Domestication of Animals mutually developed with domestication of plants circa 7500 BCE

 Man-animal interactions leading to ungulates intermediate between “wild” and “domestic” certainly postdate the beginnings of plant cultivation, though it is possible that in the first half of the 9th millennium cal. BC, the two strategies developed mutually. This could explain why at Early PPNB NevalÏ Çori, unambiguous evidence for domestic cereals has been found together with remains of sheep and goat that showed trends we interpreted as
probably characteristic of early domestic populations.........

Only during the 8th millennium cal. BC do we see the spread of more tolerant crops in the form of emmer, barley and naked wheat, which were better adapted to cultivation under differing climatic conditions (Willcox 2002). The archaeobotanical record of cereals agrees with results from DNA fingerprinting. Genetic analyses carried out by Heun et al. (1997) on a large sample including both present-day domestic and wild einkorn not only indicate a monophyletic origin for all domesticates, but suggest the ancestral population localised in the KaraçadaÈ region, some 150 km to the east of NevalÏ Çori, the only PPN site known at present with high frequencies of single-grained einkorn. Pulses also contributed significantly to the human diet in Neolithic times. Species exploited in the Anti-Taurus from the early aceramic Neolithic onward are lentil (Lens spp.), field pea (Pisum spp.), chick-pea (Cicer sp.), grass pea (Lathyrus spp.), bitter vetch (Vicia ervilia), and horse bean (Vicia faba). The PPN vegetal diet was com- plemented by pistachio nuts (Pistacia spp.), almonds (Amygdalus spp.), and different fruits (Vitis, Celtis, Prunus) (Van Zeist 1988, de Moulins 1993, 1997, Pasternak 1998). At Early PPNB NevalÏ Çori, the number of pulses in the samples nearly equals the number of cereal grains, underscoring the importance of vegetable protein during the 9th millennium cal. BC (Pasternak 1998).

 new study tracks the morphology changes in animals as they got domesticated along with plants

 By the 10th millennium cal. BC, sedentary communities already inhabited the northern Fertile Crescent (e.g., Cauvin 1978, Rosenberg et al. 1995). With time, socio-cultural complexity increased, as is reflected, e.g., by settlement size and structure as well as architecture. In the northern Fertile Crescent, sites dating to the second half of the 10th and the 9th millennium cal. BC are characterised by spatial division of residential and specialised workshop areas as well as by the growing importance given to open courtyards as communal space (Cauvin 1977, 1997, Hauptmann 1993, ÖzdoÈan and ÖzdoÈan 1998, Schmidt 1998a, 1998b, 2000, Stordeur 1999, 2000).