Earliest European Farmers Are 1.5 Inches Shorter Than Agriculture People of Recent Ages

Experts recently conducted genetic sequencing from a skeletal collection unearthed from Europe. According to the study, information extracted from the specimens revealed how the ancient humans of the region transitioned from hunting, gathering, and foraging to having systematic farming skills.

Among the unusual patterns that experts noticed from this new European find, which dates back to 12,000 years ago, is the abilities that affected the health of the earliest farmers. The research showed how this phenomenon was prominent through the height that the ancient farmers had compared to what was expected.

Height and DNA of Ancient European Farmers

Pennsylvania State University's anthropology expert and author of the study Stephanie Marciniak explained that the recent studies attempted to find out how the DNA describes height in people.

According to Marciniak, their team looked into how the association between DNA and height translates the health condition of the earliest humans to identify the changes in their skills that jumped between hunting, gathering, foraging, and farming.

Mariiak's team included colleagues from Penn State, such as fellow anthropology and biology specialist George Perry and other collaborators from international institutes, Science Daily reports.

The authors investigated how the heights of early people changed, particularly during the pre-Neolithic, Neolithic, copper, bronze, and iron ages. The examination involved unique measurements of the skeletal remains gathered from each of their excavated bodies and the data from other DNA collections consolidated in previous studies.

From the data, experts curated a summary that is categorized based on the height of adults, stress indicators from the bones, and each of the ancient individual's DNA. The ancestry of the remains was also considered in the readings.

According to findings, the changes in the agricultural style of the ancient European participants did not switch in the region simultaneously but through various places at distinct periods.

The study was made possible through the specimens from 167 ancient individuals who existed 38,000 to 2,400 years ago. Most of the people had backgrounds in early farming.

Farmers in Neolithic Europe Were Short

The research concluded that the Neolithic individuals were 1.5 inches shorter than people of the latest ages. Genetic sequencing revealed that the average height increased as time passed. The changes were evident starting with the copper age, where individuals gained 0.77 inches in height.

Subsequent periods showed similar progression in height. The bronze and iron ages had average tallness that exceeded Neolithic heights by 1.06 and 1.29 inches, respectively.

Marciniak said that, for now, it is safe to assume that the height of these specimens was 80 percent from their genetics and 20 percent from the environment in which they existed. However, further studies are required to point out each genetic variant responsible for the height in each period.

Early and subsequent agriculture did not always affect the height loss of the earliest farmers, but the phenomenon was evident in many European regions, Marciniak continued.

The study was published in the journal PNAS, titled "An integrative skeletal and paleogenomic analysis of stature variation suggests relatively reduced health for early European farmers."

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