PREHISTORY. The evolution of Human Species followed different stages. beginning with the Australopethicus and continuing with homo

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1 PREHISTORY The evolution of Human Species followed different stages beginning with the Australopethicus and continuing with homo habilis, homo erectus and homo sapiens. The last stages include those people who lived thousands of years ago in the Palaeolithic and Neolithic Age and are the immediate ancestors of modern man.

2 Stone Age Once upon a time, when the man starting living in the earth, he used the first tools that he could get from the environment like stones, wood, bones That s the reason fon the name of that Age, and is divided in three periods: Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic.! The first men The race of the actual man, homo sapiens, from which all of us descend, a relative from a hominids that they appeared in Africa 2,5 millions years ago, and later they expanded for all Europe.

3 ! Their way of life In that time the weather isn t the same as we have nowadays in Spain. That weather was very cold with a lot of rain and due to it there were a lot of different animals like bison, reindeer, red deer, etc. The man lived in caves because of that horrible weather and he lived with another animals too. They lived from all the things that the environment offer him: hunting, fishing, gathering of wild fruits but when the food was finishing, they had to move to another place to get more, so they don t live a lot of time in the same place. The need to get food, make them advances in technology: new tools, techniques, social organization, life places The Prehistory periods! Palaeolithic Over time, a variety of tools were made for specific purposes. By about 100,000 years ago, Neanderthal cultures had several types of tools and were using bone implements. At the end of the Palaeolithic stage, modern humans (Homo sapiens) made specialized tools as needles and harpoons. In the Cro-Magnon caves of Europe there was wall paintings and evidence of religious cults. In tropical and

4 temperate forest regions, Palaeolithic tools, were adapted to the new conditions. In this period of time the prehistoric man discovered some very important: the fire; so he could light the caves, shoo away the animals, be warm and roast the meat.! Mesolithic years ago, the weather started to change and it began to seem as the weather we have nowadays. The life of the prehistoric man changed too: they didn t live in caves, they lived in rock shelters. This period is known as the Mesolithic, or Middle Stone Age.! Neolithic But a lot of thousand years later, the men discovered the animal husbandry and the agriculture. Now the had known how to get their own food. That discovers produced the Neolithic Revolution. Because of all the discovers, they started to live in villages. This is known as the Neolithic period, or New Stone Age. Stone tools became highly varied. By 6000 BC. it also appeared pottery and the knitting, and copper was used for the first time in some regions. In other regions, the Neolithic arrived much later. STONE AGE ART The prehistoric art began on the caves walls! Cave paintings There are three places containing cave paintings in Northern Spain. The paintings are located in the deep recesses of caves in the mountains of Northern Spain, far out of the destructive forces of wind and water. The

5 wall illustrations are not the only signs of human habitation here. Tools, hearths and food remains were preserved here for thousands of years. Altamira is the only site of cave paintings in which the signs of domestic life extend into the first cavern which contain the actual paintings. The colours have lasted because they were made from permanent natural earth pigments which are minerals. The iron minerals give the reds, yellow and browns, while manganese dioxide gives the blacks. They were 'fixed' by mixing them with blood, animal fat, urine, fish glue, egg white or vegetable juices. The cave paintings had a magic meaning; they did that paintings so that the hunting was good.! Venus figurines Venus figurines, statues dated between 27,000 and 26,000 years ago, depict women with exaggerated reproductive and sexual parts. Scientists think that these were used as a universal artistic symbol; a sign of recognition between peoples. While some male figurines have been uncovered, the vast majority of the figurines found in the late Palaeolithic represent women.! Ornaments Ornaments to decorate the body first surfaced around 30,000 years ago. This was jewellery made out of shells, animal teeth, and ivory. Later these advanced into beads (28,000 years ago). This gives us a clue that they felt that the

6 ornaments were important enough to devote their time (each bead took two hours to make). Some of the ornaments that these people made were out of materials that were far from their homes, in some cases hundreds of miles. Scientists have come up with the interpretation that the different bands of people traded goods with each other. If this occurred they must of had some ability to communicate with each other. This also brings up the point that we lived a rather peaceful existence with one another.! Flutes There has been at least a dozen flutes found between the time period of 28,000 to 22,000 years ago. There has also been one found in south-western France dating 32,000 years ago! These instruments are made of bird bone with finger holes carved into the bone. The flute indicates that our ancestors had music, which is another form of artistic expression.! Shelters Prehistoric people lived in huts and caves. They built their huts using the large bones of the giant mammals for frames. They covered the bone frames with branches and earth. Prehistoric people had two homes. One home for winter and one other for summer. The winter home was near where the

7 animals grazed in winter. The summer home was near where the animals grazed in summer. The prehistoric hunters were nomads and followed the mammoths to their grazing lands. In the Neolithic period began the megalithic art The megalithic is a great stone, a large stone used in the construction of monumental structures such as dolmens, monoliths, cromlech. The dolmens are large stones (megaliths) creating with a horizontal stone. Numerous such structures have survived from Stone Age France and England -- for example, at Stonehenge, 2,500-1,500 b. C.. About half of the original monument is missing, but enough ruins to give an idea of what it was. It was begun by people of the late Neolithic period and completed by a Celtic people, began to use metal implements and to live in a more communal fashion than their ancestors. The popular story has been that Stonehenge was built by the Druids, but they were Celts present during the much later time of Roman occupation.

8 The monolithic was a stone, also decorated or not decorated, erected as a single block. The cromlech was a prehistoric monument, consisting of a hill surrounded by a circle of monoliths. It was usually used for funereal rites. Metal Age After the Neolithic, the last of the Stone Ages, come the Metal Age, it called this way because metal was used after of stone in this period. Metal Age Periods! Copper Age At the end of the 5 th millennium BC significant changes took place in the life of Neolithic people. The climate, that suddenly turned cooler, was no longer favourable to the vegetable growing agriculture and animal husbandry became more important. All these changes affected the thinking of the late Neolithic man. Numerous elements of religion were revived or replaced, and under the new circumstances new cults and new types of objects were produced. The stone tool industry, which had been brought to a high quality in previous periods, and the constant search for new raw material resulted in another very important change. A mineral was discovered and mined in big quantities,

9 which had already been used sporadically, however its conscious use in such large quantities became a practice only then. The utilisation of copper and the production of more effective copper tools started, which soon transform society at the time.! Bronze Age Bronze Age, the time in the development of any human culture, before the introduction of iron, when most tools and weapons were made of bronze. Chronologically, the expression is of strictly local value, for bronze came into use, and was again replaced by iron, at different times in different parts of the world. Archaeological discoveries since 1960 have disturbed traditional theories concerning the origins of copper and bronze technologies. Bronze objects have been found in Asia Minor that date from before 3000 BC. At first this alloy was used carefully, mostly for decorative reasons; the tin needed to make it was not available in the region. Regular imports of tin from Cornwall in Britain during the 2nd millennium BC, however, made possible wider use of bronze in the Middle East, and it was eventually utilized for tools and weapons. Unprocessed copper was being pounded into tools and ornaments as early as 10,000 BC. Later discoveries in Yugoslavia have shown that copper was in use there in 4000 BC. although bronze was not made at that time. By 3000 BC. bronze began to be used in Greece. In China the Bronze Age did not begin until 1800 BC. The

10 pre-columbian civilizations of the Americas had no bronze technology until about ad The Bronze Age in the Middle East and the eastern Mediterranean has been divided into three phases early, middle, and late. The early phase is characterized by increased use of the metal, from the sporadic to the common. It was the time of the Sumerian civilization and the originate of Akkad to prominence in Mesopotamia; it also generated the spectacular treasures of Troy. Babylon reached its height of glory during the middle Bronze Age. Minoan Crete and Mycenaean Greece were major late-bronze-age civilizations. The Bronze Age there ended about 1200 BC, after which iron technology became common.! Iron Age Iron Age, marks the period of development of technology, when the working of iron came into general use, replacing bronze as the basic material for implements and weapons. It is the last stage of the archaeological sequence known as the three-age system (Stone Age, Bronze Age, & Iron Age). Chronologically, the term is only of local value because iron took the place of bronze at different times in different cultures. The major technical advance of the early Greek period was the widespread use of iron. Furnaces were developed that could reach the high melting

11 temperature of that metal. Iron technology had spread throughout the classical world by about 500 BC. Early steels were discovered by adding small amounts of carbon to iron as it was hammered over a charcoal fire. Mining became well developed and included the use of pumps to keep mines from flooding. Metalware was used for pots and dishes, sometimes with unexpected disastrous results such as lead poisoning. Among the greatest Roman works were the large aqueducts that carried water for hundreds of miles, roads that spanned the empire, and public sewer systems. Advances in building construction led to the extensive use of the arch by the Romans and to the invention of durable cements and concretes for structures that have survived to the present. Technology also advanced armaments with the development of catapults, better swords, and body armament. Bibliography Ana D. Martínez Miras / Carmen Rosa Useros Sierra