farming and livestock breeding appeared in areas of rich biological diversity, where domesticated plants and animals were found in the wild. These regions also contain a large number of food resources in their natural state. Before their domestication, domesticated plants and animals were exploited in the form of gathering and hunting, with the methods and techniques required for domestication already known at the end of the Palaeolithic. Between 9500 and 8500 B.C., "pre-domestic" forms of agriculture were introduced; plants still had a wild character, but their reproduction was controlled by humans. Control of wild animals also began in the same period. These practices gradually led to the emergence of domesticated plant and animal species, which are distinct from the wild forms from which they derive. From a biological point of view, these domesticated species undergo a transition from natural selection to artificial selection by humans. This indicates the conclusion of the domestication process in the period between 8500 BC and 8000 BC. From this point onwards, village communities relied more on the "agro-pastoral" system, combining agriculture and animal husbandry, and less on hunting, fishing, and gathering practices.

Many explanations have been put forward to explain why these changes have occurred, none of which has achieved consensus. The sedentary (or semi-sedentary) lifestyle introduced as early as the Final Epipalaeolithic (c. 12500 BC – 10000 BC) precedes the phenomenon and can therefore no longer be seen as its consequence, but may be one of its causes. Questions have focused on demographic changes since the increase in population prompted human communities to better control their food resources and domesticate. Climatic changes occur during the transition phase between the end of the last Ice Age and the beginning of the Holocene, which coincides with the domestication process and is therefore one of the factors to be taken into account. Other research has emphasized the "symbolic" aspects of the phenomenon, which alters man's relationship with nature.

The development of agriculture is a fundamental process in human history. It led to strong demographic growth and was accompanied by numerous material (notably the appearance of ceramics) and mental changes. Although the Near East was not the only focus of domestication worldwide, it was probably the earliest and most influential. The expansion of agriculture, and with it the Neolithic village lifestyle, was rapid after 8000 B.C., spreading throughout the West and Central Asia, the Indian subcontinent, North and East Africa, and Europe. The species domesticated during this period formed the basis of the economies of these regions until the modern era, and gained even more territory.

Definitions According to G. Willcox, plant cultivation consists of "assisting the reproduction and hence multiplication of plants" and their domestication is defined as "selection of cultivar traits, for example the loss of the dispersal mechanism"., p. 163: "Cultivation, when its diverse origins are considered, might be defined as assisting the reproduction and hence multiplication of plants", p. 164: "The term domestication is defined by archaeobotanists as selection of traits in cultivars, for example the loss of the dispersal mechanism." A domesticated plant is therefore different from the wild plant from which it derives (its "progenitor"), as can be seen from their morphology, which is not identical. The cultivation of plants and the acquisition of domesticated traits did not occur at the same time, since the latter is the consequence of the former:

a first phase of "pre-domestic" plant cultivation, in which species still have a wild morphology, as the selection process has not yet succeeded in bringing about morphological changes (i.e. cultivation without and before domestication); the "domestic" cultivation of plants, which derives from the former, when the process of selection and domestication has been completed and the morphology of the plants is no longer wild but domestic (i.e. cultivation with and after domestication).

According to D. Helmer, the domestication of animals can be defined as "the control of an animal population through the isolation of the herd, with the loss of panmixia, the suppression of natural selection and the application of artificial selection based on particular traits, either behavioral or cultural. The animals become the property of the human group, and are entirely dependent on it".

The criteria for defining domestication vary according to whether plants or animals are considered: for botanists, a plant is domesticated when it has a domestic morphology, while for zoologists, an animal is domesticated when it is integrated into and manipulated by a human group.

Agriculture, which is the result of these evolutions, can be defined as "an established production economy in which farmers depend for their subsistence on cultivation and, in many instances, herding".

History of studies

Little was known about the beginnings of agriculture in the Near Eastern Neolithic before the 1950s, when three major excavations identified and dated sites such as Jericho (Tell es-Sultan in the West Bank), excavated by Kathleen Kenyon, Beidha (Jordan), excavated by Diana Kirkbride, and Jarmo (northern Iraq), excavated by Robert John Braidwood. From the 1960s–70s, excavations of Neolithic sites began to expand in the Middle East (particularly following rescue excavations in anticipation of the construction of the Tabqa dam in Syria). These excavations improved knowledge of the period and provided more data on agriculture. Conservation of the samples is facilitated by the region's arid climate. After 1995, excavations multiplied and provided a considerable amount of data.

The biological approach to domestication can be traced back to the work of Charles Darwin, notably The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication (1868). Archaeobotanical studies took off in the 1960s, particularly following the work of Maria Hopf and Hans Helbæk, and later Willem van Zeist, Gordon Hillman, Jack Harlan, and Daniel Zohary. This work led to the development of methods for identifying and analyzing samples and to a better understanding of the process of plant domestication from a biological point of view. Many archaeozoological studies have also developed and refined knowledge of animal domestication. The contribution of genetics in particular is helping to advance understanding of the phenomenon. In just a few decades, archaeologists have been joined by other specialists in the study of this phenomenon: botanists, zoologists, geneticists, chemists, demographers, and linguists.

From an economic, social and cultural point of view, the study of the phenomenon was marked by the work of Vere Gordon Childe, who in the 1920s and 1930s introduced his concept of the "Neolithic revolution", which characterized the beginning of agriculture. From the 1950s onwards, interpretations developed along different lines: the ecological model of David L. Clarke's ecological model (1953), Lewis Binford's demographic model (1969), Kent Flannery's broad-spectrum revolution (1969), followed in the post-1990s by Ofer Bar-Yosef's climatic approach, and Jacques Cauvin's "symbolic revolution".Detailed summary of traditional hypotheses in Marc Verhoeven, "Beyond Boundaries: Nature, Culture and a Holistic Approach to Domestication in the Levant", Journal of World Prehistory, vol. 18, no. 3, 2004, pp. 179-214. Critical discussion of recent theories in

Geography

In Neolithic studies, the Near East is understood as a region stretching from the Mediterranean Sea to the Zagros, from the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf to the Taurus Mountains, to which Cyprus and Central Anatolia are commonly included, because they participated rapidly in the Neolithization process. This vast region encompasses a great diversity of natural environments and landscapes, grouped into several major zones according to geographical and cultural criteria.For a detailed geographical description of these regions: Paul Sanlaville, Le Moyen-Orient arabe, Le milieu et l'homme, Paris, Armand Collin, 2000.

The environments are diverse not only on the scale of this part of the world but also over short distances: it sometimes takes just a few kilometers to go from the Mediterranean forest to the steppe. The contrasts are further accentuated by the presence of highlands and wide seasonal and annual variations in precipitation. The result is great biodiversity, in particular, the presence of hundreds of plant species. Domesticated varieties are all found in their natural state, but more generally, wild cereals are found from central Anatolia to the southern Levant and central Zagros. Genetic studies have made it possible in some cases to determine the plant and animal variants that gave rise to the domesticated species, but this remains uncertain in several cases. This has been referred to as the "Fertile Crescent", a concept that originated in the work of James Henry Breasted, and which in its current sense is a biogeographical area that extends roughly over the Levant and the slopes and foothills of the Taurus and Zagros.

Levant

The Levant, located to the east of the eastern Mediterranean, is characterized by alternating environments stretching in a north-south direction: the coastal plain to the west, which was wider during the Epipaleolithic and Neolithic periods than it is today, since sea levels were lower, then progressing eastwards, the foothills gradually rise to form mountain ranges, often well-forested and reaching up to 2,000 meters in altitude, then a new low-lying zone, the Rift or "Levantine corridor", a structuring axis that descends to the south below sea level, followed by an area of higher plateaus and, finally, a slow descent towards the Arabian desert.A. Nigel Goring-Morris et Anna Belfer-Cohen, "The Upper Paleolithic and Earlier Epi-palaeolithic of Western Asia", in This region is divided into three geographical areas, sometimes two, with the same west-east division.

The southern Levant, north of Sinai and the Negev, comprising the coastal plain, the Upper Galilee and Judean mountains, the Jordan plain with the Dead Sea and Lake Tiberias, the Arabah plain to the south, and the Transjordanian plateaus to the east.Matthew Suriano, "Historical Geography of the Ancient Levant", in The central Levant (sometimes attached to the Northern Levant, of which it is then the "upper" part, other times partly grouped with the Southern Levant), between the Damascus oasis (included) to the south and the Homs gap to the north, with the coastal plain of Lebanon, the Lebanon Mountains, the Litani Valley and the Beqaa Plain, then the Anti-Lebanon Mountains, whose eastern slopes shelter the Ghouta around Damascus and finally the desert.Matthew Suriano, "Historical Geography of the Ancient Levant", in