Do Now:1)What developments are important to humankind in these pictures? 2)Is life more or less violent today for humanity?

Neolithic RevolutionAbout 10,000 years ago people in the Middle East learned how to raise a wild wheat plant, and agriculture (farming and raising livestock) was born -- another big wave of history. Some of the causes of the Neolithic Revolution, or the start of settled agriculture, are a warmer climate and longer growing season. The result is the development of permanent settlements or communities Civilization!!!

Domestication of Plants and Animals

At about the same time, people began to domesticate wild animals, raising them for food and as a source of power that could pull wagons and plows. The dog was the first animal tamed, followed by the goat, horse and pig.(Pastoral Nomads – wandering herders of goats and sheep.)

The Neolithic Revolution

(8000BCE-3500BCE)•Sometimes termed the Agricultural Revolution.•Humans begin to slowly domesticate plant and animal stocks in Southwest Asia.•Agriculture requires nomadic peoples to become sedentary.•Populations begin to rise in areas where plant and animal domestication occurred.

Costs & Advantages of Agriculture

Advantages Costs•Steady food supplies

•Greater populations

•Leads to organized societies capable of supporting additional vocations (soldiers, managers, etc.)

•Heavily dependant on certain food crops (failure = starvation)

•Disease from close contact with animals, humans, & waste

•Can’t easily leave sites

Agriculture Slowly Spreads: What do you notice about the core

areas?

Independent Development vs. Cultural Diffusion

• Areas of Independent Development:

1. SW Asia (wheat, pea, olive, sheep, goat)

2. China & SE Asia (rice, millet, pig)3. Americas (corn, beans, potato,

llama)

• Areas of Agriculture Through Diffusion:

1. Europe2. West & Sub-Saharan Africa (?)3. Indus River Valley (rice cultivation)

Interactions Between Nomadic Peoples and Sedentary Agricultural

Peoples •Some nomadic peoples engaged in pastoralism.

•Some practiced slash & burn agriculture. •The violent and peaceful interaction between nomads and agriculturalists endures throughout history. (Trade & raids)

•High starch diets slowly allowSedentary populations to grow.

•First plow invented c.6000BCE;crop yields grow exponentially by 4000BCE.Pop. grows from 5-8 million to 60-70 million. •Eventually agricultural populations begin to spread out, displacing or assimilating nomadic groups; farming groups grow large enough for advanced social organization.

Sedentary Agriculturalists Dominate

First Towns Develop

Catal HuyukModern Turkey

First settled:

c. 7000BCE

JerichoModern Israel

First settled:

c. 7000BCE

CATAL HUYUK EXCAVATION

CivilizationNot everything about civilization was positive. Complex societies usually meant greater separation of people into classes based on social position or wealth. Civilized societies also tended to be more warlike and more patriarchal (male dominated) than hunter-gatherer bands in which everyone helped to supply food that ensured the group’s survival. Hunting and gathering declined as agriculture became the way most humans made their living. Agriculture became the main source of wealth in most societies until the industrial age.

Social Classes and Religion

Often a wealthy class of aristocrats controlled the land and collected rents from poor farmers. Society became divided between the “haves” and the “have nots.” People in civilized societies divided themselves into unequal social classes with priests and kings at the top, men came to dominate women, and slavery became common.

ReligionReligion became more organized and focused on many nature and animal spirits. People began to develop religious rituals.

Record Keeping

Writing probably began as a way to record business dealings, especially the exchange of agricultural products. Writing was used to track accounts, record time or seasons (calendar) and record laws. Cities and writing are considered the primary indicators of civilization. When people started to write, prehistoric times ended, and historic times began.

WritingWriting began as pictographs which were symbols of objects. Cuneiform writing developed in Sumer and was wedge shaped.

Professional record keepers who could read and write were known as Scribes.

Bronze Age

The Stone Age was followed by the Bronze Age when people learned to make bronze tools, ornaments, and weapons. Bronze is made by combining copper with tin, which produces a harder metal than copper alone, and it holds an edge much longer. The Bronze Age was a time of great invention; the wheel, plow, writing, money, cities, armies and chariots all came into use during the Bronze Age in Mesopotamia.

Bronze Age

The Bronze Age is important in history as the period when civilization and writing began, marking the end of prehistoric times and the beginning of ancient times. In Mesopotamia, the Bronze Age lasted from roughly 4000 BC to the beginning of the Iron Age around 1000 BC.

First Towns Develop

•Towns require social differentiation: metal workers, pottery workers, farmers, soldiers, religious and political leaders. (POSSIBLE B/C FOOD SURPLUSES!)

•Served as trade centers for the area; specialized in the production of certain unique crafts

•Beginnings of social stratification (class)

Towns Present Evidence of:

•Religious structures (burial rites, art)

•Political & Religious leaders were the same

•Still relied on limited hunting & gathering for food

Roles of Women

•Women generally lost status under male-dominated, patriarchal systems.

•Women were limited in vocation,worked in food production, etc.

•Women may have lacked thesame social rights as men.

Metal Working: From Copper to Bronze•The working of metals

became very important to early human settlements for tools & weapons.•Early settlements gradually shifted from copper to the stronger alloy bronze by 3,000BCE—ushers in the Bronze Age!

•Metal working spread throughout human communities slowly as agriculture had.

Further Technological Advancements

Wheeled Vehicles•Saves labor, allows transport of large loads and enhances trade

Potters Wheel (c.6000BCE)•Allows the construction of more durable clay vessels and artwork

Irrigation & Driven Plows•Allows further increase of food production, encourages pop. growth

Early Human Impact on the Environment

•Deforestation in places where copper, bronze, and salt were produced.

•Erosion and flooding where agriculture disturbed soil and natural vegetation.

•Selective extinction of large land animals and weed plants due to hunting & agriculture.

Advanced Civilization: The Next Step?•By 3500BCE, relatively large,

advanced preliterate societies had developed along the Indus, Huang He, Nile, and Tigris & Euphrates Rivers.

•As societies grew in size and need, sedentary human beings were once again faced with pressures to adapt to changing natural and human environments.