The Neolithic is thought to have arrived in Egypt via diffusion from an
origin in southwest Asia, relatively late compared to neighboring
locations. The authors suggest an alternative approach to understanding
the development of food production in Egypt based on the results of new
fieldwork in the Fayum. They provide the results of a detailed study of
the Fayum archaeological landscape interpretable at different temporal
and spatial scales, using an expanded version of low-level food
production to organize observations concerning paleoenvironment,
socioeconomy, settlement, and mobility. While domestic plants and
animals were indeed introduced from elsewhere, when a number of aspects
of the archaeological record are compared, a settlement system is
suggested that has no obvious analogues with the Neolithic in southwest
Asia. The results obtained from the Fayum are used to assess other
contemporary sites in Egypt.