History/Origins/Future of Energy, Matter, Space, Time, and Life (4 of 5)
Dan Fake
Matter, Space, Time, and Life (4 of 5)
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From ~40,000 Years Ago
to ~4,000 Years Ago
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Years Ago
Event
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~40,000 .........
Aurignacian tools were used from 40,000 to 30,000
years ago. Diverse tools characteristic of modern
humans, dominated by blades flaked from prepared
cores, use of ivory, bone and antler as raw material,
in addition to stone:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/apeman/fact_file/culture/stone_tools/index_p.shtml
~37,000 .........
Baradostian cultures as revealed in Kebara
(layer D) in Israel and Zarzi, Iraq.
~36,000 .........
Chatelperronian tools were used from 36,000 to
27,000 years ago. An advanced Neanderthal
technology, perhaps influenced by the technology
of modern humans living in the same area:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/apeman/fact_file/culture/stone_tools/index_p.shtml
~35,000 .........
Cave bears, cave lions, wooly rhino extinct; Homo
sapiens migrate in large numbers to Europe; first
evidence of round huts and mortars in Ain Gev,
Israel.
~34,000 .........
Modern human site, in Malaya Siya, Russia.
~32,000 .........
Period of cave art traditions commence in Europe,
lasting for 18,000 years:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/apeman/fact_file/culture/cave_art/index_p.shtml
Anatomically modern humans in Okinawa (Japan).
~30,000 .........
Toolmaking technologies become increasingly
diverse and refined. A horse carved from the ivory of
a mammoth's tusk is the oldest known animal carving,
and dates from around 30,000 years ago.
~28,000 .........
Research on bones found in a cave in Croatia supports
theory of some mating between Neanderthals and Homo
Sapiens (October 26, 1999):
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F486000/486041.stm
There wasn't much, if any mixture, between Neanderthals
and modern humans (March 29, 2000):
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_694000/694467.stm
~25,000 .........
Bow and arrow.
European cave paintings over 25,000 years ago
provide evidence of a complex and modern society
(February 22, 2000):
http://news6.thdo.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F650000/650095.stm
~24,000 .........
Engraving on portable objects tend to depict a broad
representation of nature, including animals not seen in
cave art, and also plants. They may therefore have
served some altogether different purpose. Most famous
of these portable artifacts are the Venus figurines, which
first appear around 24,000 years ago. All of the hundreds
which have been found are strikingly similar depictions
of a female human body, with exaggerated breasts and
buttocks, and an abstract, almost non-existent, head.
Suspicion via skeleton of a 4-year old boy in Portugal
which had some features of Neanderthals and modern
humans indicates some inter-species mating may have
occurred between Homo sapiens and Neanderthals
(April 21, 1999):
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F323000/323657.stm
This skeleton dated at 24,500 years per reference to the
skeleton (October 26, 1999) at
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F486000/486041.stm
~22,000 .........
The brief Solutrean period (22,000 to 19,000 years ago)
of toolmaking introduced very elegant tool designs made
possible by heating and suddenly cooling flint stones to
shatter them in carefully controlled ways:
http://www.handprint.com/LS/ANC/stones.html
~20,000 .........
Earliest settlement of northeast Asia.
~19,000 .........
Wild cereal gathering - western Asia.
Pleistocene scenario / environment ~19,000
years ago:
http://www.amnh.org/Exhibition/Fossil_Halls/Timelines/pleistocene.html
~18,000 .........
View of the earth at the last glacial maximum:
http://www.scotese.com/lastice.htm
Height of the last glaciation, reaching deep into North
America; sea levels are 100 to 130 meters lower than
today.
The Magdalenian period (18,000 to 12,000 years ago)
of toolmaking saw the increased use of very small
flaked stones for arrows and spears, multibarbed
harpoon points, and spear throwers made of wood,
bone or antler.
During this period a new tool appears -- symbolic
representation, as in cave paintings from Chauvet --
and with it human culture as a realm of shared
representation and visualization, rather than solely
of shared technical process:
http://www.handprint.com/LS/ANC/stones.html
~15,000 .........
Fish hooks; huts made of mammoth bones;
beginning of widespread colonization of North
America.
~14,000 .........
Jomon hunter-gatherers make the first pottery
in Japan.
~13,000 .........
Rope; beginning of widespread colonization of
South America; ice sheet from most recent ice age
begins to retreat northward.
The first farmers grew wheat and rye 13,000 years
ago in Syria and were forced into cultivating crops
by a terrible drought (October 28, 1999):
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F489000/489449.stm
~12,000 .........
Saber-toothed tiger extinct; end of most recent
ice age; ice land bridge connecting Asia to North
America melted/inundated by water.
For voluminous details on human civilizations,
philosophies, and changing religions used in much
of the material in this post and in post 5 of 5, for
~12,000 to ~3,000 years ago, refer to Antiquity
Online:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/index.html
~11,000 .........
Extinction of mammoth, perhaps due to
overhunting; farming widespread and sun-dried
mud bricks used - western Asia; incipient
agriculture (cultivation of wild cereals) begins
in the Fertile Crescent (Middle East).
~10,500 .........
Goats domesticated from bezoar goats in the
Near East; high altitude Andean grasses of South
America were initially cultivated into crops of
quinoa, arwi, and canihua, along with squash,
peppers, and beans in the area of Ayacucho,
Peru.
~10,000 .........
Walled towns; organized agriculture; domesticated
animals; people of Jericho decorated human skulls
for use in religious rituals; sheep domesticated from
Asiatic moufflon in the Near East; manos and metates
(grinding stones) used for milling grain provide
evidence of the domestication of food plants in
Mexico and Peru.
Earliest evidence of pottery in southern China.
~9,500 ..........
Pigs domesticated from wild boars in the Near East.
~9,000 ..........
Main crafts in Catal Huyuk, Turkey - pottery and
obsidian tools; main craft in Jarmo, Iraq - textiles;
stone spade first used - China; animal carvings
made in bone, antler, and amber - Denmark and
southern Sweden.
Cattle domesticated from aurochs and cats
domesticated from wild cats in the Near East.
Earliest evidence of pottery in the central Sahara
and in Persia.
~8,500 ..........
Evidence people learned how to extract metals
from rock.
~8,300 ..........
Potatoes, manioc, oca, and ulloco all domesticated
in South America; rice cultivation in the Yangtze
valley, China.
~8,000 ..........
Earliest European agriculturists settled in farming
villages on the plains of Thessaly and Crete; crops
of millet raised on terraces of river valleys and
chickens domesticated from red jungle fowl in
China; crops developed on Indus river plain.
Wheat and barley cultivation introduced into the Nile
Valley from West Asia 8,000 years ago (6000 BCE):
http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/egypt.html
Earliest evidence for farming in the Indian sub-
continent.
Several cultures leave evidence of their existence
in Iran.
Earliest evidence of pottery in east Africa.
~7,000 ..........
First ziggurats built - Sumer; rice first cultivated
in China; copper and irrigation used in Mesopotamia;
llama domesticated from guanaco in the Andes; the
wild grass teosinte was gradually modified by
selection of bigger ears of corn until it was at
this time recognized as a domesticated type of
maize (corn) in Mesoamerica; metal objects made
by hammering, pure gold and copper, produced in
the Balkans.
~6,600 ..........
In Europe, copper had been picked from the ground
and used as jewelry. The Europeans shaped the copper
by pounding it cold. Then someone discovered that
heating copper made it more malleable. Working with
metals had begun in southeastern Europe as early as
around 6,600 years ago (4600 BCE) -- almost a thousand
years before it reached Asia Minor:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch07.htm
~6,500 ..........
Southeast Europe becomes an important center of
gold and copper-working; farming begins around
Ganges river in India; cave art flourishes in
northern Africa; first megalithic tombs in Britain
and Portugal and passage graves in France; farming
adopted in western Europe and within 1,000 years,
larger areas of forest had been cleared.
~6,400 ..........
Horses domesticated from tarpans in southern
Russia.
~6,000 ..........
Large-scale settlement of fertile Indus river plain;
pyramid temples in Peru; donkeys domesticated
from wild asses in the Near East.
It was around this time that a people called Sumerians
moved into Mesopotamia, perhaps from around the
Caspian Sea. And the Sumerians found among the
Ubaidians a people who spoke a Semitic language
who had moved in among the Ubaidians. Within
200 years, the Sumerians supplanted the Ubaidians
and Semites and established a civilization lasting
until 4,400 years ago.
Sumerians begin use of clay tablets to keep records.
They built better canals for irrigating crops and for
transporting crops by boat to village centers. They
improved their roads, over which their donkeys
trod, some of their donkeys pulling wheeled carts.
And the Sumerians grew in number, the increase in
population the key element in creating what we call
civilization -- a word derived from an ancient word
for city.
At least twelve cities arose among the Sumerians.
Among them were Ur, Uruk, Kish and Lagash -- Ur,
for example, becoming a city of about 24,000 people.
In the center of each city was a temple that housed
the city's gods, and around each city were fields
of grain, orchards of date palms, and land for
herding:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch01.htm
In northwest China, the Yangshao people produce
painted pottery and live in settlements that are
partially underground; in east and northeast China,
the Longshan produce jade carvings and black
pottery and practice divination by a practice
called scapulimancy.
Earliest evidence of pottery in the Americas, north
of the Amazon in South America (Guyana).
~5,500 ..........
Cities and city-states distinguished by size,
planning, architecture, and fortifications first
appeared in Egypt and Mesopotamia; sailing
boats used on the Nile in Egypt; earliest
Chinese city founded, Liang-ch'eng-chen.
From sometime around 5,500 years ago (3500
BCE) the Egyptians began building a system
of dikes and sluices, and around this time
Egypt began growing food in greater abundance
than elsewhere in Africa. The construction
would continue for more than a millennium
so that by 4,000 years ago (2000 BCE) both
sides of the Nile would be a checkerboard
of water basins, sluices and canals, with
water being drawn from basins upstream
whenever water was insufficient downstream:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch02.htm
Evidence of plows and pottery in Britain.
~5,250 ..........
Development of cuneiform in Mesopotamia.
~5,200 ..........
People of Britain and northwestern France start
erecting stone monuments and henges - circular
ditch and bank enclosures - a practice which
continues for 1,700 years.
~5,100 ..........
First Egyptian dynasty founded by King Narmer,
a local chieftan, uniting Upper and Lower Egypt
5,100 years ago (3100 BCE):
http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/egypt.html
The Egyptian civilization lasted for 2,385 years.
~5,000 ..........
24 hour day devised in Babylon; hieroglyphic
script developed in Egypt; camels domesticated
from wild camels in south central Asia and southern
Arabia;
An advanced Longshun culture migrates from
eastern China westward, using burial practices
showing signs of a hierarchy which becomes
widespread.
Permanent settlements of 5 to 10 houses established
in the Tehaucan Valley in Mexico.
~4,800 ..........
Sumerians at war (pike and shield carrying army of
King Eannatum of Lagash tramples on the defeated
of the city of Umma):
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/sumer.htm
~4,600 ..........
Clay female figurines, temple platforms, and
shrines in various places on the central coast
of Peru.
Rise of Indus Valley civilization in Pakistan
& Northwest India, said civilization lasting for
~800 years:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch05.htm
Map of India up to 2,500 years ago (500 BCE):
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/map06ind.htm
~4,500 ..........
It becomes common to alloy copper with tin to
produce bronze, initiating the Bronze Age; Sahara
region begins to dry out; complex ceremonial
centers, small towns built of mud brick and
stone, sunken courts, ritual pits, ceremonial
centers, and irrigable river valleys on the
Peruvian coast.
Pyramids of Giza built - Egyptian pyramid
construction took place over a period of
about 500 years starting 4,700 years ago,
with the Great Pyramid being built during
the reign of Pharoah Cheops 4,550 to
4,528 years ago (2550 to 2528 BCE):
http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/egypt.html
Map of Mesopotamia up to 4,500 years ago
(2500 BCE):
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/map01mes.htm
Map of Africa from 4,500 to 3,500 years ago
(2500 to 1500 BCE):
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/map02af.htm
~4,400 ..........
In Mesopotamia, just north of the Sumerians, a Semitic
people had settled. And pushing on the Sumerians,
a dynasty of Semitic kings came to rule the city of Kish.
There, around 4,400 years ago (2400 BCE), a former
cup-bearer to one of these kings overthrew the ruling
dynasty. With good military tactics that included
holding and fighting from high ground, he extended
his rule. He defeated the Sumerian king of Nippur,
where the Sumerian god Enlil was believed to dwell.
He claimed that his victories were given to him by
Enlil. And he became known as Sargon the Great:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch03.htm
Map of Sargon's empire:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/map03sar.htm
~4,350 ..........
Rise of Akkadian civilization in Mesopotamia,
said civilization lasting for 120 years.
~4,300 ..........
Between 4,300 and 4,000 years ago (2300 and 2000
BCE), Indo-Europeans moved south into Greece,
and in the southern portion of Greece they conquered
and made themselves an aristocracy over those who
had migrated there many centuries before. These
latest migrants are known as the Mycenae Greeks,
who had gods similar to other Indo-Europeans,
including a father god of the sky called Zeus, whom
they believed held power over the entire world:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch07.htm
Map of the Aegean region, up to 2,300 years ago
(300 BCE):
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/map11ae.htm
~4,200 ..........
Rise of Minoan civilization in Crete, said
civilization lasting for 750 years.
Where people were producing more food than
they needed to survive, warriors had the incentive
not only to plunder but also to conquer. And
conquering kings arose on the North China Plain
as they did in West Asia. The first dynasty of kings
in the north China plain has been described as
belonging to the Xia family -- whose rule is thought
to have begun around 4,200 years ago (2200 BCE):
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch06.htm
~4,112 ..........
Ur-Nammu of Ur, a Mesopotamian King, writes the
first known law code in the world.
~4,000 ..........
Chariots first used and end of Sumerian power in
Mesopotamia; guinea pigs domesticated from cavies
in Peru; settlements fortified in eastern and central
Europe, a phenomenon that spreads westward within
800 years.
By around 4,000 years ago (2000 BCE) the Bell Beakers
(communities of metal working tradesmen from Spain
who had begun migrating around 500 years earlier) had
traveled as far as what is now Czech Republic in central
Europe, as far as Corsica, Sicily and North Africa, and
they had entered Britain as far north as what is now
Scotland.
In Britain the Bell Beakers started the monument to be
known as Stonehenge:
http://www.fsmitha.com/h1/stoneh.htm
--- end 4 of 5 ---
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Dan Fake, FREELOVER #1, who cares deeply about truth,
freedom, and maxing out this one and only experience we
all know and share on this earth, at this time, in this life.
http://x63.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=677641243
FREELOVER? Freethinking Realist Exploring Expressive
Liberty, Openness, Verity, Enlightenment, & Rationality
(also, pro-love, free from state and church authorities)
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