For many Americans, the thought of eating a grasshopper or beetle is enough to turn their stomachs. Yet in parts of Mexico, roasted grasshoppers are a familiar snack. In Uganda, certain grasshoppers are a traditional food. And thousands of years ago, people living in what is now the United States regularly included insects in their diets.
So why do some cultures embrace insects as food while others find the idea disgusting?
New research from Durham University in England suggests the answer has a lot to do with culture and history. Published in the journal World Archaeology, the paper brings together archaeological discoveries and historical records to explore how insects became an overlooked part of our food history and why our attitudes toward them have changed.
The evidence is surprisingly widespread.
At Oregon's Paisley Caves, researchers have found insect remains in ancient human waste dating back roughly 11,000 to 13,000 years. The remains include Jerusalem crickets and June beetles, alongside traces of plants and small animals. In Nevada, archaeologists discovered a collection of approximately 1,000 locusts dating back about 14,000 years, suggesting insects were deliberately gathered and stored for food.
Halfway around the world, researchers studying a grinding stone from Australia's Cloggs Cave found traces of moths that had been cooked and ground into food around 2,000 years ago.
These discoveries suggest ancient diets were far more varied than the familiar image of early humans surviving on meat from large animals.
But there's another reason insects have been largely overlooked in our understanding of ancient diets: Archaeologists haven't always thought to look for them.
Animal bones and stone tools can survive for thousands of years, making them easier to find and study. Insect remains are much more fragile and can be easily missed. Even when they're discovered, researchers may assume they're simply remnants of insects that happened to be present rather than evidence of something people ate.
As study author Lisa-Marie Shillito, an archaeology professor at Durham University, explained, “If we don’t think of insects as food, we can overlook evidence that people ate them.”
Our modern food preferences may even influence how scientists interpret the past. Researchers who grew up in cultures where insects aren't considered food may be less likely to recognize them as part of an ancient meal.
Of course, eating insects isn't just something our ancestors did.
In Mexico, chapulines, or grasshoppers, remain part of a culinary tradition that stretches back centuries. In Uganda, nsenene grasshoppers are a traditional food, while fried insects and larvae are sold in markets across parts of Southeast Asia.
These aren't necessarily unusual foods or modern substitutes for meat. They're established parts of local cuisines, often tied to seasons, celebrations and traditions passed down through generations.
And even in Europe, where eating insects is now relatively uncommon, that wasn't always the case. Ancient Roman writings describe people eating cicadas, grubs and other insects.
So what changed?
Shillito points to several possible influences, including changing agricultural practices, concerns about disease and social attitudes that came to associate insects with poverty or foods considered uncivilized. Over time, those beliefs may have helped push insects off the menu in much of Western society.
It's a reminder that our food preferences aren't determined by taste or nutrition alone. They're also shaped by where we grow up, what our families eat and what our communities consider normal.
That cultural divide is especially interesting as scientists explore insects as a possible source of protein for the future.
Some edible insects provide substantial amounts of protein, along with nutrients such as iron, zinc and vitamin B12. Depending on how they're raised, insect farming may also use less land and produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions than some conventional livestock operations.
But insects aren't automatically healthier or more environmentally friendly than other foods. Their nutritional value and environmental impact vary, and food safety and allergy concerns also need to be considered.
And there's no evidence from this research that learning about ancient diets will suddenly make people more willing to eat insects.
Instead, Shillito argues that looking at insects as traditional foods rather than strange new alternatives could help change how people think about them.
After all, humans have spent thousands of years adapting their diets to the foods available around them. What's considered ordinary in one place might seem completely unappetizing somewhere else.
Perhaps the surprising thing isn't that people have been eating insects for thousands of years. It's that so many of us have come to think of the practice as strange.
No specific funding was identified for this research.