Seafood is the culinary name for food that comes from any form of sea life, prominently including fish and shellfish. Shellfish include various species of molluscs. The harvesting, processing, and co…Seafood is the culinary name for food that comes from any form of sea life, prominently including fish and shellfish. Shellfish include various species of molluscs. The harvesting, processing, and consuming of seafoods are ancient practices with archaeological evidence dating back well into the Paleolithic. Findings in a sea cave at Pinnacle Point in South Africa indicate Homo sapiens harvested marine life as early as 165,000 years ago, while the Neanderthals, an extinct human species contemporary with early Homo sapiens, appear to have been eating seafood at sites along the Mediterranean coast beginning around the same time. Isotopic analysis of the skeletal remains of Tianyuan man, a 40,000-year-old anatomically modern human from eastern Asia, has shown that he regularly consumed freshwater fish. Archaeology features such as shell middens, discarded fish bones, and cave paintings show that sea foods were important for survival and consumed in significant quantities. During this period, most people lived a hunter-gatherer lifestyle and were, of necessity, constantly on the move. However, early examples of permanent settlements, such as those at Lepenski Vir, were almost always associated with fishing as a major source of food.