The first great civilizations arose in two regions of the Middle East. One region was the Nile River Valley of Egypt. The other was Mesopotamia. Both regions had fertile soil, but neither received enough rain for crops to grow. Farmers discovered, however, that they could raise crops during most of the year if they used river water for irrigation. By about 3000 B.C., Egyptian and Mesopotamian farmers had developed the world’s first large-scale irrigation systems and had invented a plow that oxen could pull.
The Roman Empire began as a country of small farms on the Italian peninsula before 500 B.C. By the A.D. 200s the Romans had developed new farming methods, e.g. systems of crop rotation. The selective breeding of plants and livestock began in Europe during Roman times, too.
During the Middle Ages European farmers invented a three-field system of crop rotation during the Middle Ages. In many areas it replaced the Roman two-field system. On most European farms horses gradually replaced oxen as the chief source of power. Many special-purpose livestock breeds were developed.
The European voyages of discovery that began in the 1400s greatly affected agriculture throughout the world. In various parts of the Americas Indian farmers grew cocoa beans, corn, peanuts, peppers, rubber trees, squash, sweet potatoes, tobacco, and tomatoes. Europeans first learned of these crops, and how best to grow them, from the Indians. The Europeans, in turn, brought their seeds, livestock, and farming tools and methods to the regions they explored and settled.
During the early 1700s, a great change in farming called the Agricultural Revolution began in the United Kingdom. By the mid-1800s, it had spread throughout much of Europe and North America. The Agricultural Revolution was brought about mainly by three developments. They were (1) improved crop-growing methods, e.g. a four-field rotation system; (2) advances in livestock breeding by means of developing new, better breeds; and (3) the invention of new farm equipment, such as the seed drill, the cotton gin, the harvester, the thresher and the steel plow.