Name _________________________________ Date _____________________ Period _______
Unit 1 Notes Packet: Archaeology and Prehistory
Directions: Please record class notes using this packet
as your guide. We will be discussing the following
topics in class over the next few days. Be sure to record
complete notes as this packet will be a great study
resource.
Chapter 1 Section 4: Legends (p. 22-24)
Lesson Essential Question 1 – How have legends been important to the study of
history?
A. What are legends? Legends are folktales that help explain the past.
B. Scientists who study the origin and development of humans are called
Anthropologists.
C. What does an archeologist study? Archeologists study the remains of
past human life.
Chapter 1 Section 5: Archeology (p. 25-28, 30)
Lesson Essential Question 2 – What is archaeology?
A. What is archeology? Archaeology is the study of remains of past human
life and cultures.
B. When did the study of archaeology begin? The study of archaeology
started about 500 years ago.
C. What did scientists discover from the study of artifacts?
They found out how people lived a long time ago.
D. What are artifacts?
1. Artifacts do not have to be works of art.
2. They can be anything made by people such as weapons, tools, or
pottery.
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3. The earliest artifacts are pieces of hard rock that were chipped into
cutting or digging tools or into weapons.
Archaeological Finds (p. 26-27)
E. What were some of the major archaeological finds in the 1700s? What
were the results of each of these finds?
1. Herculaneum and Pompeii – From the houses, theaters, streets, and
temples discovered, archeologists were able to learn how the
ancient Romans lived.
2. Rosetta Stone – A slab of stone on which are carved ancient
Egyptian picture writing and its Greek translation. Although
scientists knew ancient Greek, they had not been able to decipher,
or explain the meaning, of ancient Egyptian language.
3. Between 1850 and 1950 – Archaeologists discovered five lost
civilizations.
4. 1988 – They discovered the oldest known piece of cloth.
Dating Archaeological Remains (p 27-30)
Lesson Essential Question 3 – How do archaeologists date their finds?
F. What does excavate mean? Excavate means to dig into the earth to
uncover the remains of the past.
G. What do archaeologists do after they discover remains? They have to
date, or find the age, of the remains.
H. What were the three time periods, or ages that Christian J. Thomsen
created?
1. Stone Age
2. Bronze Age
3. Iron Age
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I. What were the ages based on? These ages were based on the material
people used for making tools and weapons.
J. What two periods did archaeologists later divide human history into?
1. Food gatherers
2. Food producers
K. How did scientist date archaeological finds?
1. At first, scientists used trees. Each year, trees form a new growth
ring. Scientists counted the number of rings in a wooden object,
and compared them to a wooden object they knew.
2. After 1946 – an American scientist named Willard Frank Libby
discovered that all things contain a radioactive element called
carbon 14. After plants, animals, and people die, the carbon 14
slowly disappears. By measuring how much carbon 14 an object
has, scientist can figure how old the object is.
Chapter 2: Prehistoric Peoples (p. 33-46)
Chapter Focus
Why It’s Important (p. 33)
L. What is prehistory? When did prehistory end? Prehistory is the period
of time before the invention of writing. It lasted until about 5,000 years
ago.
Section 1: Paleolithic Age (p. 33-40)
M. What have scientists discovered about early human beings?
1. how they lived
2. what discoveries were made
3. why they moved out of Africa to other parts of the world
N. Where do scientists believe people lived until about 1.75 million years
ago? The lived only on the grasslands of eastern and southern Africa.
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O. What happened to the earth’s climate?
1. The earth’s climate became colder.
2. Ocean water froze into huge glaciers and spread out from the
North and South poles.
3. The sea level fell and uncovered land that had been under water.
4. Land bridges then connected Africa to both southern Europe and
southwestern Asia.
P. What did people with the land bridges? People began to migrate, or
make their way, across the land bridges.
Q. What did scientists call the first age? They called it the Paleolithic Age,
or Old Stone Age.
R. How did people make their living during the Paleolithic Age? They got
their food by hunting and gathering.
Lesson Essential Question 4 – How did tools, language, clothing, and the
discovery of fire help early people advance?
Obtaining Food (p. 34-35)
S. What type of groups did Paleolithic people live in? They lived in small
bands, or groups.
T. How large were bands of Paleolithic people?
1. They usually had about 30 members.
2. When the food supply was good, the bands grew to about 40-50.
U. How long did Paleolithic people live?
1. Most group members lived to be no more than 20 to 25 years old.
2. More than half of the children died from illnesses or were killed by
animals before their first birthdays.
V. How did living in bands help people survive?
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1. People living in bands lived and worked together and shared their
food.
2. They fed and cared for people who became injured and sick.
W. What were some of the features of a band’s home territory?
1. Define home territory – An area where hunters and gatherers lived.
2. They usually covered about two square miles for every band
member.
3. There were campsites at various places throughout the home
territory.
4. The band stayed at a campsite until the availability food supply
was used up and then moved.
X. What was the role of women and children?
1. Women and children gathered berries, nuts, fruit, and eggs out of
bird and turtle nests.
2. They poked sticks into bee nests to get honey and into the ground
to dig roots.
Y. What was the role of men?
1. Men obtained the meat.
2. They caught fish using their bare hands and hunted small animals
with sticks and stones.
3. Occasionally, they were able to kill a large animal that was too
young, too old, or too hurt to run away.
4. A good kill meant that the group would have enough meat to last
for several days.
Making Tools (p. 35-36)
Z. What were tools like?
1. At first, they used sticks and stones they found on the ground.
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2. Soon they learned to shape stones to make them more useful.
3. Later, people learned to knock long, sharp-edged chips, called
flakes, from stones and use them a tools.
Making Fire (p. 36)
AA. How did people of the Paleolithic Age learn about fire?
1. The first fires were made by nature, such as those started by
lightning.
2. Eventually, people discovered how to make fire themselves.
3. They created sparks by rubbing two sticks or stones together, or
rapidly turning a stick in a hole in a dry log.
BB. What were the uses of fire?
1. People used fire to keep themselves warm and dry.
2. They used it as a weapon, throwing burning sticks of wood at
animals to drive them away.
3. Sometimes they would use fire to drive big animals into mudholes,
the animals would sink and people could kill them.
4. People used fire to clear out brush and undergrowth.
5. Finally, people began to use fire to cook food.
Seeking Shelter (p. 36)
DD. How did early people obtain shelter?
1. Early people usually camped out in the open.
2. They protected themselves from the wind by digging pits in the
ground or crouching in dry river beds, or they took shelter under an
overhanging rock or piled up brush.
3. At first, caves were used in emergencies, but by 100,000 years ago,
people in some places were living in caves most of the time.
Making Clothing (p. 36-37)
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Name _________________________________ Date _____________________ Period _______
EE. How did early people use animal skins?
1. Hunters found large animals could be used for protection and warmth.
2. They scraped the animal skins clean and laid them in the sun to dry.
3. Later, people discovered that pounding fat into the skin while it was
drying would make it softer.
4. At first, people wrapped the skins around themselves.
5. Later, they learned how to fasten the skins together.
FF. What difference did clothing make as to where early people lived?
1. Before they had clothing, most people stayed in areas that were
warm and dry.
2. Once they had clothing to protect them, they were able to move
into areas that were cooler and wetter.
Developing Language (p. 37)
GG. How did early people communicate before talking? Early people
simply made sounds or pointed to objects to express meaning. Hand
signals were also probably used.
Lesson Essential Question 5 – What were Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons like?
The Neanderthals (p. 37-38)
HH. What was the first kind of Homo sapiens? Neanderthals
II. Describe Neanderthals.
1. Neanderthals were good hunters.
2. They used traps to catch birds and small animals.
3. They used pitfalls to catch large animals like the rhinoceros and
elephant.
4. Neanderthals were also builders.
5. They improved cave dwellings by digging drainage ditches in
caves and designing rock protection for entrances.
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6. According to experts, Neanderthals were also the first people to
bury their dead.
The Cro-Magnons (p. 39-40)
JJ. What was the second kind of Homo sapiens? Cro-Magnons
KK. Describe Cro-Magnons.
1. Archeologists consider Cro-Magnons the first modern human
beings.
2. Cro-Magnons were very skillful toolmakers.
3. They invented the burin, which resembles a chisel.
4. Using the burin, people could make other tools and objects from
antler, bone, ivory, and shell, as well as wood and stone.
5. Using new tools made Cro-Magnons better hunters, thus increasing
their food supply.
6. Points of antler or bone fastened to the end of wooden sticks could
penetrate the hides of larger animals.
7. People fashioned antler and bone into spear throwers, or devices
that made spears fly through the air faster and farther.
8. This allowed hunters to stay a greater distance from animals,
making hunting less dangerous.
9. Another important tool that Cro-Magnons invented was the axe,
which was used to cut down trees and hollow out the logs to make
canoes.
10. Cro-Magnons made bone, ivory, and shell into body ornaments,
such as necklaces and rings.
11. They decorated clothing with bone or ivory beads.
12. They played music on flutes carved from long, hollow bones.
13. Cro-Magnons were artists as well as toolmakers.
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14. They carved statues out of ivory and bone or molded them out of
clay, and covered the walls of some caves with pictures painted
brightly out of mineral paints.
15. Cro-Magnons bands cooperated, often hunting large animals
together.
Section 2: The Neolithic Age (p. 41-46)
Lesson Essential Question 6 – How did people change from food gatherers to
food producers?
LL.
How did people change in the Neolithic Age? People changed from
food gatherers and food producers.
Farmers and Herders (p. 41-42)
MM. What were two important discoveries of the Neolithic Revolution?
1. One important discovery was learning to grow food.
2. The other was learning to herd animals.
NN. How do experts believe people learned how to grow food? Experts
believe the people discovered that seed from wild grains, such as wheat
and barley, could be planted and harvested. This probably came from
when they noticed that new shoots had grown from spilled grain.
OO. How do experts believe people learned how to herd animals? People
learned they could herd animals when a hunting band built fences to
enclose a herd of wild animals they had chased into a ravine. The
hunters killed one animal at a time, saving the rest for later.
PP. Over time, what happened to the animals that were captured? They
began to lose their fear of people and became domesticated.
QQ. Define domestication – The taming of an animal.
RR. What did early people begin using animals such as donkeys, camels,
and llamas for? People began to use certain animals as pack animals.
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SS. What two things happened during the Neolithic Revolution when food
supplies increased?
1. With more food available, the population grew.
2. People also began to live longer.
Early Villages (p. 42-43)
TT.
What happened as people began to produce food? Once people began
to produce food, they were able to settle in one place.
UU. What were some of the earliest known villages?
1. Jericho (southwestern Asia)
2. Abu Hureyra (Syria)
3. Catal Hüyük
VV. What have archeologists discovered about Catal Hüyük?
1. The houses in Catal Hüyük were made of sun-dried mud brick.
2. They had flat roofs made of reeds plastered over with mud.
3. As protection, the houses in the village had two or three rooms and
no doors.
4. People went in and out of the houses through a hole in the roof by
using a ladder.
5. The floors were covered with rushes, or grasslike plants, and
sleeping platforms were covered with mats.
Lesson Essential Question 7 – Why were specialization, government, and religion
important to Neolithic societies?
Specialization (p. 45)
WW. Define specialization – Specialization was the development of
occupations or jobs.
XX. Why did specialization develop? Fewer people were needed to
produce food so they began to do jobs that had nothing to do with food.
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Name _________________________________ Date _____________________ Period _______
YY.
What were some examples of specialization?
1. Potters
2. Weavers
3. Metal workers
ZZ.
What were some of other developments that helped specialization?
1. People learned to make pottery by baking clay.
2. People learned to weave cloth.
3. People learned to work with metals
Government (p. 45)
A. How was government different during Neolithic times? It was more
complex due to land ownership. People began to protect the land that
they owned.
B. How did Neolithic villages keep order? A single chief was chosen.
Religion (p. 45-46)
C. What do experts believe that most chiefs did? Most chiefs were also
priests.
D. What did priests do? They handled religious duties for the village, which
included offering prayers for things people needed, such as rich soil,
healthy animals, and water for crops.
E. How did religion change over time?
1. At first, Neolithic people prayed to the forces of nature that they
saw around them.
2. After a time, they created gods and goddesses to represent these
forces.
3. The most important goddess was Earth Mother, the goddess of
fertility.
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Name _________________________________ Date _____________________ Period _______
4. Archeologists believe that more elaborate religious customs and
ceremonies appeared at this time.
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