Prehistory

An Overview

Dating Conventions and Abbreviations

B.C.=before Christ

B.C.E.=before the Common Era

A.D.=Anno Domini (the year of our Lord) C.E.=Common Era c. or ca.= circa C.=century

The Paleolithic period

old stone age c. 500,000 BC - c. 6000 BC Basic features Hunting and gathering Remarkable art (and religion?) Simple tools of chipped stone Simple shelters Fire c. 150,000 BC Language

Homo habilis-lower Paleolithic

Handy Man
In Africa, an early ancestor of modern humans, called Homo habilis developed the earliest known stone tools. These were relatively simple tools known as choppers.

These humans likely

subsisted on scavenged meat and wild plants, rather than hunted prey. Poulnabrone dolmen in County Clare, Ireland

Homo erectus
Upright man About 1.3 to 1.8 million years ago. The species originated in Africa and spread as far as India, China and Java

H. erectus learned to control fire and created more complex chopper tools, as well as

expanding out of Africa to reach Asia.

The Mysterious Neanderthal This period began about 200,000 years ago Neanderthals (closely related to modern humans) lived (c. 120,00035,000 years ago)

Middle Paleolithic

This period began about 200,000 years ago Neanderthals (closely related to modern humans)

lived (c. 120,00035,000 years ago)

The stone artifact technology- Mousterian.

Extraordinary art!
Middle Paleolithic peoples demonstrate the earliest undisputed evidence for art other expressions of abstract thought such as intentional burial of the dead.

Human evolution

The Australopithecines
Lucy

Middle Paleolithic religion

ritual burial

Eating
Who was the more productive? The hunter? Or the gatherer?

Homo sapiens
Upper Paleolithic

about 35,000 to 10,000 years ago

The cave art of Lascaux is an example of Upper Paleolithic culture Globally, societies were hunter-gatherers evidence of regional identities begins to appear in the wide variety of stone tool types being developed to suit different

environments.

Homo faber
Early stone tools A. Homo habilis B. Homo erectus C. Neanderthal

C.

A. B.

Cave art
What general theme is evident here?

Cave artists

Settling down
Prerequisite to civilization

The peripatetic life

Travelling from place to place

The Neolithic period

Began in Middle East around 6000 BC

Basic features
Polished stone tools More settled, less nomadic lifestyles permanent villages Population increases Development of a more complex and social order Food production

The Neolithic period

Adoption of agriculture &The development of pottery More complex, larger settlements such as Catal Huyk and Jericho. Agriculture and the culture it led to spread to the Mediterranean, the Indus valley, China and Southeast Asia. The first large-scale constructions were built, including settlement towers and walls,

e.g.: Jericho and ceremonial sites,

Stonehenge

Skara Brae, Scotland.

The Fertile Crescent

The Fertile Crescent is a crescent-shaped region containing the comparatively moist and fertile land Shaduf (Arabic) irrigation tool originally developed in ancient Mesopotamia

Shaduf or shadoof

Farming
Development of Agriculture Basis of civilization

innovations like the use of fire and

the development of agriculture the development of tools, language and writing. From Hunter/Gatherer to Horticulturist to Agriculturist An important center appears to be Greater Mesopotamia (present day Iraq). This is a rich flood plain where wheat, barley, and oats are believed to have originated. The image below shows the Zagros mountains of Iraq where the landscape appears much as it probably was 10,000yearsago.

Age

Period

Tools Handmade tools and objects found in nature cudgel, club, sharpened stone, chopper, handaxe, scraper, spear, Bow and arrow, harpoon, needle, scratch awl

Economy

Dwelling Sites

Society

Religion

Stone age

Paleolithi c

Hunting and gathering

Mobile lifestyle caves, huts, tooth or skin hovels, mostly by rivers and lakes

A band of edibleplant gatherers and hunters (25-100 people)

Mesolithic (known as the Epipalaeolithi c in areas not effected by the Ice Age (such as Africa))

Handmade tools and objects found in nature bow and arrow, fish basket, boats

Tribes and Bands

Neolithic

Handmade tools and objects found in nature chisel, hoe, plough, yoke, reaping-hook, grain pourer, barley, loom, earthenware (pottery) and weapons

Agriculture Gathering, hunting, fishing and domestication

Farmsteads during the Neolithic and the Bronze Age Formation of cities during the Bronze Age

Bronze Age

Copper and bronze tools, potter's wheel

Iron Age

Iron tools

Agriculture cattle breeding, agriculture, craft, trade

Tribes and the formation of chiefdoms in some Neolithic societies at the end of the Neolithic period' States and chiefdoms during the Bronze Age

Evidence for belief in the afterlife first appears in the Middle Paleolithic or Upper Paleolithic , marked by the appearan ce of burial rituals and ancestor worship. Priests and sanctuary servants appear in the prehistory .

Social Organization/Control
Hunting &Gathering communal life little specialization in social or economic roles gender roles (?) relatively egalitarian cultural/technical information is widely diffused custom, tradition rule Agriculture private life, property increasing social and economic specialization gender-specific roles social hierarchy emerges cultural/technical information expands and becomes a form of property coercion becomes necessary

Hunting & Gathering Small bands (25-250), semi-nomadic existence seasonal migration wide variety of food sources (typically 350 plant varieties) exploits territory extensively security through diversity small (portable) tool kit

Agriculture sedentism, expanding population permanent living sites replaces diversity with monoculture exploits intensively security through specialization tool kit, technology expands exponentially

Pottery

Weaving ,metallurgy

Domestication of animals and plants

Milk Worker Meat To provide leather, wool, hides Manure for soil conditioning

Tools

Mesolithic Adze mounted directly onto handle A wooden axe.

Mesolithic Adze flint axe with wooden handle

Adze head on digging tool

Beaker-period Flint arrowheads

Neolithic leafshaped Flint arrowheads Early flint arrow Flint Arrowheads, c. 2000 BC

10000year-old Sickle, Flint Arrowhead s

Flint arrowhead, at least 4,000 years old

Arrows, as used c. 6000 BC three drawings of flint heads, traditional, missing, incurved

art work of flint head of arrow

The first writing

Evolution of shelters
Hut Lean to

Tent
Pit houses

Paleolithic period
Hut Terra Amata, near Nice in France between 450,000 and 380,000 BCE The hut included a hearth, or fireplace and was

made by bracing branches with a circle of large

and small stones. The hut was 8 meters long by 4 meters wide.

Hand-axes and other stone tools and flakes were found in the vicinity

Paleolithic period
tent

Plateau Parain in France. Dated to about 15,000 to 10,000 BCE,

tent was suspended over a wooden framework and held down by stones. It included a central hearth. Stone tools were fond in the area

around this site.

Paleolithic period
Lean to Le lazaret cave is located in southern France . Between 186,000 and 127,000 years ago. Area of the cave 32 by 11 feet.

Neolithic period
Stonehenge Stonehenge is probably the most important prehistoric monument in the whole of Britain and has attracted visitors from earliest times. It stands as a timeless monument to the people who built it. The Stonehenge that we see today is the final stage that was completed about 3500 years ago, The first Stonehenge was a large earthwork . built around 3100 BC. They form a circle about 284 feet in diameter.

Neolithic period
The second and most dramatic stage of Stonehenge started around 2150 BC. Some 82 bluestones from the Preseli mountains, in south-west Wales were transported to the site. During the same period
the original entrance of the circular earthwork w as widened and a pair of Heel Stones were erected. Also the nearer part of the Avenue was built, aligned with the midsummer sunrise.

Neolithic period
The third stage of Stonehenge, about 2000 BC, saw the arrival of the Sarsen stones, which were almost certainly brought from the Marlborough Downs near Avebury, in north Wiltshire, about 25 miles north of Stonehenge. Modern calculations show that it would have taken 500 men using leather ropes to pull one stone, with an extra 100 men needed to lay the huge rollers in front of the sledge. These were arranged in an outer circle with a continuous run of lintels. Inside the circle, five trilithons were placed in a horseshoe arrangement, whose remains we can still see today.

Neolithic period
Skara brae

Skara Brae, situated near the Bay of Skaill on Orkney's Mainland, is unique: it is a complete village with houses and streets. The houses are built closely together and made of stone. The spaces between the houses was filled with rubbish and turf for some kind of protection against the wind. he houses, which measure from 4.3m x 4mto 6.4m x 6.1m, were probably roofed with timber, whalebone, turf and heather. It is a free-standing structure, with a central hearth but no household furniture.

Neolithic period
Ain Mallaha
Ain mallaha ,near lake hulen,israel . Between 9000-8000 BC. There were about 5o dry stone huts on a open site of some 2000sq.m Most of them circular, semi-subterranean and rock lined, from 3m to 9m in dia. Beehive forms were constructed of reeds and were supported on posts The huts were dug into the bank on the upper side to a depth of about 1.3m and the entrance were located on the lower side. Some of the huts had stone paved floors, and had walls finished with lime plaster painted red ochre

Catal Hyk
Modern Turkey. 6500 BCE. Situated at the foot of the Taurus mountains in Anatolia. It extended over 13 ha (32 acres) with a population of 20000-60000 people. Rectangular single roomed houses each about 25sq.mwith plastered walls and floors. Densely packed with open courtyard .floor were covered with straw mats and wall designed with simple geometric designs.

Catal Hyk

Animals were kept in very close proximity to human living quarters. The flat roof-tops of houses were used as living space in the evening. Later, open central courtyards were developed

beidha
The first hut in beidha (7000 -6000BC),in southern Jordan. the dwellings and storerooms were grouped in clusters within walled courtyards, Whole village was surrounded by a stone wall. Each house had one room measuring 7mx9m.Floor and walls were plaster with red stripes Anumber of shrine like buildings found at Jericho (7000 BC). A small room ,consist of standing stone with in a niche. inner chamber containing a pair of stone pillars symmetrically.

Arphachiyah -5000bc
beehive shaped tholoi were built in the Mesopotamian lowlands during the Neolithic period . it is in keyhole -shaped in plan. Walls were 2m thick . Rectangular anti rooms were up to 19m long. Domed chambers up to 10m across. Walls were plasters ,occasionally painted red, Roofs were thatched .

Khirokitia
located in Cyprus -5650 BC. Round houses 3m to 8m in diameter. Lower part of the walls were made up of limestone. Dome is constructed using mud brick Some houses had double walls Stone pillars were constructed to support the lofts Outbuilding used for grinding corn, Storage, cooking and Workshops. Wall courtyard