Animal Foods and the Origins of Meat Eating

Baboon analogies augment evidence from chimpanzees in suggesting that early hominins consumed diverse animal foods that left no archeological traces (e.g., swarming insects) or scarce remains not yet identified (e.g., aquatic invertebrates and fish). Such behavior would have set the stage for consumption of meat (the flesh of vertebrates, especially mammals) that is well documented at hominin archeological sites by about 2 mya. Baboon analogies suggest some features of the development of animal food consumption in early hominins, before the regular consumption of substantial quantities of meat. The analogies indicate that foraging and hunting were more prominent than scavenging in the early stages. Competition with large carnivorous animals for carcasses was probably avoided until the development of effective weapons and greater social coordination.