Scientists from South Ural State University have discovered that prototypes of such products as cheese, cottage cheese and soured milk appeared in the territory of South Ural region between the 3rd and the 2nd millennium BC. The tradition of fermented dairy foods were brought here by the migrants from the Eastern Europe and Caucasus, where people had learned to cook such foods already in the end of the Stone Age.
The peoples, who lived in the South Ural region in the Bronze Age, were cattle herders and had a milk and meat diet, and mostly they ate namely dairy and fermented dairy foods. Based on a number of indicators, scientists have managed to prove it.
During the excavations at the Sintashta (Bredy District, Chelyabinsk Region) and Alakul (Kurgan Region) Bronze Age settlements, judging upon the bones of mares and cattle, paleozoologists have found that such animals mostly lived a long life, and that means that they were housed first and foremost to produce milk, while meat was of second priority. Examining the animal teeth, the scientists paid attention to the degree of their wear and the order of their eruption. Beef cattle was slaughtered at the peak of their body weight at a young age, while dairy cows and mares were housed for 8–10 years.
The fact that our ancient ancestors had milk and dairy foods in their diets is also proved by milk peptides found in their dental scales. This is the direct evidence of frequent consumption of milk-containing products. In addition, the ratio of the nitrogen and carbon isotopes deposited in bones was indicative of the milk and meat nature of the diet of the Bronze Age people.
In the course of analysing the ancient tableware, the scientists have discovered multi-layered burnt parts on it – this is the result of using the ware to cook food multiple times. The lipidic analysis has shown the traces of milk fats, and this means that people actively consumed and processed milk. And the discovered vessels with bottom holes were probably used to separate curdy fractions.
“Not everyone can digest raw milk. We have performed a series of genetic analyses for the Bronze Age Cis-Urals region. We have conducted such analyses for the Kazburun burial ground (forest-steppe zone in Bashkortostan),” shares the chief research fellow of the SUSU Eurasian Studies Research and Education Centre Andrey Epimakhov. “In the human remains, the geneticists have found a lactose intolerance gene: it has turned our that half of the local population of that period had raw lactose intolerance. So, there was milk in use, but what were they doing with it? Just poured it on the ground? Then why do the milking? This means that people with raw milk intolerance consumed it in the form of fermented dairy foods.”
Within the grant from the Russian Science Foundation for the project Migration of Human Collectives and Individual Mobility in the Framework of Multidisciplinary Analysis of Archaeological Information (Bronze Age of the Southern Urals), the SUSU scientists have analysed the nature of the diet of the peoples who lived in the South Ural region in the Bronze Age. The researchers also wrote a scientific paper, the results of which they have already shared with the global research community on Academia.edu and ResearchGate (social networks for the collaboration of scientists).
Information:
The origin of the world’s first cheese dates back as far as 7000 years. Scientists presume that this salty dairy product originates from the Arab East. When setting off for a long journey, nomads took milk with them and carried it in lamb tripe bags. Exposed to movement and heat, the milk clotted and converted into a product that resembled modern cheese.