Prehistoric technology

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prehistoric_technology 

Prehistoric technology is technology that predates recorded history. History is the study of the past using written records. Anything prior to the first written accounts of history is prehistoric, including earlier technologies. About 2.5 million years before writing was developed, technology began with the earliest hominids who used stone tools, which they may have used to start fires, hunt, and bury their dead.

There are several factors that made the evolution of prehistoric technology possible or necessary. One of the key factors is behavioral modernity of the highly developed brain of Homo sapiens capable of abstract reasoning, language, introspection, and problem solving. The advent of agriculture resulted in lifestyle changes from nomadic lifestyles to ones lived in homes, with domesticated animals, and land farmed using more varied and sophisticated tools. Art, architecture, music and religion evolved over the course of the prehistoric periods.

Old World

Hominin timeline
−10 — – −9.5 — – −9 — – −8.5 — – −8 — – −7.5 — – −7 — – −6.5 — – −6 — – −5.5 — – −5 — – −4.5 — – −4 — – −3.5 — – −3 — – −2.5 — – −2 — – −1.5 — – −1 — – −0.5 — – 0 —	Miocene Pliocene Pleistocene Hominini Nakalipithecus Ouranopithecus Oreopithecus Sahelanthropus Orrorin Ardipithecus Australopithecus Homo habilis Homo erectus Homo bodoensis Homo sapiens Neanderthals,Denisovans	← Earlier apes ← Gorilla split ← Chimpanzee split ← Earliest bipedal ← Stone tools ← Dispersal beyond Africa ← Earliest fire / cooking ← Earliest clothes ← Modern humans H o m i n i d s
(million years ago)

Stone Age

The Stone Age is a broad prehistoric period during which stone was widely used in the manufacture of implements with a sharp edge, a point, or a percussion surface. The period lasted roughly 2.5 million years, from the time of early hominids to Homo sapiens in the later Pleistocene era, and largely ended between 6000 and 2000 BCE with the advent of metalworking.

The Stone Age lifestyle was that of hunter-gatherers who traveled to hunt game and gather wild plants, with minimal changes in technology. As the last glacial period of the current ice age neared its end (about 12,500 years ago), large animals like the mammoth and bison antiquus became extinct and the climate changed. Humans adapted by maximizing the resources in local environments, gathering and eating a wider range of wild plants and hunting or catching smaller game. Domestication of plants and animals with early stages in the Old World (Afro-Eurasia) Mesolithic and New World (Americas) Archaic periods led to significant changes and reliance on agriculture in the Old World Neolithic and New World Formative stage. The agricultural life led to more settled existences and significant technological advancements.

Although Paleolithic cultures left no written records, the shift from nomadic life to settlement and agriculture can be inferred from a range of archaeological evidence. Such evidence includes ancient tools, cave paintings, and other prehistoric art, such as the Venus of Willendorf. Human remains also provide direct evidence, both through the examination of bones, and the study of mummies. Though concrete evidence is limited, scientists and historians have been able to form significant inferences about the lifestyle and culture of various prehistoric peoples, and the role technology played in their lives.

Lower Paleolithic

The Lower Paleolithic period was the earliest subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. It spans the time from around 2.5 million years ago when the first evidence of craft and use of stone tools by hominids appears in the current archaeological record, until around 300,000 years ago, spanning the Oldowan ("mode 1") and Acheulean ("mode 2") lithic technology.

Early humans (hominids) used stone tool technology, such as a hand axe that was similar to that used by primates, which are found to have intelligence levels of modern children aged 3 to 5 years. Intelligence and use of technology did not change much for millions of years. The first "Homo" species began with Homo habilis about 2.4 to 1.5 million years ago. Homo habilis ("handy man') created stone tools called Oldowan tools. Homo ergaster lived in eastern and southern Africa about 2.5 to 1.7 million years ago and used more diverse and sophisticated stone tools than its predecessor, Homo habilis, including having refined the inherited Oldowan tools and developed the first Acheulean bifacial axes.

Homo erectus ("upright man") lived about 1.8 to 1.3 million years ago in West Asia and Africa and is thought to be the first hominid to hunt in coordinated groups, use complex tools, and care for infirm or weaker companions. Homo antecessor the earliest hominid in Northern Europe lived from 1.2 million to 800,000 years ago and used stone tools. Homo heidelbergensis lived between 600,000 and 400,000 years ago and used stone tool technology similar the Acheulean tools used by Homo erectus.

European and Asian sites dating back 1.5 million years ago seem to indicate controlled use of fire by Homo erectus. A northern Israel site from about 690,000 to 790,000 years ago suggests that man could light fires. Homo heidelbergensis may have been the first species to bury their dead about 500,000 years ago.

Middle Paleolithic

The Middle Paleolithic period occurred in Europe and the Near East, during which the Neanderthals lived (c. 300,000–28,000 years ago). The earliest evidence (Mungo Man) of settlement in Australia dates to around 40,000 years ago when modern humans likely crossed from Asia by island-hopping. The Bhimbetka rock shelters exhibit the earliest traces of human life in India, some of which are approximately 30,000 years old.

Homo neanderthalensis used Mousterian Stone tools that date back to around 300,000 years ago and include smaller, knife-like and scraper tools. They buried their dead in shallow graves along with stone tools and animal bones, although the reasons and significance of the burials are disputed.

Homo sapiens, the only living species in the genus Homo, originated in Africa about 200,000 years ago. As compared to their predecessors, Homo sapiens had a more complex brain structure, which provided better coordination for manipulating objects and far greater use of tools. There was art created during this period. Intentional burial, particularly with grave goods, may be one of the earliest detectable forms of religious practice since it may signify a "concern for the dead that transcends daily life." The earliest undisputed human burial so far dates back 130,000 years. Human skeletal remains stained with red ochre were discovered in the Skhul cave at Qafzeh, Israel with a variety of grave goods.

Upper Paleolithic Revolution

During the Upper Paleolithic Revolution, advancements in human intelligence and technology changed radically with the advent of behavioral modernity between 60,000 and 30,000 years ago. Behavioral modernity is a set of traits that distinguish Homo sapiens from extinct hominid lineages. Homo sapiens reached full behavioral modernity around 50,000 years ago due to a highly developed brain capable of abstract reasoning, language, introspection, and problem solving.

Aurignacian tools, such as stone bladed tools, tools made of antlers, and tools made of bones were created during this period. People began creating clothing. What appear to be sewing needles were found around 40,000 years ago and dyed flax fibers dated 36,000 BP were found in a prehistoric cave in the Republic of Georgia. Human beings may have begun wearing clothing as far back as 190,000 years ago.

Cultural aspects emerged, such as art of the Upper Paleolithic period, which included cave painting, sculpture such as the Venus figurines, carvings and engravings of bone and ivory. The most common subject matter was large animals that were hunted by the people of the time. The Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain and Côa Valley Paleolithic Art are examples of such artwork. Musical instruments such as flutes emerged during this period.

Mesolithic period

The Mesolithic period was a transitional era between the Paleolithic hunter-gatherers, beginning with the Holocene warm period around 11,660 BP and ending with the Neolithic introduction of farming, the date of which varied in each geographical region. Adaptation was required during this period due to climate changes that affected environment and the types of available food.

Small stone tools called microliths, including small bladelets and microburins, emerged during this period. For instance, spears or arrows were found at the earliest known Mesolithic battle site at Cemetery 117 in the Sudan. Holmegaard bows were found in the bogs of Northern Europe dating from the Mesolithic period. These microliths point to the use of projectile technology since they are widely assumed to have formed the tips and barbs of arrows. This is demonstrated by mesolithic assemblages found in southwest Germany, which revealed two types of projectiles used: arrows with transverse, trapezoidal stone tips and large barbed antler "harpoons". These implements indicate the nature of human adaptation to the environment during the period, describing the Mesolithic societies as hunter-gatherers.

Neolithic Revolution

The Neolithic Revolution was the first agricultural revolution, representing a transition from hunting and gathering nomadic life to an agriculture existence. It evolved independently in six separate locations worldwide circa 10,000–7,000 years BP (8,000–5,000 BC). The earliest known evidence exists in the tropical and subtropical areas of southwestern/southern Asia, northern/central Africa and Central America.

There are some key defining characteristics. The introduction of agriculture resulted in a shift from nomadic to more sedentary lifestyles, and the use of agricultural tools such as the plough, digging stick and hoe made agricultural labor more efficient. Animals were domesticated, including dogs. Another defining characteristic of the period was the emergence of pottery, and, in the late Neolithic period, the wheel was introduced for making pottery.

Neolithic architecture included houses and villages built of mud-brick and wattle and daub and the construction of storage facilities, tombs and monuments. Copper metalworking was employed as early as 9000 BC in the Middle East; and a copper pendant found in northern Iraq dated to 8700 BC. Ground and polished stone tools continued to be created and used during the Neolithic period.

Numeric record keeping evolved from a system of counting using small clay tokens that began in Sumer about 8000 BC.

Bronze Age

A late Bronze Age sword or dagger blade.

The Stone Age developed into the Bronze Age after the Neolithic Revolution. The Neolithic Revolution involved radical changes in agricultural technology which included development of agriculture, animal domestication, and the adoption of permanent settlements.

The Bronze Age is characterised by metal smelting of copper and its alloy bronze, an alloy of tin and copper, to create implements and weapons. Polished stone tools continued to be used due to their abundance compared with the less common metals (especially tin).

This technological trend apparently began in the Fertile Crescent, and spread outward.

Iron Age

An axehead made of iron, dating from Swedish Iron Age.

The Iron Age involved the adoption of iron or steel smelting technology, either by casting or forging. Iron replaced bronze, and made it possible to produce tools which were stronger, lighter and cheaper to make than bronze equivalents. The best tools and weapons were made from steel.

Other societal changes often accompanied the introduction of iron, including practice changes in art, religion and agriculture. The Iron Age ends with the beginning of the historic periods, generally marked by the development of written language that enabled creation of historic records.

The timing of the adoption of iron depended upon "the availability of iron ore and the state of knowledge". Iron was smelted in Egypt about 6000 B.C. and iron replaced bronze in the Middle East about 1500 B.C. Chinese began casting iron about 5000 B.C. and their methods for casting iron was the precursor to modern steel manufacturing methods. Most of Asia, however, did not adopt production of iron until the historic period.

In Europe, iron was introduced about 1100 B.C. and had replaced bronze for creating weapons and tools by 500 B.C. They made iron through the forging smelting process and integrated casting in the Middle Ages. Large hill forts or oppida were built either as a refuge in time of war, or sometimes as permanent settlements. Agricultural practices were made more efficient with more effective and varied iron tools.

Iron was extracted from metal ore starting about 2000 B.C. in Africa.

New World

Main article: Archaeology of the Americas

The New World periods began with the crossing of the Paleo-Indians, Athabaskan, Aleuts and Eskimos along the Bering Land Bridge onto the North American continent.

The Paleo-Indians were the first people who entered, and subsequently inhabited, the Americas during the final glacial episodes of the late Pleistocene period. Evidence suggests big-game hunters crossed the Bering Strait from Asia into North America over a land and ice bridge (Beringia), that existed between 45,000 BCE – 12,000 BCE, following herds of large herbivores far into Alaska.

In their book, Method and Theory in American Archaeology, Gordon Willey and Philip Phillips defined five cultural stages for the Americas, including the three prehistoric Lithic, Archaic and Formative stages. The historic stages are the Classic and Post-Classic stages.

Lithic

The Lithic period occurred from 12,000 to 6,000 years before present and included the Clovis, Folsom and Plano cultures. Clovis culture was considered the first culture to use projectile points to hunt on the North American continent. Since then, a pre-Clovis site was found in Manis, Washington that found use of projectile points to hunt mastodons.

Archaic

The Archaic period in the Americas was dated from 8,000 to 2,000 years before present. People were hunters of small game, such as deer, antelope and rabbits, and gatherers of wild plants, moving seasonally to hunting and gathering sites. Late in the Archaic period, about 200-500 A.D., corn was introduced into the diet and pottery-making became an occupation for storing and curing food.

Formative

The Formative stage followed the Archaic period in the Americas and continued until there was contact by European people. Some of the cultures from that period include that of the Ancient Pueblo People, Mississippian culture and Olmec cultures.

Cultures of the Formative Stage are supposed to possess the technologies of pottery, weaving, and developed food production. Social organization is supposed to involve permanent towns and villages, as well as the first ceremonial centers. Ideologically, an early priestly class or theocracy is often present or in development.

Prehistory

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prehistory

 

Delineations on pieces of antler

Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins c. 3.3 million years ago and the invention of writing systems. The use of symbols, marks, and images appears very early among humans, but the earliest known writing systems appeared c. 5000 years ago and it took thousands of years for writing systems to be widely adopted. In some human cultures, writing systems were not used until the nineteenth century and, in a few, are not even used until the present. The end of prehistory therefore came at very different dates in different places, and the term is less often used in discussing societies where prehistory ended relatively recently.

Sumer in Mesopotamia, the Indus valley civilization, and ancient Egypt were the first civilizations to develop their own scripts and to keep historical records; this took place already during the early Bronze Age. Neighboring civilizations were the first to follow. Most other civilizations reached the end of prehistory during the Iron Age. The three-age system of division of prehistory into the Stone Age, followed by the Bronze Age and Iron Age, remains in use for much of Eurasia and North Africa, but is not generally used in those parts of the world where the working of hard metals arrived abruptly from contact with Eurasian cultures, such as Oceania, Australasia, much of Sub-Saharan Africa, and parts of the Americas. With some exceptions in pre-Columbian civilizations in the Americas, these areas did not develop complex writing systems before the arrival of Eurasians, so their prehistory reaches into relatively recent periods; for example, 1788 is usually taken as the end of the prehistory of Australia.

The period when a culture is written about by others, but has not developed its own writing system is often known as the protohistory of the culture. By definition, there are no written records from human prehistory, so dating of prehistoric materials is crucial. Clear techniques for dating were not well-developed until the nineteenth century.

This article is concerned with human prehistory, the time since behaviorally and anatomically modern humans first appeared until the beginning of recorded history. Earlier periods are also called "prehistoric"; there are separate articles for the overall history of the Earth and the history of life before humans.

Definition

Massive stone pillars at Göbekli Tepe, in southeast Turkey, erected for ritual use by early Neolithic people 11,000 years ago

 

An early sketch imagining an adult and a juvenile from prehistoric times making a stone tool

 

A nineteenth century concept of early humans in a wilderness

Beginning

The term "prehistory" can refer to the vast span of time since the beginning of the Universe or the Earth, but more often it refers to the period since life appeared on Earth, or even more specifically to the time since human-like beings appeared.

End

The date marking the end of prehistory is typically defined as the advent of the contemporary written historical record. The date consequently varies widely from region to region depending on the date when relevant records become a useful academic resource. For example, in Egypt it is generally accepted that prehistory ended around 3100 BCE, whereas in New Guinea the end of the prehistoric era is set much more recently, in the 1870s, when the Russian anthropologist Nicholai Miklukho-Maklai spent several years living among native peoples, and described their way of life in a comprehensive treatise. In Europe the relatively well-documented classical cultures of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome had neighbouring cultures, including the Celts and to a lesser extent the Etruscans, with little or no writing, and historians must decide how much weight to give to the often highly prejudiced accounts of these protohistoric cultures in Greek and Roman literature.

Time periods

In dividing up human prehistory in Eurasia, historians typically use the three-age system, whereas scholars of pre-human time periods typically use the well-defined geologic record and its internationally defined stratum base within the geologic time scale. The three-age system is the periodization of human prehistory into three consecutive time periods, named for their respective predominant tool-making technologies:

• Stone Age
• Bronze Age
• Iron Age

For the prehistory of the Americas see Pre-Columbian era.

History of the term

The notion of "prehistory" began to surface during the Enlightenment in the work of antiquarians who used the word 'primitive' to describe societies that existed before written records. The first use of the word prehistory in English, however, occurred in the Foreign Quarterly Review in 1836.

The use of the geologic time scale for pre-human time periods, and of the three-age system for human prehistory, is a system that emerged during the late nineteenth century in the work of British, German, and Scandinavian anthropologists, archeologists, and antiquarians.

Means of research

The main source of information for prehistory is archaeology (a branch of anthropology), but some scholars are beginning to make more use of evidence from the natural and social sciences. This view has been articulated by advocates of deep history.

The primary researchers into human prehistory are archaeologists and physical anthropologists who use excavation, geologic and geographic surveys, and other scientific analysis to reveal and interpret the nature and behavior of pre-literate and non-literate peoples. Human population geneticists and historical linguists are also providing valuable insight for these questions. Cultural anthropologists help provide context for societal interactions, by which objects of human origin pass among people, allowing an analysis of any article that arises in a human prehistoric context. Therefore, data about prehistory is provided by a wide variety of natural and social sciences, such as anthropology, archaeology, archaeoastronomy, comparative linguistics, biology, geology, molecular genetics, paleontology, palynology, physical anthropology, and many others.

Human prehistory differs from history not only in terms of its chronology, but in the way it deals with the activities of archaeological cultures rather than named nations or individuals. Restricted to material processes, remains, and artifacts rather than written records, prehistory is anonymous. Because of this, reference terms that prehistorians use, such as "Neanderthal" or "Iron Age", are modern labels with definitions sometimes subject to debate.

Stone Age

The concept of a "Stone Age" is found useful in the archaeology of most of the world, although in the archaeology of the Americas it is called by different names and begins with a Lithic stage, or sometimes Paleo-Indian. The sub-divisions described below are used for Eurasia, and not consistently across the whole area.

Palaeolithic

Main article: Paleolithic

Proposed map of early human migrations, according to mitochondrial population genetics with numbers that are millennia before the present (its accuracy is disputed)

"Palaeolithic" means "Old Stone Age", and begins with the first use of stone tools. The Paleolithic is the earliest period of the Stone Age.

The early part of the Palaeolithic is called the Lower Palaeolithic, which predates Homo sapiens, beginning with Homo habilis (and related species) and the earliest stone tools, dated to around 2.5 million years ago. Evidence of control of fire by early humans during the Lower Palaeolithic Era is uncertain and has at best limited scholarly support. The most widely accepted claim is that H. erectus or H. ergaster made fires between 790,000 and 690,000 BP (before the present period) in a site at Bnot Ya'akov Bridge, Israel. The use of fire enabled early humans to cook food, provide warmth, and have a light source at night.

Early Homo sapiens originated some 200,000 years ago, ushering in the Middle Palaeolithic. Anatomic changes indicating modern language capacity also arise during the Middle Palaeolithic. During the Middle Palaeolithic Era, there is the first definitive evidence of human use of fire. Sites in Zambia have charred bone and wood that have been dated to 61,000 BP. The systematic burial of the dead, music, early art, and the use of increasingly sophisticated multi-part tools are highlights of the Middle Paleolithic.

Throughout the Palaeolithic, humans generally lived as nomadic hunter-gatherers. Hunter-gatherer societies tended to be very small and egalitarian, although hunter-gatherer societies with abundant resources or advanced food-storage techniques sometimes developed sedentary lifestyles with complex social structures such as chiefdoms, and social stratification. Long-distance contacts may have been established, as in the case of Indigenous Australian "highways" known as songlines.

Mesolithic

Main article: Mesolithic

Dugout canoe

The Mesolithic, or Middle Stone Age (from the Greek mesos, 'middle', and lithos, 'stone'), was a period in the development of human technology between the Palaeolithic and Neolithic periods of the Stone Age.

The Mesolithic period began at the end of the Pleistocene epoch, some 10,000 BP, and ended with the introduction of agriculture, the date of which varied by geographic region. In some areas, such as the Near East, agriculture was already underway by the end of the Pleistocene, and there the Mesolithic is short and poorly defined. In areas with limited glacial impact, the term "Epipalaeolithic" is sometimes preferred.

Regions that experienced greater environmental effects as the last ice age ended have a much more evident Mesolithic era, lasting millennia. In Northern Europe, societies were able to live well on rich food supplies from the marshlands fostered by the warmer climate. Such conditions produced distinctive human behaviours that are preserved in the material record, such as the Maglemosian and Azilian cultures. These conditions also delayed the coming of the Neolithic until as late as 4000 BCE (6,000 BP) in northern Europe.

Remains from this period are few and far between, often limited to middens. In forested areas, the first signs of deforestation have been found, although this would only begin in earnest during the Neolithic, when more space was needed for agriculture.

The Mesolithic is characterized in most areas by small composite flint tools: microliths and microburins. Fishing tackle, stone adzes, and wooden objects, e.g. canoes and bows, have been found at some sites. These technologies first occur in Africa, associated with the Azilian cultures, before spreading to Europe through the Ibero-Maurusian culture of Northern Africa and the Kebaran culture of the Levant. However, independent discovery is not ruled out.

Neolithic

Main article: Neolithic

Entrance to the Ġgantija phase temple complex of Ħaġar Qim, Malta, 3900 BCE

 

An array of Neolithic artifacts, including bracelets, axe heads, chisels, and polishing tools - Neolithic stone artifacts are by definition polished and, except for specialty items, not chipped

"Neolithic" means "New Stone Age". Although there were several species of human beings during the Paleolithic, by the Neolithic only Homo sapiens sapiens remained. (Homo floresiensis may have survived right up to the very dawn of the Neolithic, about 12,200 years ago.) This was a period of primitive technological and social development. It began about 10,200 BCE in some parts of the Middle East, and later in other parts of the world and ended between 4,500 and 2,000 BCE. The Neolithic is a progression of behavioral and cultural characteristics and changes, including the use of wild and domestic crops and of domesticated animals.

Early Neolithic farming was limited to a narrow range of plants, both wild and domesticated, which included einkorn wheat, millet and spelt, and the keeping of dogs, sheep, and goats. By about 6,900–6,400 BCE, it included domesticated cattle and pigs, the establishment of permanently or seasonally inhabited settlements, and the use of pottery. The Neolithic period saw the development of early villages, agriculture, animal domestication, tools, and the onset of the earliest recorded incidents of warfare. The Neolithic era commenced with the beginning of farming, which produced the "Neolithic Revolution". It ended when metal tools became widespread (in the Copper Age or Bronze Age; or, in some geographical regions, in the Iron Age). The term Neolithic is commonly used in the Old World, as its application to cultures in the Americas and Oceania that did not fully develop metal-working technology raises problems.

The monumental building at Luni sul Mignone in Blera, Italy, 3500 BCE

Settlements became more permanent with some having circular houses with single rooms made of mudbrick. Settlements might have a surrounding stone wall to keep domesticated animals in and protect the inhabitants from other tribes. Later settlements have rectangular mud-brick houses where the family lived together in single or multiple rooms. Burial findings suggest an ancestor cult where people preserved skulls of the dead. The Vinča culture may have created the earliest system of writing. The megalithic temple complexes of Ġgantija are notable for their gigantic structures. Although some late Eurasian Neolithic societies formed complex stratified chiefdoms or even states, states evolved in Eurasia only with the rise of metallurgy, and most Neolithic societies on the whole were relatively simple and egalitarian. Most clothing appears to have been made of animal skins, as indicated by finds of large numbers of bone and antler pins which are ideal for fastening leather. Wool cloth and linen might have become available during the later Neolithic, as suggested by finds of perforated stones that (depending on size) may have served as spindle whorls or loom weights.

Chalcolithic

Main article: Chalcolithic

Artist's impression of a Copper Age walled city, Los Millares, Iberia

In Old World archaeology, the "Chalcolithic", "Eneolithic", or "Copper Age" refers to a transitional period where early copper metallurgy appeared alongside the widespread use of stone tools. During this period, some weapons and tools were made of copper. This period was still largely Neolithic in character. It is a phase of the Bronze Age before it was discovered that adding tin to copper formed the harder bronze. The Copper Age was originally defined as a transition between the Neolithic and the Bronze Age. However, because it is characterized by the use of metals, the Copper Age is considered a part of the Bronze Age rather than the Stone Age.

Chalcolithic copper mine in Timna Valley, Negev Desert, Israel

An archaeological site in Serbia contains the oldest securely dated evidence of copper making at high temperature, from 7,500 years ago. The find in June 2010 extends the known record of copper smelting by about 800 years, and suggests that copper smelting may have been invented independently in separate parts of Asia and Europe at that time, rather than spreading from a single source. The emergence of metallurgy may have occurred first in the Fertile Crescent, where it gave rise to the Bronze Age in the 4th millennium BCE (the traditional view), although finds from the Vinča culture in Europe have now been securely dated to slightly earlier than those of the Fertile Crescent. Timna Valley contains evidence of copper mining 9,000 to 7,000 years ago. The process of transition from Neolithic to Chalcolithic in the Middle East is characterized in archaeological stone tool assemblages by a decline in high quality raw material procurement and use. North Africa and the Nile Valley imported its iron technology from the Near East and followed the Near Eastern course of Bronze Age and Iron Age development. However the Iron Age and Bronze Age occurred simultaneously in much of Africa.

Transition into ancient history

Further information: Protohistory and Ancient history

Bronze Age

Main article: Bronze Age

An image of an ox-drawn plow is accompanied by script, Egypt, c. 1200 BCE

The Bronze Age is the earliest period in which some civilizations have reached the end of prehistory, by introducing written records. The Bronze Age or parts thereof are thus considered to be part of prehistory only for the regions and civilizations who adopted or developed a system of keeping written records during later periods. The invention of writing coincides in some areas with the early beginnings of the Bronze Age. Soon after the appearance of writing, people started creating texts including written accounts of events and records of administrative matters.

The term Bronze Age refers to a period in human cultural development when the most advanced metalworking (at least in systematic and widespread use) included techniques for smelting copper and tin from naturally occurring outcroppings of ores, and then combining them to cast bronze. These naturally occurring ores typically included arsenic as a common impurity. Copper and tin ores are rare, as reflected in the fact that there were no tin bronzes in Western Asia before 3000 BCE. The Bronze Age forms part of the three-age system for prehistoric societies. In this system, it follows the Neolithic in some areas of the world.

While copper is a common ore, deposits of tin are rare in the Old World, and often had to be traded or carried considerable distances from the few mines, stimulating the creation of extensive trading routes. In many areas as far apart as China and England, the valuable new material was used for weapons but for a long time apparently not available for agricultural tools. Much of it seems to have been hoarded by social elites, and sometimes deposited in extravagant quantities, from Chinese ritual bronzes and Indian copper hoards to European hoards of unused axe-heads.

By the end of the Bronze Age large states, which are often called empires, had arisen in Egypt, China, Anatolia (the Hittites), and Mesopotamia, all of them literate.

Iron Age

Main articles: Iron Age and Classical antiquity

The Iron Age is not part of prehistory for all civilizations who had introduced written records during the Bronze Age. Most remaining civilizations did so during the Iron Age, often through conquest by the empires, which continued to expand during this period. For example, in most of Europe conquest by the Roman Empire means that the term Iron Age is replaced by "Roman", "Gallo-Roman", and similar terms after the conquest.

In archaeology, the Iron Age refers to the advent of ferrous metallurgy. The adoption of iron coincided with other changes in some past cultures, often including more sophisticated agricultural practices, religious beliefs and artistic styles, which makes the archaeological Iron Age coincide with the "Axial Age" in the history of philosophy. Although iron ore is common, the metalworking techniques necessary to use iron are very different from those needed for the metal used earlier, and iron was slow-spreading and for long mainly used for weapons, while bronze remained typical for tools, as well as art.

Timeline

Hominin timeline
−10 — – −9.5 — – −9 — – −8.5 — – −8 — – −7.5 — – −7 — – −6.5 — – −6 — – −5.5 — – −5 — – −4.5 — – −4 — – −3.5 — – −3 — – −2.5 — – −2 — – −1.5 — – −1 — – −0.5 — – 0 —	Miocene Pliocene Pleistocene Hominini Nakalipithecus Ouranopithecus Oreopithecus Sahelanthropus Orrorin Ardipithecus Australopithecus Homo habilis Homo erectus Homo bodoensis Homo sapiens Neanderthals,Denisovans	← Earlier apes ← Gorilla split ← Chimpanzee split ← Earliest bipedal ← Stone tools ← Dispersal beyond Africa ← Earliest fire / cooking ← Earliest clothes ← Modern humans H o m i n i d s
(million years ago)

Further information: Timeline of human evolution and Timeline of human prehistory

All dates are approximate and conjectural, obtained through research in the fields of anthropology, archaeology, genetics, geology, or linguistics. They are all subject to revision due to new discoveries or improved calculations. BP stands for "Before Present (1950)." BCE stands for Before Common Era".

Paleolithic

Lower Paleolithic

• c. 2.8 million BP – Genus Homo appears
• c. 2.5 million BP – Evidence of early human tools
• c. 600,000 BP – Hunting-gathering
• c. 400,000 BP – Control of fire by early humans

Middle Paleolithic

• c. 300,000–30,000 BP – Mousterian (Neanderthal) culture in Europe.
• c. 200,000 BP – Anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens) appear in Africa, one of whose characteristics is a lack of significant body hair compared to other primates. See e.g. Omo remains.
• c. 170,000–83,000 BP – Invention of clothing
• c. 75,000 BP – Toba Volcano supereruption.
• c. 80,000–50,000 BP – Homo sapiens exit Africa as a single population. In the next millennia, descendants from this population migrate to southern India, the Malay islands, Australia, Japan, China, Siberia, Alaska, and the northwestern coast of North America.
• c. 80,000–50,000? BP – Behavioral modernity, by this point including language and sophisticated cognition

Upper Paleolithic

• c. 45,000 BP / 43,000 BCE – Beginnings of Châtelperronian culture in France.
• c. 40,000 BP / 38,000 BCE – First human settlement in the southern half of the Australian mainland, by indigenous Australians (including the future sites of Sydney, Perth, and Melbourne.)
• c. 32,000 BP / 30,000 BCE – Beginnings of Aurignacian culture, exemplified by the cave paintings ("parietal art") of Chauvet Cave in France.
• c. 30,500 BP / 28,500 BCE – New Guinea is populated by colonists from Asia or Australia.
• c. 30,000 BP / 28,000 BCE – A herd of reindeer is slaughtered and butchered by humans in the Vezere Valley in what is today France.
• c. 28,000–20,000 BP – Gravettian period in Europe. Harpoons, needles, and saws invented.
• c. 26,500 BP – Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Subsequently, the ice melts and the glaciers retreat again (Late Glacial Maximum). During this latter period human beings return to Western Europe (see Magdalenian culture) and enter North America from Eastern Siberia for the first time (see Paleo-Indians, pre-Clovis culture and Settlement of the Americas).
• c. 26,000 BP / 24,000 BCE – People around the world use fibers to make baby-carriers, clothes, bags, baskets, and nets.
• c. 25,000 BP / 23,000 BCE – A settlement consisting of huts built of rocks and mammoth bones is founded near what is now Dolní Věstonice in Moravia in the Czech Republic. This is the oldest human permanent settlement that has been found by archaeologists.
• c. 23,000 BP / 21,000 BCE – Small-scale trial cultivation of plants in Ohalo II, a hunter-gatherers' sedentary camp on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, Israel.
• c. 16,000 BP / 14,000 BCE – Wisent sculpted in clay deep inside the cave now known as Le Tuc d'Audoubert in the French Pyrenees near what is now the border of Spain.
• c. 14,800 BP / 12,800 BCE – The Humid Period begins in North Africa. The region that would later become the Sahara is wet and fertile, and the aquifers are full.

Mesolithic/Epipaleolithic

• c. 12,500 to 9,500 BCE – Natufian culture: a culture of sedentary hunter-gatherers who may have cultivated Rye in the Levant (Eastern Mediterranean)

Neolithic

• c. 9,400–9,200 BCE – Figs of a parthenocarpic (and therefore sterile) type are cultivated in the early Neolithic village Gilgal I (in the Jordan Valley, 13 km north of Jericho). The find predates the domestication of wheat, barley, and legumes, and may thus be the first known instance of agriculture.
• c. 9,000 BCE – Circles of T-shaped stone pillars erected at Göbekli Tepe in the Southeastern Anatolia Region of Turkey during pre-pottery Neolithic A (PPNA) period. As yet unexcavated structures at the site are thought to date back to the epipaleolithic.
• c. 8,000 BC / 7000 BCE – In northern Mesopotamia, now northern Iraq, cultivation of barley and wheat begins. At first they are used for beer, gruel, and soup, eventually for bread. In early agriculture at this time the planting stick is used, but it is replaced by a primitive plow in subsequent centuries. Around this time, a round stone tower, now preserved at about 8.5 meters high and 8.5 meters in diameter is built in Jericho.

Chalcolithic

• c. 3,700 BCE – Pictographic proto-writing, known as proto-cuneiform, appears in Sumer, and records begin to be kept. According to the majority of specialists, the first Mesopotamian writing (actually still pictographic proto-writing at this stage) was a tool for record-keeping that had little connection to the spoken language.
• c. 3,300 BCE – Approximate date of death of "Ötzi the Iceman", found preserved in ice in the Ötztal Alps in 1991. A copper-bladed axe, which is a characteristic technology of this era, was found with the corpse.
• c. 3,000 BCE – Stonehenge construction begins. In its first version, it consisted of a circular ditch and bank, with 56 wooden posts.