Class 6, Social studies, Early humans, Life style and occupation of the early humans. Burial sites and archaeological sites

1. Early Human History
Paleolithic art from Lascaux, France.

2. I. The Stone Age
 Stone Age split into three distinct periods:
 Paleolithic (Old Stone) Age – roughly 2 million years ago until
12,000 B.C.E.
 Mesolithic (Middle Stone) Age – about 12,000 to 8,000 B.C.E.
 Neolithic (New Stone) Age – about 8,000 to 3,000 B.C.E.
 Life during Paleolithic age
 Simple tool use (sticks, stones of varying shapes and sizes)
 Nomads – highly mobile, moved from place to place looking for
food
 Hunter-gatherers – depended on hunting animals and collecting
foods
 Humans evolved to what we are today: Homo sapiens sapiens
 Originated about 240,000 years ago in Africa

3. I. continued…
 Life in Paleolithic Age continued…
 Population growth was slow – hunter-gatherer way of life cannot
support large groups
 Late Paleolithic – development of culture
 A people’s unique way of life – helps explain the environment and rules
for social behavior
 Development of complex languages and speech
 Entire world is populated by end of Paleolithic Age
 Developments in the Mesolithic Age
 Last great Ice Age ends, living conditions improve for most of the
Northern Hemisphere
 Human progress accelerates – tools, weapons become more
sophisticated
 Food storage, animal domestication (taming) begins
 Population growth accelerated

4. II. Neolithic Revolution
 Between 10,000 and 12,000 years ago, agriculture
(farming) began
 This is called the Neolithic (or Agricultural) Revolution
 Took thousands of years to spread from Middle East (Fertile
Crescent) to rest of world
 Many groups began by practicing an early agriculture technique
called slash-and-burn farming:
 Cut and burned vegetation to clear a field – allowed to grow back
after a year or two, once farmers have moved on
 Further domestication of animals – horses, dogs, goats, pigs,
sheep, camels

5. II. Continued…
 Neolithic Revolution paves way for permanent
settlements
 Agriculture allowed larger groups to live in one place
 Catal Huyuk
 A Neolithic Age village, founded about 7,000 B.C.E. in modern-
day Turkey
 Population was in the thousands
 Specialized workers and cultural life flourished
 Drawbacks: natural disasters, diseases, warfare were common
problems or people live closely together
 Neolithic Revolution comic

6. III. Civilization
 Permanent settlements, like Catal Huyuk, led to
emergence of civilization
 Societies that rely on agriculture, produce food surpluses
 Have formal political organization
 Characterized by groups of non-farming elites, merchant and
manufacturing groups, specialized workers
 Development of writing
 Essential to civilization for communication, record keeping,
establishment of law and order
 Cuneiform – first system of writing, emerged in Middle East
around 3500 B.C.E.

7. IV. End of Stone Age
 Bronze Age
 Emergence of civilizations also brought about the end of the
Stone Age
 Bronze Age – began around 3000 B.C.E. with the widespread
use of bronze (type of metal) tools

8. Key Vocabulary – Chapter 1 (Part 1)
 Paleolithic (Old Stone) Age
 Homo sapiens sapiens
 Neolithic (New Stone) Age
 Neolithic Revolution
 Hunting and gathering
 Bronze Age
 Slash and burn agriculture
 Bands
 Catal Huyuk
 Civilization
 Cuneiform
 Nomads