1. Prehistory
An Overview

2. The prehistoric period
c. 4.5 MYA-3700 BCE
Major accomplishments
Tool manufacture and use
Communication
Verbal
Written?
Domestication of animals
And plants?
Finally: agriculture
The “First Wave”

3. The Paleolithic period
“old stone age”
c. 500,000 BCE - c BCE
Basic features
Hunting and gathering
Remarkable art (and religion?)
Simple tools of chipped stone
Simple shelters
Fire
c. 150,000 BCE?
Language

4. The Neolithic period Began in Middle East around 6000 BCE
to c BCE
Basic features
Food production
Polished stone tools
and weapons?
More settled, less nomadic lifestyles
“permanent” villages
Population increases
Development of a more complex (and satisfying?) social order

5. Human evolution

6. The Australopithecines
“Lucy”

7. Homo habilis
“Handy Man”

8. Homo erectus

9. The mysterious Neanderthal
The subject of one of prehistory’s most intriguing questions

10. Eating
Who was the more productive?
The hunter?
Or the gatherer?

11. c
The peripatetic life

12. Extraordinary art!

13. Cave art (cont.)
What general theme is evident here?

14. Cave artists

15. Paleolithic religion?

16. Homo faber Early stone tools C. A. B. A. Homo habilis B. Homo erectus
C. Neanderthal C. A. B.

17. The Fertile Crescent
shaduf

18. Farming

19. Settling down
Prerequisite to civilization

20. Jericho
Jordan River valley
c BCE

21. Catal Hüyük
Modern Turkey
c BCE

22. Catal Hüyük (cont.)

23. The first writing?

24. Neolithic religious life