Sign In
International
Media release
From:
Anthropology: Exploring the evolution of endurance running
Endurance running for game hunting may have been as efficient as other traditional hunting methods, according to an article published in Nature Human Behaviour. The findings, based on modelling and ethnohistoric and ethnographic accounts, provide support for the endurance pursuit hypothesis.
Human locomotor muscles are primarily comprised of fatigue-resistant fibres and this, along with the ability to sweat out metabolic heat generated by prolonged activity, is unique among mammals. As such, some anthropologists have proposed the endurance pursuit hypothesis, which suggests that these traits evolved owing to selection for the ability to chase prey over long distances. However, there have been few reports of contemporary humans hunting by these endurance pursuits, and running is energetically costly.
Eugène Morin and Bruce Winterhalder used modelling to estimate the return rates of hunting by endurance running and found that the calorific gains of endurance running were comparable to other hunting methods. These findings suggest that running could have been a beneficial tactic for obtaining food.
The authors also compiled and analysed a database of ethnographic and ethnohistoric literature dating from the early 1500s to the early 2000s to investigate the potential role of hunting by endurance running. They found examples of nearly 400 cases from 272 locations across the world in which humans used endurance pursuits for hunting, which suggests that this strategy was not as rare as previously thought. These endurance pursuits may have included more than one hunter and occurred in various ecosystems, including open settings such as plains as well as forest biomes.
Morin and Winterhalder suggest that this type of hunting would probably have been a strategy available to Pleistocene (2.6 million to 11,700 years ago) hominins and may also have had a role in human evolution. However, they note that this work relies on ethnographic accounts from recent history (mostly written over 100 years ago) that do not speak directly to our evolutionary past.
