On "natural" bodyweight in human history

[Stu Hughes]

Hey Rip,
I don't suppose you'd have any idea if pre-agriculture carried similar bodyweights to an individual in modern times who trains with heavy weights? I'm wondering more about access to the amount of food necessary compared to the amount of physical effort they would have had to make on a daily basis.

Stu

[Mark Rippetoe]

A very interesting question, one on which I have no access to any data. Perhaps the fans can help us out.

[Sam Crish]

I recall that they were fairly similar for non-weightlifting folks. I'll look for references later but I think most thinking is that it's just over 65kg for a standard paleolithic man and that was reduced slightly in the neolithic.

I'd imagine that people who train with heavy weights are more similar to the neanderthal in bodyweight - estimates for male averages are about 77kg all the way up to some study that estimated over 90kg IIRC.

[JPC]

Dr. Cordain, the auther of The Paleo Diet said the average hunter/gatherer ate 3000 something calories, if I remember correctly from the book. I'm sure this varied with the seasons and geographical area. I don't imagine there were many people over 200lbs back then.

Don't be confused about their activity level. Although they were(and still are in isolated places) more active than most non athletes today who have sedentary jobs, they had to work much less than early farmers, and less than your average manual laborer today. When you have the skills, the hunter/gatherer life isn't as hard as we think.

[rikkusan]

That's funny, I just read a book that mentioned something about that. I believe I read about it in 'Omninvore's Dilema' where is stated that pre-agricultural man (hunter/gatherer) was taller and lived longer than post-agricultural, and that we have only recently in history 'regained' our height and longevity. In other words, agriculture has had a hugely negative effect on our health and we are only just starting to recover as a human race.

[rocko]

I would assume that pre-agriculture men who didn't have tv's or the internet, probably went to sleep as soon as the sun went out after a long day of physical labor. So, while they may have not given too much thought to their calorie intake, they probably got plenty of rest and great recovery from that unlike the modern man who usually gets and average of 6 hours of sleep or less.

[herbie]

I?ve s watched quite a few documentaries on hunter gatherer tribes. Physiques vary considerably a few look very muscular others malnourished, some like a guy of the cover of men?s health very low body fat some muscle. A few have that untrained skinny fat look. From memory those who looked seriously muscular lived on a remote island anuta. The ocean and some sort of tuber provided the staple diet there seemed like there was abundance of food but harvesting it wasn?t easy they paddled large hulking canoes around .I wouldn?t make the mistake of assuming an early agricultural lifestyle was less physically demanding