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This article reflects my long-standing concern for the remote causation of psychopathology (Bacciagaluppi, 1989). According to evolutionary psychiatry, psychopathology arises when an unnatural environment frustrates basic needs (Stevens and Price, 1996, p. 31). The question then arises of the origin of the unnatural environment. In general terms, although biology and culture may have co-evolved originally, their different rates are an inherent cause of imbalance. Cultural evolution follows a Lamarckian pattern, and its rate far outstrips that of biological evolution.
At the beginning of the Neolithic, the domestication of plants and animals—the so-called “agricultural revolution”—was a particularly important cultural change, which led to living conditions that were different from those of the Upper Paleolithic, which were characterized by the hunter-gatherer adaptation. Agriculture led to sedentary habits and to a large number of children.
Yet there was still a continuity between the Upper Paleolithic and the early Neolithic. Recent archaeological evidence suggests that in the early Neolithic, human communities were peaceful and cooperative. The town of Çatal Hüyük, excavated in Anatolia by the British archaeologist James Mellaart (1967), shows no signs of damage through warfare for over 1500 years (Eisler, 1987, pp. 13-14). The excavations carried out in the Danube region by the University of California archaeologist Marija Gimbutas (1982) show that these early Neolithic settlements had no defensive structures. They were not built on hill-tops and were not surrounded by fortifications.
These communities were also characterized by the cult of a Mother Goddess, as testified by the so-called Venus images, which provide a link with the Upper Paleolithic, in which these images were also produced.
According to Riane Eisler (1987, chapter 3), the highest stage reached by this peaceful culture was the civilization of Minoan Crete, which was discovered at the turn of the twenti