On Mon, 21 Jul 1997, Paul Getty wrote:
>  My
> >pre-agricultural ancestors didn't eat the seeds of wild wheat at all, not
> >having lived in the Eastern Mediterranean.
>

> I don't think that any of us know for sure just who ate wild wheat.  And
> most people from Northern Europe can not be sure that their ancestors were
> not from the Eastern Mediterranean.  And there may have been grasses in
> Northern Europe very close in type to the species that became wheat.  To
> make assumptions about diet and how best to live, based on such incomplete
> knowledge that mankind has of this part of his past, is to invite criticism
> and skepticism.  And it is good to have theories chopped at by others.
> Keeps everyone from falling into a nutritional type of heresy.
> Paul Getty
> Morehead City, NC
> [log in to unmask]

Having made a pretty good study of the movements of European peoples
(paleolithic and neolithic), I'm pretty sure that none of my ancestors
spent any significant amount of time in the Eastern Mediterranean, at
least not after the advent of agriculture.

And I've tried eating wheat raw.  It's nearly impossible to eat more than
a tablespoon or so at a sitting, since they're rather hard to chew -- it's
like eating the unpopped kernels from a bowl of popcorn.  It can certainly
be done, but it's labor intensive and you would wind up not eating that
many.

I'm not disputing your right to argue, certainly!  But I don't see any
evidence for large-scale grass seed consumption in pre-agricultural
Europe.

Corbie