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The average American consumes over twenty gallons of milk per year. Today cow's milk and products made from it, such as butter, cheese and yogurt, are a regular part of the diet in most parts of the world. But did you ever stop to wonder when and how humans started drinking cow's milk?
美国人平均每年消费20余加伦牛奶。如今牛奶以及牛奶制品，如黄油，奶酪和酸奶，在世界上大多数地区都很常见。然而你停下来想过人类是从何时开始饮用牛奶，又是如何饮用的？
We know that cows were used for milk as early as 2000 BC from artistic or written descriptions of the milking process, or from discoveries of early milk carts. But these irrefutable clues only date back 2,000 to 4,000 years after the earliest known evidence of cattle herding. Because of this discrepancy, the prevailing hypothesis was that for a few thousand years, domesticated cattle were used only for meat and hides.
从公元前2000年关于挤奶过程的绘画或者文字记载，以及考古发现的早期牛奶车，我们知道人类养牛用来产奶。但是这些不容否认的线索只能追朔到牛群出现的最早记载以后的2000到4000年。对于这种时间上的差异，普遍的假说是因为那几千年来人们只使用家养奶牛的皮肉。
But an international team of researchers may have put this hypothesis to rest. Scientists at the University of Bristol in England developed a technique to identify the residue of fats from cows' milk on ancient pieces of pottery.
但是国际研究小组可能会推翻这种假说。位于英国格兰的布里斯托大学科学家们开发出一种技术，可用来识别古时陶瓷碎片上残留的牛奶油脂。
The team examined over 2,000 pottery shards from twenty-three different archaeological sites across the Near East and Southeastern Europe. They found milk residue on pots dating back to 7000 BC!
这个小组检查了超过2000块陶瓷碎片，这些碎片来自横跨近东和欧洲东南地区不同的考古遗址。他们在一块公元前7000年的瓦罐上发现了牛奶残留物。
The oldest milk residue was discovered around ancient Anatolia, which we know as modern-day Turkey. The region may have been ideal for cattle domestication because it had higher rainfall and greener grazing needed to support cattle, compared to drier neighboring regions better suited for sheep or goats.
这些最早的牛奶残留物在古安纳托利亚周围被发现，安纳托利亚就是现代的土耳其。这个地区是养殖奶牛的理想之地，因为这里降雨量大，草场更清脆葱绿，有利于奶牛的生长，而相邻地区较干燥，更适合养殖绵羊和山羊。
This is the first good proof that when humans first started herding cattle, they used the milk as well as the meat. So next time you're enjoying a cool drink of milk, thank the ancient Anatolians!
这是第一个有力的证据，它证明了古时人类养殖牛群时，不仅食用牛肉也饮用牛奶。所以下次再品尝美味的牛奶时，别忘了谢谢古安纳托利亚人！
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