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Paleolithic

The Paleolithic (American spelling; British spelling: Palaeolithic; pronunciation: /plilk/ or /


pel-/) Age, Era or Period is a prehistoric period of human historydistinguished by the development
of the most primitive stone tools discovered (Grahame Clark's Modes I and II), and covers roughly
95%[1] of human technological prehistory. It extends from the earliest known use of stone tools,
probably by hominins such as australopithecines, 2.6 million years ago, to the end of
the Pleistocene around 10,000 BP.[2]
The Paleolithic era is followed by the Mesolithic. The date of the PaleolithicMesolithic boundary
may vary by locality as much as several thousand years. During the Paleolithic period, humans
grouped together in small societies such as bands, and subsisted by gathering plants and fishing,
hunting or scavenging wild animals.[3] The Paleolithic is characterized by the use
of knapped stone tools, although at the time humans also used wood and bone tools. Other organic
commodities were adapted for use as tools, including leather and vegetable fibers; however, due to
their nature, these have not been preserved to any great degree. Surviving artifacts of the Paleolithic
era are known aspaleoliths. Humankind gradually evolved from early members of the
genus Homo such as Homo habilis who used simple stone tools into fully behaviorally and
anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) during the Paleolithic era.[4] During the end of the
Paleolithic, specifically the Middle and or Upper Paleolithic, humans began to produce the earliest
works of art and engage in religious and spiritual behavior such as burial and ritual. [3][5]
[6]
The climate during the Paleolithic consisted of a set of glacial and interglacial periods in which the
climate periodically fluctuated between warm and cool temperatures.
The term "Paleolithic" was coined by archaeologist John Lubbock in 1865.[7] It derives from
Greek: , palaios, "old"; and , lithos, "stone", meaning "old age of the stone" or
"Old Stone Age."
The Paleolithic Period coincides almost exactly with the Pleistocene epoch of geologic time, which
lasted from 2.6 million years ago to about 12,000 years ago.[8] This epoch experienced important
geographic and climatic changes that affected human societies.
During the preceding Pliocene, continents had continued to drift from possibly as far as 250 km from
their present locations to positions only 70 km from their current location. South Americabecame
linked to North America through the Isthmus of Panama, bringing a nearly complete end to South
America's distinctive marsupial fauna. The formation of the Isthmus had major consequences on
global temperatures, because warm equatorial ocean currents were cut off, and the cold Arctic and
Antarctic waters lowered temperatures in the now-isolated Atlantic Ocean. Most of Central
America formed during the Pliocene to connect the continents of North and South America, allowing
fauna from these continents to leave their native habitats and colonize new areas. [9] Africa's collision
with Asia created the Mediterranean Sea, cutting off the remnants of the Tethys Ocean. During
the Pleistocene, the modern continents were essentially at their present positions; the tectonic
plates on which they sit have probably moved at most 100 km from each other since the beginning
of the period.[10]

Climates during the Pliocene became cooler and drier, and seasonal, similar to modern climates. Ice
sheets grew on Antarctica. The formation of an Arctic ice cap around three million years ago is
signaled by an abrupt shift in oxygen isotope ratios and ice-rafted cobbles in the North Atlantic and
North Pacific ocean beds.[11] Mid-latitude glaciationprobably began before the end of the epoch. The
global cooling that occurred during the Pliocene may have spurred on the disappearance of forests
and the spread ofgrasslands and savannas.[9]

Neolithic
The Neolithic

/nilk/[1] Era, or Period, from (nos, "new") and (lthos, "stone"),

or New Stone Age, was a period in the development of human technology, beginning about 10,200
BC, according to the ASPRO chronology, in some parts of the Middle East, and later in other parts of
the world[2] and ending between 4,500 and 2,000 BC.
Traditionally considered the last part of the Stone Age, the Neolithic followed the
terminal Holocene Epipaleolithic period and commenced with the beginning of farming, which
produced the "Neolithic Revolution". It ended when metal tools became widespread (in the Copper
Age or Bronze Age; or, in some geographical regions, in the Iron Age). The Neolithic is a progression
of behavioral and cultural characteristics and changes, including the use of wild and domestic crops
and of domesticated animals.[3]
The beginning of the Neolithic culture is considered to be in the Levant (Jericho, modern-day West
Bank) about 10,2008,800 BC. It developed directly from the Epipaleolithic Natufian culture in the
region, whose people pioneered the use of wild cereals, which then evolved into true farming. The
Natufian period was between 12,000 and 10,200 BC, and the so-called "proto-neolithic" is now
included in the Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPNA) between 10,200 and 8,800 BC. As the Natufians had
become dependent on wild cereals in their diet, and a sedentary way of life had begun among them,
the climatic changes associated with the Younger Dryas are thought to have forced people to
develop farming. By 10,2008,800 BC, farming communities arose in the Levant and spread to Asia
Minor, North Africa and North Mesopotamia. Early Neolithic farming was limited to a narrow range of
plants, both wild and domesticated, which included einkorn wheat, millet and spelt, and the keeping
of dogs, sheep and goats. By about 6,9006,400 BC, it included domesticated cattle and pigs, the
establishment of permanently or seasonally inhabited settlements, and the use of pottery.[4]
Not all of these cultural elements characteristic of the Neolithic appeared everywhere in the same
order: the earliest farming societies in the Near East did not use pottery. In other parts of the world,

such as Africa, South Asia and Southeast Asia, independent domestication events led to their own
regionally distinctive Neolithic cultures that arose completely independent of those in Europe and
Southwest Asia. Early Japanese societies and other East Asian cultures used
pottery before developing agriculture.[5][6]
Unlike the Paleolithic, when more than one human species existed, only one human species (Homo
sapiens sapiens) reached the Neolithic.[7] Homo floresiensis may have survived right up to the very
dawn of the Neolithic, about 12,200 years ago.[8]
The term Neolithic derives from the Greek , neolithikos, from neos, "new"
+ lithos, "stone", literally meaning "NewStone Age". The term was invented by Sir John
Lubbock in 1865 as a refinement of the three-age system.

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