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The world, when the Black Sea flooded

UPDATE: Flood theory debunked: it was gradual [more] tidbits

[detailed map]

The most spectacular event of the 6th millennium BC-- identified only a few years ago-- was the catastrophic flooding of the (freshwater) Black Sea from the (saltwater) Mediterranean, around 5550 BC. (You sometimes see an alternate 7150bp date which is an 'uncalibrated' ¹⁴C measurement.)

(The channel now is 20 miles long and a half-mile wide. At this scale, the 500-foot drop would be less than one pixel.)

The icecaps had been melting since about 13,000 BC, steadily raising sealevels worldwide [graph] and finally the natural dam of the Bosporus sprang a leak. The highest point of the 'dam' must have been on the southern edge, so that as the leak grew into a stream, it naturally trickled the 20 miles to the north side.

Since the landbridge must have been heavily travelled, and since the consequences of this growing trickle shouldn't have been hard to foresee, I have to wonder why it wasn't blocked with earthworks, to protect this invaluable 'highway' from gradual erosion. And since it wasn't successfully blocked when it might have been, I have to wonder also if the breakthru wasn't assisted for unknown reasons, hostile or simply curious...? [trade war?]

Probably a storm's waves changed the trickle to an unstoppable river, cutting off intercontinental communication for the next couple of years. The resulting waterfall soon dwarfed Niagara, and must have drawn neolithic gapers from hundreds of miles around. (At its maximum volume, the channel-outlet was deepened to 400 feet.)

Within two years, 20,000 square miles of prime Ukrainian freshwater lakefront had permanently disappeared under suddenly undrinkable saltwater up to 510 feet deep. [cite] [older] [cite] science, interview
1999 expedition: [site] [links]

As the salinity gradually rose, all the freshwater species would have died off. Probably very little of this could be salvaged for food-- the stench must have lasted for months.

The waters rose slowly enough that few were drowned, but perhaps 10,000 people were made homeless. (European population density estimated at one per 10 square kilometers, but this region would have supported more: cite) They might have quickly surveyed the extent of the damage, and pooled their knowledge of regions they might invade, then split up into large groups headed for the likeliest regions. ("Auntie Em, there's company comin' ...major company!")

Since the oldest evidence for agriculture in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Danube valley all date to this approximate period, it's tempting to imagine a cultural diffusion set in motion by the flood. But I think the disaster was instead purely local...

Since their immediate neighborhood had already reached its mesolithic carrying capacity, before the flood, we should guess that the ultimate 10000-person excess resulted by the end of the second winter in nearly 10000 deaths from starvation (and/or murderous competition for food).

Since Mesopotamia was 1000 miles off, with mountains almost all the way between, it seems highly improbable that Black Sea refugees, having somehow heard of the underexploited Tigris-Euphrates delta, undertook such a journey without even the benefit of advance preparation.

The Danube region, on the other hand, shows many new cultural artifacts accompanying agriculture in the mid 6th millennium, so it may represent a new population moving in, rather than the old population adopting new ideas. But this was much too gradual a process to represent a cushioning of that small shortterm blip in refugee numbers. [more] ditto

Ukraine: 4000 BC ditto

When the water levels were finally equal, navigation became possible again, but a bridge wasn't built until 7500 years later.

A remarkable side-effect of the catastrophe was the creation of a deep oxygen-free layer at the bottom of the Black Sea, which has probably preserved every shipwreck since 5550 in pristine condition. Over the next decade, recovery of these should allow history to be rewritten in vastly greater detail.

(This map is 600 by 360, with each pixel about ten miles square, so as a first approximation, each habitable single-pixel region might support a tribe of 20 hunter-gatherers-- each making its own decisions, but leaving almost no archeological record.)

All pre-flood coastal settlements on the Black Sea would have been inundated, and none have yet been discovered by submarine. Bulgaria: [info]

The Anatolian end of the Bosporus landbridge had the most advanced technology in the world at this point. Primitive copper-working was being explored, with the products exported to Mesopotamia, but the technology remained local for another 1000 years. [info] Flax was being woven into linen.

A mideast 'stamp seal' has been dated as pre-flood, but pictographic writing was still more than 2000 years away. (The potter's wheel and plow would also take 2000 years to arrive.)

The oldest known language in the middle-east was Sumerian, unrelated to either semitic or Indo-European language families (possibly related to the Dravidian languages of pre-Indo-European India: cite). (The Sumerian flood-legends date to millennia later, after 3000 BC.)

The middle-east was just emerging from a long climatic drought, 6200-5700 BC [map now]

Anatolia: neolithic, ditto; archeology

Catal Hoyuk's 3000 years of occupation, maybe as a center for the obsidian trade, ended abruptly at just this point, after reaching a peak population of about 5000. (Alternate spellings: Catal Huyuk, Catal Hüyük, Çatal Hüyük, Chatal Hüyük, Catalhoyuk, etc.) Evidence of trade: cowrie shells from the Mediterranean, manganese copper and turquoise from eastern Anatolia (300 miles) and the Sinai (700 miles), mercury ore from Sizmar, and tabular flint from the Taurus Mountains. [cite]

Catal Hoyuk: goddess ditto

(Obsidian is a volcanic glass useful for mirrors [qv] and razor-sharp tools.) [pix]

Anatolian foods: wheat, barley, peas, almonds, acorns, pistachios, hare, duck, goose, cattle (aurochs), deer, boar, wild ass, fox, wolf, gazelle, leopard. Cattle were domesticated by 6700 BC (possibly imported from Africa).

Most men died by 40, most women by 30. A skeleton-expert has claimed Asians and Europeans were living side by side in Catal Hoyuk!?? ('Ukrainians' via the Bosporus landbridge, then?)

Mid-east archeological sites: timeline

Middle-east buildings were mostly of mud bricks, but plaster was starting to be made from limestone. The smooth white interior-walls this allowed made indoor living a much more esthetic experience. In Catal Hoyuk they painted beautiful murals in red, brown, yellow, blue, green, mauve, grey and black. (The leopard's spots were a favorite motif.)

Baked clay pots had been spreading since c8000 BC, and Catal Hoyuk probably had high-temperature kilns by 6000 BC. Even before the flood, two styles of pottery are known from the upper Euphrates region, called Hassuna and Samarra. [pix-French] ditto [table]

Hassuna: spindle whorls, obsidian imports, animal-hides, attached bldgs around enclosed courtyard

Samarra: chocolate-brown pottery, external buttresses on buildings

Hamoukar would grow to population of 25,000 [info]dittomap

c5000 BC a new style of painted pottery spread across northern Syria, called Halaf. (This may indicate an Indo-European cultural diffusion.) Southern Mesopotamia's Ubaid style spread more widely some centuries later.

The middle-east also had some canals, and defensive walls.

On Cyprus, the village of Khirokitia (pop 500, aka Chirokitia) had been abandoned for unknown reasons c6000 BC. (cf drought 6200-5700?) [pix] [info] ditto

Crete c7000 BC was occupied by wheat-barley-lentil-sheep-goat agriculturalists. Firing of pottery and brick came around 6500, with very little evolution for the next 1700 years. Not until 4800 is there evidence of weaving, and tools made of rock crystal. In 4500 are the first large buildings with many small rooms (ie, hotels?). [info]

Around 5200-4600, the Cycladic island of Saliagos was settled. [info] Marble fertility figurines. Pottery resembles Anatolian more than Greek mainland.

Aegean island obsidian was being exploited by boat from the Greek mainland by 8000 BC. (So the pre-flood Black Sea must also have seen much boating.) Hunter-gatherers on the Greek mainland started planting wheat and barley, along with limited herding of sheep and goats by 7000. These were added to wild deer, pigs, birds, fish, acorns, olives, and legumes. [info] [timeline] (On Sicily, they had also started domesticating lentils, pigs, and cattle. On the French mainland, only sheep had been adopted.)

Spread of agriculture: [overview] [map] ditto [wordy]

Fully developed agricultural communities started appearing on the Greek and Italian mainland between 6400 and 5800 BC, with the oldest c6400 in northern Greece, eg Nea Nikomedeia. [info] mirror [translated] They lived in cottages with thatched roofs, and five 'fertility goddess' figurines were found in the largest and most central. (Also stamp seals and carved frogs.) Their main foods were wheat, barley, lentils, sheep, and goats. Clay 'bullets' fired with slings were a popular weapon.

(These areas resemble the middle-east for climate and geography, so transfer of technology would have been easy.)

6100-5300 BC: Sesklo culture spreads widely across northern Greece. The center at Sesklo has 3500 people living on 30 acres surrounded by a defensive wall [image] [pic] [general] [pix] [map] [pottery] [pendant] Perseus Figurines start to include more males.

The 5550 flood correlates approximately in southern Greece with an ill-distinguished Middle-Neolithic/Late-Neolithic boundary: [info] Sheep and goats remained the main source of meat. Obsidian continued to grow in popularity, and arrowheads were barbed for the first time. A 39yo woman was found buried with (her own?) tools of bone and obsidian.

sheep and pigs were domesticated by 7500 BC in eastern Anatolia (eg Cayonu and Cafer). Sheep spread much more widely than pigs.

wheat and barley had been domesticated in the Levant c8500 BC

Jericho was in the middle of a millennium of abandonment, after having been occupied for more than 3000 years, which included trading with Anatolia for obsidian and Beidha for hematite. (Jericho's main export was salt.) Around 6000 BC residents of Jericho used clay to sculpt faces onto some nine skulls, but they still hadn't discovered (or couldn't afford?) pottery. [info] Wild pigs had been unusually prevalent in their diet.

Beidha in Jordan had been deserted since 6500 BC [technical]

Zagros mountains: winemaking more (nice coincidence with Noah legend, actually!) goats domesticated here by 8000 BC (Ganj Dareh)

Ali Kosh

North Africa: agriculture

Sahara: still annual grasses and low shrubs [cite] [simulation] very favorable conditions for hunter-gatherers

African climate: [timeline]

"...a second aridity maximum around 22,000-13,000 14C years ago. Conditions then quickly became warmer and moister, though with an interruption by aridity around 11,000 14C years ago. A resumption of warm, moist conditions led up to the Holocene 'optimum' [8000-6000 BC] of greater rainforest extent and vegetation covering the Sahara. Conditions then became somewhat more arid and similar to the present. Relatively brief arid phases (e.g. 8,200 14C y.a.) appear to punctuate the generally moister early and mid Holocene conditions."

Egypt's first dynasty was still two millennia off, but a fringe theory claims the Sphinx had already been built. [debate] more

upper Egypt: El Badari

Nile delta: Merimde Beni Salama

Goddess tradition? review, debate

SE Europe [info]

The 'Seven Daughters of Eve' hypothesis claims that as the Ice Age ended c13000 BC, various Mediterranean tribes drifted north, with the Spaniards being the first to re-occupy Scandinavia, and the Italians (!??) occupying Ireland. Asia's western 'daughter' started from the east side of the Black Sea around this time. [more]

EW Barber says the warp-weighted loom was invented c5500 in Europe.

The first Bodensee stilt-houses on Lake Constance were built around this time. [reconstruction]

Holland: dugout log used as boat [multipage] (maybe 8000 BC)

Scotland: northwest peninsula becomes islands [info] [tsunami]

Rice and millet were being cultivated in northeast China, where the climate was warmer and wetter than today. Hangchou Bay at the mouth of the Yangtze has been excavated and suggests domestication of dogs, pigs, and water buffalo. Fishhooks and arrowheads were carved from bone and bamboo. Shovels were made from water buffalo shoulderblades.

500 miles west, the Hupei basin produced some beautiful ceramics by 5000 BC. And 400 miles north, the P'ei-li-kang culture domesticated chickens, pigs, and water buffalo along with millet. [skeleton]

Maize was not yet being cultivated in Mexico, but squash probably was, and lima beans had definitely been domesticated in Peru.

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