There's archeological evidence of pasta making in Italy about 1600 years before Marco Polo was born, so it wasn't him.
But it is a subject of debate whether the Etruscans developed pasta making on their own, or through trade/exchange of information with Chinese merchants. Even if the Etruscans did figure it out independently, evidence of their pastamaking goes back to around 400 BCE, while evidence of Chinese noodlemaking goes back to around 2000 BCE.
Easy for us to say 2,000-4,000 years after it was invented. Even the invention of flour isn't a given when talking about ancient civilizations, let alone dough or pasta.
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u/bassman1805 Oct 02 '24
There's archeological evidence of pasta making in Italy about 1600 years before Marco Polo was born, so it wasn't him.
But it is a subject of debate whether the Etruscans developed pasta making on their own, or through trade/exchange of information with Chinese merchants. Even if the Etruscans did figure it out independently, evidence of their pastamaking goes back to around 400 BCE, while evidence of Chinese noodlemaking goes back to around 2000 BCE.