Stone Age people ate fish roe.

Caviar on a spoon
Credit: © Burke/Triolo Productions—The Image Bank/Getty Images
Author Michael Nordine
September 11, 2026

Love it?

There is truly nothing new under the sun, including one of the culinary world’s foremost delicacies: fish eggs. People have been eating a food similar to caviar — the cured, unfertilized eggs of sturgeon — since the Stone Age, with research suggesting that our ancient ancestors first began enjoying it 6,000 years ago. (True caviar is salt-cured and comes exclusively from sturgeon, with eggs from other fish being known more generally as roe.) 

The evidence comes from Friesack 4, an archaeological site in Brandenburg, Germany, where protein analysis found traces of carp roe on a clay cooking vessel. It’s believed that our ancestors prepared their roe by gathering fresh eggs and dropping them into a pot of either boiling water or fish broth before covering the pot with leaves — either to trap heat, add another flavor to their concoction, or both. The result might not catch as high a price as caviar does today but still demonstrates that humans have always had a taste for the finer things in life.

By the Numbers

Did you know?

Female sturgeon may live for more than 400 years.

For decades, we mere humans thought that sturgeon could live for around 150 years. That’s already an impressive lifespan, but it turns out we might have been underestimating them by several centuries. Research published in spring 2026 by the Michigan and Wisconsin Departments of Natural Resources, Michigan State University, and Michigan Technological University found that sturgeon native to the Great Lakes region may live longer than 400 years, though females are especially long-lived.

Ed Baker, the study’s lead author, said that males can live for up to 279 years and females for as long as 427 years. A sturgeon’s age is estimated by counting growth rings in its ear bones, which is apparently the source of the original miscalculation: The new study found that their growth slows as they age, making those rings blend together.

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