What is History?
From PRE-history to
CIVILIZATION
PERIOD ONE
APWH
8000 BCE-600 CE
First Peoples; First Farmers
Key Concept 1.1. Big Geography and the Peopling of the Earth
The term Big Geography draws attention to the global nature of world history. Throughout the
Paleolithic period, humans migrated from Africa to Eurasia, Australia, and the Americas. Early
humans were mobile and creative in adapting to different geographical settings from savanna
to desert to Ice Age tundra. By making an analogy with modern hunterforager societies,
anthropologists infer that these bands were relatively egalitarian. Humans also developed
varied and sophisticated technologies.
What key points should we take from this
key concept?
Nomads: Follow the Food
Foraging Societies

Foraging is hunting and gathering
 Small

groups nomadic groups that follow food
At the mercy of nature
 Natural

phenomena could endanger entire communities
Few possessions
Pastoral Societies





Domestication of animals
Mostly in mountain regions and in areas that could
not support crops.
Supplemented with small scale agriculture
Mostly egalitarian
Concept of extended family
Pastoral cont.


Social class based on size of herd
Few possessions
Key Dates
• 250,000 BP - Physical modernity
• 100,000 BP - Out of Africa
• 10,000 BP – end of Ice Age
• 10,000 BP – farming
Neolithic Revolution
Agricultural Revolution
8,000 – 3,500 B.C.E.
Neolithic (New Stone Age)
Paleolithic
Mesolithic
Neolithic
Early Stone Age
Late Stone Age
Middle Stone Age
Gathering hunting peoples = hunting foraging bands
AP Term!
How did we go from fewer than 10,000 individuals
100,000 years ago to… LINK today?
The Last Ice Age
100,000 – 10,000
Years ago
In Africa (250,00 – 100,000 BP)
• Adapt to range of environments
How did people
survive before
hunting and
fishing?
• Tools – stone, bone, hand axes
• Hunting and fishing
• Seasonal settlements
What is the
advantage of
moving around?
• Exchange of ideas/goods – 200 miles
• Symbolic behavior - Body ornaments
and burials
And then they
started to leave
Africa…
100,000
40,000
•
•
•
•
Hunting
Clothing
Storage
Venus Figurines
• Bone needles – layered
doting
• Spears, bow and arrow
• Cave paintings
60,000
30,00015,000
•
•
•
•
Bering Strait or West Coast?
Large animals * environmental
Clovis point
Diversification after ice age
Development of weaponry
Animal-skin disguises
Stampeding tactics
Lighting of fires, etc. to drive game into kill zones
•
•
•
•
•
•
3,500
years ago
From Philippines and New Guinea
Ocean going canoes
Brought domesticated plants/animals
Stratified
Extinction of animals – flightless birds – moa
Stratified society - Chiefdom
Paleolithic Societies
Small (20-50) kinship
Egalitarian – no permanent leaders, wealth (insulting the
Social Organization meat), skill set, women and men (70%-30%)
1. How did a gathering and hunting society
impact the accumulation of surplus?
Agricultural
More free time – work less than Neolithic societies
Manipulate environment – fire (eucalyptus trees) large animals
gone (mammoth
flightless
birds) Otherwithin
hominids a
(Flores man,
would
this
impact
equality
Neanderthal)
2. How
society?
Religious
COT
No full time religious leaders, rock art Lascaux, feminine
mystique , animistic – animal, rock, tree spirits
25,000 smaller tools Africa
10,000 climate warms, more plants, settling = stored and
accumulated goods , less egalitarian – some more talented or
lucky
1,200-4,000 more tools, specialized tools – bow & arrow,
pottery, canoes, paddles, more elaborate burial sites
Agricultural Development
Settling Down: Neolithic Revolution
(Not an actual fight or lunge for power)…
Agricultural Revolution
=
Neolithic Revolution
Cultivation of plants and domestication of animals
• People don’t use what they find in nature, they
change nature to get what they need
Occurred separately and independently
See page 28-29
Agricultural Societies




Neolithic Revolution=Agricultural revolution
Neolithic revolution when people began
congregating and forming small villages
Relied more on environment (soil and water)
More sense of unity with sustained cultural
interactions
Agricultural Soc. Cont.


Idea of ownership of property
Food surplus=specialization of labor
 Irrigation

lead to even greater surplus
Civilizations emerge
Impact of Agriculture on Environment





Farming villages changed environment by rerouting
water, clearing land, and building cities
Land and resources reconfigured to fit needs of
growing civilization
Animals used for both food and labor
Metallurgy= reliable tools and weapons
Latter part of Neolithic revolution=Bronze Age
Hunting and
Foraging
Agriculture
Complex
Societies
Questions
Refer to pages 28-29
Which agricultural center did not spread agricultural
knowledge much beyond its core region?
Where would you have expected this region to
spread its use of agriculture?
Chiefdom vs. Stateless Societies
Chiefdom
Stateless
Inherited power
Control by gifts, charisma
Priests organize projects
Tribute collections –
specialization
• Polynesian, N America
• Gender equality
• Specialization – little
inequality
• Group decision making
through lineage
• Some social stratificationbut not inherited
• Çatalhöyük, Turkey, Tiv,
Nigeria
•
•
•
•
Core and Foundational Civilizations
Mesopotamia
Shang
Olmecs
Nile River Valley
Indus River
Valley
Norte Chico
Independent, global, 3,500 B.C.E. – 1000 B.C.E.
• The Code of Hammurabi
• Established high standards of
behavior and stern punishment for
violators
– lex talionis – “law of retaliation”
– Social status and punishment
– women as property, but some rights
Cultural Hearths – centers of innovation, where
key cultural traits develop and influence
surrounding areas (writing, metullargy, astronomy,
long-distance trade, math, specialization of labor,
and formal governments )
Writing
5000 years ago
Mesopotamia and
Egypt
Cuneiform and
Hieroglyphics