ABSTRACT
This chapter will examine the geographical conditions in the Anatolia-Zagros region of the Near East at the end of the last Ice Age. It will be seen that as the last Ice Age in Eurasia ended, there came into existence in the one region a particular association of plants and animals which were (a) abundant, (b) very useful, and (c) genetically and behaviourally predisposed to domestication. For the first time too in an interglacial, there was present a species of Homo who was pre-adapted by behavioural plasticity for manipulating his subsistence resources on an everamplifying scale.
