What is the oldest recipe for soup?

It's impossible to pinpoint the absolute oldest recipe for soup. Here's why:

* Ancient History: Our understanding of ancient cooking practices is limited. Early humans likely combined ingredients in ways we might call "soup" long before written records existed.

* Lack of Standardized Recipes: Early recipes wouldn't have been written down in the way we think of them today. Instead, they were likely passed down orally through generations, changing and adapting along the way.

* Interpreting Evidence: Archaeological discoveries provide clues, but often need interpretation. A pot found in an ancient settlement might have been used for soup, but we can't be certain.

However, we can point to some early indications of soup-like dishes:

* Ancient Egypt: Hieroglyphs depict soup-making processes, and texts reference "bread soup," a simple broth with bread. This dates back to at least 2500 BCE.

* Ancient Mesopotamia: Clay tablets describe recipes for "beer soup," a combination of beer, barley, and spices. These date back to around 2000 BCE.

* Ancient Greece: The poet Homer references a dish called "kykeon," a mixture of barley, wine, and cheese, which some consider a soup.

So, while we can't say definitively what the oldest recipe is, we can be confident that soups have been a staple of human diets for thousands of years. The earliest evidence points to simple combinations of ingredients, often boiled or simmered, with the focus being on sustenance rather than elaborate flavor.