"Got Milk?"

Take a look at this map:

Graphic: Expansion of crop cultivation and dairy farming during the Neolithic period.

Now I know nobody takes me seriously when I've said that chess probably came off the Ark with Noah and family -- but really, is it entirely coincidence that the area where the goat, pig, sheep and cow were domesticated is so close to the "mountains of Ararat" just a bit further to the northeast?  Hmmm...

The article at Der Spiegel - it turned me off.  The author makes a lot of assumptions and value judgments (for instance, calling hunter-gatherers in Europe "backward" and the farmers of the "middle east" "advanced.")  Thing is, by the time these farmers finally got to Europe, they hadn't been "from" the middle east" for at least a couple of thousand years.  LOL!  Well, check it out for yourself and see what you think:

10/15/2010
Neolithic Immigration
How Middle Eastern Milk Drinkers Conquered Europe
By Matthias Schulz