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The Ancient World Part I:
PreHistory
Human history in the period before recorded events, known mainly through archaeological discoveries, study, research.
Time Line of Art History: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
In his famous book, "Organism," Abraham Maslow originated the idea of self-actualization within a hierarchial structure of physilogical and psychological needs. Within this structure are what Maslow calls "esteem needs." From the very beginning of time historians have made manifest evidence of man's expression of "esteem needs." Over 30,000 years ago in Chauvet France the discovery of dynamic, vibrant paintings of animals drawn on limestone cave walls stand as a testament to man's need to express his world through art.
Beauty is truth, truth beauty,
That is all ye know on earth and
All ye need to know.
-------- John Keats (1819) "Ode on a Grecian Urn"
Take the time to see the truth, to see the beauty that man has created across time and space. "Click away!"
Blackwater Draw 9500–3000 B.C.E.
North America
South America
France and Spain
Eynan/Ain Mallaha 10,000–8200 B.C.E.
The Levant Middle East
Wadi Kubbaniya ca. 17,000–15,000 B.C.E.
Egypt
Apollo 11 ca. 25,500–23,500 B.C.E. and Wonderwerk ca. 8000 B.E.C.Cave Stones
Africa
Pachmari Hills ca. 9000–3000 B.C.E.
Central India
Central Asia
Central China
Neolithic Period in China 10,000 B.C.E.
China
Jomon Culture ca. 10,500–ca. 300 B.C.E.
Japan
Ubirr ca. 40,000 B.C.E.?–present
Australia
The rock art of the Australian Aborigines represents the longest continuously practiced series of artistic traditions anywhere in the world. The site of Ubirr in Arnhem Land, northern Australia, contains one of the most impressive assemblages of Aboriginal rock painting, ranging from the earliest periods to works created within living memory
Time Line Index:
The Timeline Index : People, Periods, Places and Events in a chronological context.
NEOLITHIC : First Permanent Settlements
Readings: MacroHistory and World Report
Time is the motion of particles relative to each other. From a scientific perspective, without motion and without matter there is no time. If the material universe had a beginning, time as we know it began when the universe began. But science can postulate no such beginning.
Hunters, Gatherers, Farmers, Gods and Human Sacrifice
An examination of Stone Age humanity reveals that people lived in packs: in extended families, in clans or sometimes a grouping of clans called a tribe. They moved about, scavenging, hunting game and gathering food that grew wild. They had sticks, bone, stones and twine for tools. Strangers they came upon, or outsiders they knew, they did not necessarily see as fellow humans.
Magic and Religion
Not knowing how the world worked, Stone Age people attributed everything to
the magic of the spirits. Birds flying or hovering on an updraft of air without
falling to the ground was magic. Lightning, thunder, rain, the tides, and
procreation were magic. Fire was magic and it was spirit, for it moved itself,
and, when water was thrown upon it, it uttered a cry like a slain animal.
Agriculture and Fertility Gods
By 10,000 BCE, humans had spread into virtually all habitable places on earth. In the northern hemisphere between the years 10,000 and 8,000 the last of the continental glaciers retreated. Where the glaciers retreated, agriculture began to replace, in small steps, hunting culture. In an area called the Fertile Crescent, hunter-gatherers camped alongside fields of wild wheat or barley, and cereals. Here was also the game - such as gazelles. Soon they were planting gardens to supplement their hunting. By 7000 BCE, in hilly regions, settlements of from 50 to 100 persons emerged. There were long dry summers and rainy winters. The soil was thin but fertile. The planting of seeds had become a major source of food. People began growing grains and vegetables and raising sheep and goats, and their farming anchored them to one place. Visit the Media Museum for a great video presentations on Stone Age to Neolithic life in Scotland
In ancient times, hunter-gatherers commonly called themselves "the people." This suggests that they considered outsiders not quite people. They had no science to draw from in classifying who was human and who was not, or what was human.
Readings: Washington State University-World Cultures to 1500
This Learning Topic proposes to explore the concept of human culture. Culture is not easily defined, nor is there a consensus among scholars, philosophers and polititicians (nor, probably, among the rest of us) as to what exactly the concept should include. We hope, here, to outline some of the broad-ranging debates which have gone on about the concept of culture during the past century. Furthermore, we hope to offer some insight into what the culture debate means in our own lives and to provide some examples of how cultural meanings are formed, maintained, and changed.
Perhaps the most fundamental shift necessary for the emergence of science is the way people see themselves in relation to the physical world (nature). Originally humanity survived by gathering and hunting. While we only have hints of the way in which our remote ancestors perceived themselves and the world, we can see that in those cultures of that type that survive today, people always see themselves imbedded within the systems of nature. Nature, the places, plants, animals and the people themselves are all part of the same spiritual whole, which man can contact and influence by ritual and magic. In this world, man survives by killing, by taking life from, and sharing it with other life. It is a world perceived as mystery, and described in myth. Without doubt, our ancestors viewed themselves in much the same way.
By 12,000 years ago at the latest, human populations
had spread into most of the habitable regions of the globe, including Australia
and North and South America. With the aid of their flexible, rapidly evolving
cultures, these groups, loosely organized as small bands of "hunter-gatherers,"
were able to adapt to virtually all the climate zones and environmental niches
on the planet, from the Arctic to temperate zones (immediately above) to the
tropics. The essence of hunting and gathering economies is to exploit many
resources lightly rather than to depend heavily on only a few. Small, mobile
human populations subsist on whatever resources are available within their
territory. They adapt to conditions as they find them, using what is already
there. They hunt game--whatever kinds are available, adapting their life style
to the conditions they face. In temperate and tropic zones, hunter-gathers
exploit many different plant resources for food, fiber, medicine, soap substitutes,
etc. It is not unusual for such groups to recognize and exploit several hundred
plant species. In the Arctic and sub-Arctic, hunter gatherers are forced by
the climate to rely more on hunting to survive.
Video and Audio Presentations: Early Man
Introduction to Civilization Part 1
The timescale of human history versus the earth's age, and the relatively recent development of writing and agriculture. Note: Start at 7:47 Minutes for chronological presentation.
Introduction to Civilization Part 2
It has long been considered the most compelling question in our history: Where do human beings come from? Although life has existed for millions of years, only in the past century-and-a-half have we begun to use science to explore the ancestral roots of our own species. The search for the ultimate answer has taken a number of twists and turns, with careers made and broken along the way. APE TO MAN is the story of the quest to find the origins of the human race - a quest that spanned more than 150 years of obsessive searching
The Western Tradition: The Dawn of History
The origins of the human race are traced from anthropoid ancestors to the agricultural revolution.
Bridging World History: Annenburg Media
How did the many paths of human migration people the planet? From their origins on the African continent, humans have spread across the globe. This unit explores how and why early humans moved across Africa, Eurasia, and the Americas, based on recent studies in archaeology and linguistics
Video and Audio Presentations: Evolution of the Divine
Karen Armstrong: Myths and the Modern World: Audio NPR
As soon as people became aware of their own mortality, writes Karen Armstrong, they created stories that gave their lives meaning, explained their relationship to the spiritual world, and instructed them on how to live their lives.
The Story of God is an epic journey across continents, cultures and eras exploring religious beliefs from their earliest incarnations, through the development of today's major world faiths and the status of religious faith in a scientific age. The series examines the roots of religious beliefs in prehistoric societies and the different ways in which humanity's sense of the divine developed. It looks at the divergence between religions that worship a range of deities and those that represent strict monotheism.
Religious Tolerance. Org: Some Theories on the Origins of Religion
There are two broad groups of theories about the origin of religion. Faith based: Amongst great religious diversity, there are probably hundreds of different religious creation stories which describe how humans, other species of life, the Earth, and the rest of the universe came to be. Many of these stories describe the origins of their particular religion. It was typically a revelation from one or more deities. Science based: Anthropologists, evolutionary biologists and other researchers have reached a near consensus that humans of the species homo sapiens evolved from a species of proto-humans who originated somewhere in Africa.
Archaeologists look at ritual behavior and sacred spaces and objects in archaeological
and ethnographic settings to attribute religious meanings. Examples from present-day,
traditional societies show the complexity of spiritual life and the limits
and possibilities of archaeological reconstruction
Additional Links:
Human Prehistory: An Exhibition
Offers an overview of human evolution and prehistory with a particular emphasis on early human developments in the Old World.
A journey to where we're from and were we are going
A journey through the story of human evolution in an interactive documentary experience
The Smithsonian Institution Human Origins Program
In Search for what makes us human
A slick site produced by the French government that offers a visual tour of the famous cave art at Lascaux
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