Re-creating the complex cuisine of prehistoric Europeans

Source: Ars Technica

Results

The team found traces of wild grasses and legumes, fruits or berries, green vegetables, and roots and tubers native to the broader region. Shards recovered from sites in the Don River basin showed use of the seeds of wild legumes (possibly clover) and grasses, as well as evidence of bran and barley. In contrast, shards from the Upper Volga and Dnieper‑Dvina region contained more traces of guelder‑rose berries, other fleshy fruits, and smaller‑seeded Amaranthaceae plants.

Shards from the Baltic region showed higher traces of freshwater fish, with some sites also including berries, sea beetroot, flowering rush, beets, and sea club‑rush tubers. Traces of dairy products were found in shards from a site in Denmark, likely obtained from nearby farming communities.

Cooking Experiments

The authors explored different potential food mixtures, focusing on two main plant groups: guelder‑rose berries and species related to the Amaranthaceae family (beet, goosefoot, and saltbush). The berries were gathered in the fall from southern England and frozen immediately. They boiled the berries with water in replica pottery vessels, combining some batches with freshwater fish such as carp, and varying the distance of the vessels from open flames and active embers. Cooking residues were sampled and compared to residues from the prehistoric vessels.

Conclusions

“Our results show that there was a general tendency towards combining specific foods into distinct preparations in particular regions,” the authors concluded. For example, Viburnum berries were combined with freshwater fish in the Upper Volga and Baltic regions. Fish accompanied by wild grasses and legumes were preferred in the Don River basin, while other sites favored fish with green vegetables. Thus, “hunter‑gatherer‑fishers were not living on fish alone; they were actively processing and consuming a wide variety of plants.”

Reference

PLoS ONE, 2026. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0342740 (About DOIs).