Prehistoric

The Stone Age is usually divided into three separate periods--Paleolithic Period, Mesolithic Period, and Neolithic Period--based on the degree of sophistication in the fashioning and use of tools.

Paleolithic Old Stone Age

Lower Paleolithic
the earliest subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age from around 2.5 million years ago when the first evidence of craft and use of stone tools by hominids appears in the current archaeological record, until around 300,000 years ago the appearance of the Homo genus (Homo habilis) Homo habilis is assumed to have lived primarily on scavenging. Homo erectus moves from scavenging to hunting, developing the hunting-gathering lifestyle which would remain dominant throughout the Paleolithic into the Mesolithic . Homo erectus migrated out of Africa and dispersed throughout Eurasia. Stone tools in Malaysia have been dated to be 1.83 million years old. The Peking Man (an example of Homo erectus ) fossil, discovered in 1929, is roughly 700,000 years old. Homo heidelbergensis is a candidate for first developing an early form of symbolic language. Whether control of fire and earliest burials date to this period or only appear during the Middle Paleolithic is an open question. From about 300,000 years ago, technology, social structures and behaviour appear to grow more complex, with prepared-core technique lithics, earliest instances of burial and hunting-gathering subsistence. Homo sapiens first appears about 200,000 years ago.

Middle Paleolithic
the second subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age as it is understood in Europe, Africa and Asia The earliest evidence of behavioral modernity first appears during the Middle Paleolithic/Middle Stone Age Middle Paleolithic burials at sites such as Krapina, Croatia (c. 130,000 BP) and Qafzeh, Palestine (c. 100,000 BP) have led some anthropologists and archaeologists to believe that Middle Paleolithic cultures may have possessed a developing religious ideology which included belief in concepts such as an afterlife; other scholars suggest the bodies were buried for secular reasons. In addition to developing other advanced cultural traits such as religion and art, humans also first began to take part in long distance trade between groups for rare commodities (such as ochre, which was often used for religious purposes such as ritual) and raw materials during the Middle Paleolithic as early as 120,000 years ago. stone-tipped spears, which were the earliest composite tools The use of fire became widespread for the first time in human prehistory during the Middle Paleolithic and humans began to cook their food during the early Middle Paleolithic (c. 250,000 years ago).

Upper Paleolithic
the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age as it is understood in Europe, Africa and Asia 40,00035,000 BC: Cro Magnon appear in Europe 35,000 BC: Zar, Yataghyeri, Damjili and Taghlar caves in Azerbaijan. c. 32,000 BC: Europeans understand how to harden clay figures by firing them in an oven at high temperatures. 30,000 BC: Invention of the bow and arrow. c. 30,000 BC26,000 BC: Lion-Human, from Hohlenstein-Stadel, Germany created. It is now in Ulmer Museum, Ulm, Germany. 29,00025,000 BC: Venus of Doln Vstonice. It is the oldest known ceramic in the world.

c. 28,000 BC: People start to live in Japan. 25,000 BC17,000 BC: Wall painting with horses, rhinoceroses and aurochs, Chauvet Cave, Vallon-Pont-d'Arc, Ardche gorge, France, is made. Discovered in December 1994. c. 23,000 BC: Venus of Petkovice (Petkovick venue in Czech) from Petkovice in Ostrava, Czech Republic, was made. It is now in Archeological Institute, Brno. c. 22,000 BC: Neanderthals believed to have become extinct in Europe. c. 22,000 BC: Last Glacial Maximum: Venus of Brassempouy, Grotte du Pape, Brassempouy, Landes, France, was made. It is now at Musee des Antiquites Nationales, St.-Germain-en-Laye. c. 22,000 BC21,000 BC: Venus of Willendorf, Austria, was made. It is now at Naturhistorisches Museum, Vienna. c. 17,000 BC15,000 BC: Hall of Bulls, Lascaux caves, is painted. Discovered in 1940. Closed to the public in 1963. c. 15,000 BC-13,000 BC: Paleo-Indians move across North America, then southward through Central America. c. 14,000 BC: Bison, on the ceiling of a cave at Altamira, Spain, is painted. 13,000 BC: earliest evidence of warfare 11,500 BC10,000 BC: Wooden buildings in South America (Chile), first pottery vessels (Japan). 11,000 BC: First evidence of human settlement in Argentina.

Technology
Paleolithic humans made tools of stone, bone, and wood The Lower Paleolithic hominid Homo erectus possibly invented rafts (c. 800,000 or 840,000 BP) to travel over large bodies of water. Throughout the Paleolithic, man was a food gatherer, depending for his subsistence on hunting wild animals and birds, fishing, and collecting wild fruits, nuts, and berries.

Mesolithic - Middle Stone Age

New types of settlements and new stone industries developed characterized by the early rise of agriculture that would later emerge into the Neolithic period farming, herding, polished stone axes, timber longhouses and pottery spread into Europe wooden objects, e.g. canoes and bows

Neolithic - New Stone Age

beginning about 9500 BCE in the Middle East that is traditionally considered the last part of the Stone Age beginning with the rise of farming ending when metal tools became widespread in the Copper Age (chalcolithic) use of wild and domestic crops and of domesticated animals the use of pottery