1. The first peoples TO 10,000 BCE
Take Notes –Era 1: Key Concept 1.1. Write down Yellow Text.
The first peoples

2. Quick note on dates BCE and CE Eurocentric thinking BC and AD
Muslim calendar marks year 1 in 622 CE with Muhammad’s emigration to Medina
China: dates by emperor reign

3. Objectives: What you should learn
The spread of human societies in the Paleolithic era
The conditions of life in gathering and hunting societies.
The factors that led to change in gathering and hunting societies.

4. Paleolithic – Old Stone Age. (250,000 BCE - 10,000 BCE)
Hazda Tribe (Tanzania)
Hunter-Gatherer way of life was Universal Human existence until 10,000 years ago.
95% of human history
Food collection
Paleolithic – Old Stone Age. (250,000 BCE - 10,000 BCE)

5. Wrong to ignore 200K years of human experience.
Archaeology reveals
Settled planet
Created earliest societies
First to reflect on the issues of life and death.
The Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc Cave – 33K years ago. Southern France

6. 250K years ago Homo sapiens emerged-> E. and S. Africa
Culture over biology shaping human behavior
Moved to new environments

7. Technological innovation – tools of stone and bone
Hunting-fishing instead of scavenging
Adapted to environments

8. Earliest Europeans left cave paintings
Myriad of speculative meanings:
“hunting magic”
Religion ?
1700 BCE
26K BCE
Venus of Willendorf – 28,000 BCE (Austria)

9. New technologies upon reaching Ukraine/Russia
To adapt to colder climate
Needles, multilayered clothing, pottery.
Homes made of mammoth remains
Semipermanent settlement suggested.

10. Into Australia 60K BCE from Indonesia
Boats
Sparse
Still hunting and gathering
Complex worldview.
Dreamtime, ancestral beings, natural order an echo of the past, current people are related to the past

11. Into the Americas 30K-15k years ago
Land bridge?
Clovis people
Hunted mammoths/bison
Disappeared with large mammal extinction (10,900 years ago)
3,500ya – into the Pacific.
Took agriculture
Organized societies
Huge environmental impact.

12. First Human Societies Small, 25-50 people, kinship
Low population density
Paleolithic bands – seasonally mobile/nomadic
Patterned movement – food
No accumulation of goods

13. First Human Societies Highly Egalitarian Clear rules
Perhaps most free in human existence.
No kings, bureaucrats, soldiers, priests
No specialists
Male and female tasks differ
Male /female relationships more equal (women gather 70% of food)
Described as tranquil and socially equal by James Cook
Clear rules
About distribution of meat , incest and ancestry

14. First Human Societies Economy and environment Worked less, need little
Low life expectancy (35)
Set deliberate fires (to aid in hunting/foraging, protection, adaptation to cold)
Extinction of large animals
Extinction of other hominids
12K ya, Honshu

15. First Human Societies Spiritual realm Rich ceremonial life
Difficult to decipher.
Lack of written source
Art is subject to interpretation
Contemporary may not accurately reflect ancient exp.
Rich ceremonial life
Part-time shamans
Variety of beliefs
Animism – plants, animals, other things have spiritual essence.

16. Settling down Last Ice Age ends 16K-10K ya
Warming period follows
Neolithic Revolution (farming)
Settlement -> societal change -> large/complex societies ->storage and accumulation of goods -> inequality
12K-4K ya
Major turn in human history.
Catal Huyuk