World Prehistory: A New Outline 0521095646

Citation preview

GRAHAME CLARK rehistory A NEW OUTLINE S3Sl

i

39 55 969

"»-. ivi

^.1

CM isLui y

:

a

new out

GN739 .C55 1969

I

)

me

/

io095

liiiill Clark, Grahame, NEW COLLEGE OF CALIFORNIA (SF)

GN 739 .C55 1969 Clark, Grahame, 1907World prehistory

/ni898 BORROWER'S NAME

Clark, Grahamey 1907World prehistory : a outline Grahame Clark. 2nd ed. new London : Cambridge University Press, 1969. xvl, 331 p., [17] p. of plates : ill., maps ; 21 cm. Bibliography: p. 303-318. Includes index. #11898 Glft:Amsbury $ . . ISBN 0-521-09564-6 ( pbk.

1.

Man,

25 AUG 92

Prehistoric. 13175

I.

NEWCxc

/

by

Title 69-inn'74«.fi^

THE LIBRARY

NEW COLLEGE OF CAUFORN.A .

Articulate

p.

i) industries, p.

33

2) industries, p.

35

flake

3)

industries,/?. 42.

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE

—

48

The earliest Advanced Palaeolithic culGeneral characteristics, p. 48 The French Sequence, p. 52 Eastern Gravettian, p. 54 tures, p. 5 1 Advanced Palaeolithic art, p. 58 Expansion of Advanced Palaeolithic African survivals, p. 64. culture: Siberia and the Far East, p. 62

—

—

—

—

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING IN THE OLD WORLD

— Neothermal,/?. 76—

The

implications of farming, p. 70

Specialized hunting, p. 73

prototypes of early cultivated cereals, p. 7^

— Climatic

70

—Wild

change: from

Mesolithic hunter-fishers,/?. 79 Late Pleistocene to The earliest farmers in the Old World,/?. 83 Zagros, /?. 84 The Levant,

—

p. 87

Anatolia,

/?.

—

—

90.

THE ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION IN SOUTH-WEST ASIA NEOLITHIC SETTLEMENT IN THE HIGHLANDS:

—

Kurdistan, Iran and

Anatolia, Syria and Northern Iraq, 95 Neolithic communities, /?. 99.

Turkmenia,

/?.

vii

94

/?.

—

96

Late

—— CONTENTS URBAN CIVILIZATION Protoliterate

Sumer,

—

IN SUMER: Ubaid, />. 100 Warka, p. 103 The Early Dynastic period, ;?. 105 Akka-

—

—

104

/>.

dians and Babylonians,/). 107.

CIVILIZATION IN THE H GH LANDS: Anatolia and The Levant, p. 1 1 2 Iran and Turkmenia, p. 117.

the Hittites,

I

—

—

/).

108

THE FOUNDATIONS OF EUROPEAN CIVILIZATION:

J

C.

6000-1500

119

B.C.

—

The earliest farmers in Greece,/;. 122 Geographical setting,/?. 119 The Balkans, central and eastern Europe, p. 124 The Mediterranean and western Europe, p. 130 The west Baltic area, p. 132 Copperworking in central Europe,/). 134 Minoan civilization,/;. 135 Early

—

—

—Aegean —'Secondary 139 143 —

Helladic, p.

/>.

Neolithic'

Battle-axe and Beaker

p.

/).

—

of chamber tombs,

137

/;.

Arctic hunter-fishers,

peoples,/).

7

— Diffusion 142 — groups,

trade,

137

—

—

144.

THE FOUNDATIONS OF EUROPEAN CIVILIZATION: FROM MYCENAE TO THE AGE OF EXPANSION

—

—

henge, p. 153

—Recession

I48

in central Europe,/). 150

Mycenaean origins,/). 148 Bronze metallurgy Mycenaean trade with barbarian societies,/).

151

—Wessex and Stone154 — Urnfield

in the east Mediterranean, p.

Tyrol, — Copper-mining 156 — Protogeometric Greece, — Expansion of —The of iron-working, 160 — Genesis and 164 of —Athenian — Greek Iron Age, — 170 —The The —The —Expansion of Roman Empire, —La Tene, —The spread of Migration Germanic Iron Age and 176 — The age of in the

cultures in central Europe,/). 155

/>.

the Urnfield cultures,/). 158

p.

p. 161

diffusion

p.

repulse

colonies, p. 163

162

Scyths,

Etruscans, p. 165

/>.

Hallstatt

/>.

p.

173

Period, p. 175

the

exploration,

Christianity,/?.

8

167

the

172

p.

alphabet,

Persia, p.

/).

179.

AFRICA

181

—Early farming Lower Egypt,/). Mesolithic 188 187 — Early Predynastic Egypt, Badarian of Upper Egypt, of Upper and Lower Egypt, 190— Late Predynastic spread of food-production 193— The 191 — Dynastic Egypt, 201 — The of East 197 — Pastoralism and iron-working,/). 201 — hunters, p.

182

185

in

p.

p.

Unification

Egypt,/).

Prehistoric Africa

9

diffusion

Africa, p.

in

Africa, p.

in

early

/).

p.

the literate world,/). 203.

206

INDIA Microlithic industries, p. 207

Sind,

p.

208

—The

—

Chalcolithic farmers in Baluchistan and

—

Post-Harappan civilization, p. 209 and Ganges basins,/?. 214 Chalcolithic Malwa and the Deccan, p. 216 Polished stone axe Spread of iron-working, />. 218 The Mauryan Empire,

Harappan

chalcolithic cultures in the Indus

communities in cultures,/). 216

— —

—

—

p. 218.

10

CHINA AND THE FAR EAST

—Liing-shan

221

and the southward The Shang (Yin) Dynasts, p. 227 Chou spread of farming, p. 225 Han Ch'in (222-207 B.C.), p. 232 dynasty (1027-222 B.C.), p. 231

china: Yang-shao

peasants,

—

/>.

223

—

(207 B.C.-A.D. 220), p. 232. viii

— —

— CONTENTS SOUTH-EAST ASIA, INDONESIA AND THE PHILIPPINES: Hoabin-

—

—

hian culture, p. 233 Microlithic industries, p. 235 Quadrangular stone-adze culture of Indo-China, Thailand and Malaya,/;. 235 Dong-

son bronzes,/). 238

—

japan: Preceramic Yayoi farmers,

p.

NORTH-EAST ASIA: 11

240

settlement,/?.

242

—

Melanesia,/;. 239.

—

—Jomon

hunter-fishers,

/j.

240

Protohistoric Japan, p. 243.

Huntet-fishers,

/).

243.

AUSTRALASIA AND THE PACIFIC

247

—

AUSTRALIA: Migration

route to Australia,/;. 247 Tasmanians, /;. 248 Australoid migrations, p. 250 The earliest settlement of Australia,

—

p. 253

—Middle Stone Age,

THE pacific: 12

p.

Polynesia, p.

— —Recent Stone Age, —New 265

254 260

p. 257.

Zealand,/;.

THE NEW WORLD

269

EARLY prehistory: The

—

immigrants, p. 269 The big-game hunters, p. 271 Desert culture of the Great Basin, p. 276 Archaic culture of eastern North America, p. 277.

—

higher civilization

first

in

—

Toltec and Aztec, p. Incas,

/;.

the new world: The

—The of Mesoamerican of —Maya, 285 — 288 — Early Peru,

food-production, p. 279 Teotihuacan, p. 284

—

beginnings of

283 Mesoamerica: The p. 289

civilization, p.

rise

Postclassic

p.

civilization

in

—

291.

marginal cultures:

Basket-maker and Pueblo cultures of the North 292 Woodland culture, p. 294 Middle Hunting, fishing and gathering communities, Mississippi culture,/;. 295 Denbigh and Dorset Coastal culture of the north-west, p. 297 p. 296 Old Bering Sea, Thule and recent Eskimo cultures of the Arctic, p. 298 Yahgan, Ona and Alacaluf peoples of Tierra del cultures, p. 299

American south-west,

—

—

—

p.

—

—

—

—

Fuego, p. 300.

Further reading

303

Index

319

IX

PLATES Ivory carving of the head of an Advanced Palaeo-

Frontispiece lithic \The

woman from

Brassempouy, France

Museum of National Antiquities,

St Germain}

BETWEEN PAGES I

Reconstructed skull of Peking [University

1 1

IIO-II

man {Homo

Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology,

Chimpanzee extracting in a blade

termites

from

erectus)

Cambridge}

a

mound by poking

of grass

[Baron Hugo von Lawick}

III

Skull with face modelled in clay

from pre-pottery

level

at Jericho [Photograph by

IV

Sumerian

Dr

K.

M.

Kenyan]

statuette of Early Dynastic times

from Tell

Asmar, Mesopotamia [Oriental Institute, Chicago]

v

Clay figurine from Early Neolithic site of Nea Nikomedeia,

West Macedonia, Greece [Robert J. Hodden Jr.]

VI

Gold funeral mask of Agam.emnon, Shaft-grave V, Mycenae [Lord William Taylour, {Thames and Hudson)]

VII

'

The Mycenaeans', Ancient Peoples and Places

Stone 'Janus' head

series

from Roquepertuse, Bouches-du-

Rhone, France [T. G. E. Powell, 'Prehistoric Art' {Thames and Hudson)]

VIII

Bronze dies for embossing helmet plates, showing Teutonic personages of the Migration Period, Torslunda, Sweden [State Historical

Museum, Stockholm] xi

PLATES I

X

King Nar-mer on stone konpolis, Egypt

Relief carving of

palette, Hiera-

[Egypt Exploration Society]

X

Terracotta Negroid head from \_Jos

XI

Museum,

Nok, Nigeria

Nigeria]

man from Mohenjo Daro,

Stone carving of bearded Pakistan {Sir

XII

Mortimer Wheeler,

'

The Indus

Pottery figure of Late

Civilisation

Jomon

'

(CamiriJge University Press)]

culture, Satohama,

Honshu,

Japan [J. E. Kidder, 'Japan', Ancient Peoples

XIII

(Thames and Hudson)]

Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology,

Cambridge]

Statue of Hoa-haka-nana-ia, Easter Island [British

XV

series

Aboriginal hunter, Australia {University

XIV

and Places

Museum]

Model of Maya youth's head, Palenque, Mexico [Museo Nacional de Antropologia, Mexico. Photograph by Irmgard GrothKimball]

XVI

Inca figurines of gold (male) and silver (female) [University

Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology,

XU

Cambridge]

MAPS 1

The

prehistoric world to the end of the Middle

page 9

Pleistocene 2

Europe

in the last Ice

Age:

the spread of 'Venus'

figurines 3

Key

sites in

59 the transition to farming in

south-west Asia

4

The

84

spread of farming into Europe from

south-west Asia charted by radiocarbon dates

mid-second millennium

121

5

Europe

6

The expansion of food-production

7

India in the second and third millennia B.C.

210

8

China: the prehistoric core of the

224

9

Some key

10

in the

sites

B.C.

in Africa

earliest state

of the Australian Stone Age

Early hunters in the

New World

xiu

142

199

252 272

PREFACE It

was only possible

in the course of the four reprintings of the

original edition of this

book

tions. In

new

preparing this

to insert

edition

I

minor changes and correchave taken the opportunity

to effect a radical overhaul, taking account of the progress of

archaeological publication and of travel

and

my own

same basic plan has been preserved, the chapters concerned with Europe,

A new

opportunities for

reflection during the period since 1961.

is

Although the

result, apart

virtually a

from the two

new book.

Introduction has been written and the Retrospect

scrapped. Chapters 1-3 cover

much

viously but have been rewritten.

the

same ground

A new

as pre-

chapter 4 has been

inserted to take account of radical advances in our understanding

of the transition from hunting and gathering to

Chapter

5,

with in chapter

rise

8,

husbandry.

4,

dealt

has been substantially rewritten. For the

present edition chapters 6 and 7 have been

Chapter

settled

which covers much of the ground previously

concerned with the

left

mainly unchanged.

later prehistory

of Africa and the

of Dynastic Egypt, has been substantially revised and re-

written and

moved forward

in the

book

to accord with the radio-

carbon evidence for the priority of husbandry

in

south-east

Europe. The old chapter 8 has been replaced by two chapters (9

and 10) devoted respectively to India and the Far

chapters on Australia and the Pacific (11) and the

East.

The

New World (12)

have been substantially revised and rewritten and reversed

in

sequence to accord with the findings of radiocarbon chronology.

Room

has also been found for a

number of new maps and halflist of works for

tone plates, as well as for a revised and enlarged further reading.

In a

work which ranges over

plays a vital part and greatly increased

full

the

whole world, chronology

advantage has been taken of the very

volume of radiocarbon determinations XV

that has

PREFACE

my

been made available since

I

would make

is

determinations

:

no great

that

in order.

The

reliance can be placed

first

I

point

on individual

the potential sources of error due to contamina-

tion, faulty collection, mistakes in labelling

cessing are in themselves

random

view of the use

edition. In

first

have made of these a few comments are

enough

and defective pro-

to induce caution;

and the

factor inherent in radiocarbon analysis has implications

that are not always given adequate weight. It

dates but the general pattern that emerges

For

that counts.

this

reason

lists

is

not individual

from a number of these

of key determinations are

appended to chapters 2-4, 6 and 8-12. Each determination quoted with

its

laboratory reference number, so that

is

full details

can be looked up in the series of Radiocarbon Supplements and other publications listed under Further Reading (p. 303).

The second

point

I

would make

is

that, until the effect

of varia-

tions in the intensity of the earth's magnetic field has been de-

termined sufficiently accurately to allow of definitive correction

of radiocarbon dates,

it is

than as absolute in years.

they are quoted

best to regard these as relative rather

Where radiocarbon

as radiocarbon

and not

dates are quoted

as exact dates in solar

years.

Thirdly, and following on

radiocarbon dates in

this, it

common

terms of the Christian era and tions of the

terms. I

I

have quoted

again

I

would

bestowed by the

staff

on

the half-life

like to

all

all

dates in

have followed the recommenda-

Cambridge Conference and the

carbon in basing these

Once

seems important to quote

practice of Radio-

of 55681 30 years.

acknowledge the

interest

and care

of the University Press.

GRAHAME CLARK Peterhouse, Cambridge

SO December

iS)Gj

XVI

INTRODUCTION The days

are long past

history itself

prehistory

— or

for that matter

—could any longer be equated with the experience

of European nations

As

predecessors. civilization as

I

home

at

or overseas or with their immediate

emphasize in

shall try to

we know

communal

literate

when

life,

it

is

only one of

this

book, Western

many

adventures in

each one of which stems comparatively

from a prehistoric experience of immense antiquity. This by no means lessens the importance of Western civilization,

recently

but rather enhances

Europe

it.

It

has after

all

been one of the glories of

to have developed the industrial processes that have

transformed the

way of life

of

all civilizations

and so to have speeded up communications

and most cultures

as to create

an entity

of the whole world. Even more to the point has been the Euro-

pean contribution to the conceptual framework of mankind. philosophy,

Speculative

the

formulation

of theoretical laws

we call natural science and the of history by which man has broken free from the limita-

governing the universe which concept

tions of present time,

tions

all

these are fields to which other civiliza-

and indeed primitive man himself have

in

some measure

contributed; they are nevertheless ones in which the European

contribution has from the time of the Classical Greeks been outstanding.

During the age. It

is

last

hundred years the world

at large

not merely that the lead in science and

its

has

come of

applications

come to be shared and in some fields approby what were once the North American and Russian

in technology have

priated

outposts of Western society: of still greater portent for the future are the achievements of the heirs of ancient civilizations left

temporarily behind by the course of historical change; and,

looking

still

prehistoric.

further ahead, those of peoples until very recently

Wide

recognition has for example been accorded to

INTRODUCTION many 'Western'

the achievements of the Japanese and Chinese in fields

of accompHshment ranging from nuclear physics to the

production of optical apparatus, motor-cars and super-rapid

rail

transport and the successful pursuit of prehistoric archaeology.

Again, granted the immense

difficulties

they encountered on

achieving independence, the achievements of African countries are hardly

less

many of

new

the

remarkable several of the States :

forming the United Nations comprise peoples

who were

still

when first colonized by Europeans. The widely varying degrees of cultural attainment presented by the peoples of the world to an observer in London or Paris only a hundred years ago must have appeared to many at the prehistoric

time as in some sense an inevitable outcome of the process of evolution. In his Prehistoric Times

John Lubbock argued

ward

first

published in 1865 Sir

that peoples of simpler culture

in relation to the civilization prevailing in

were back-

western Europe

at the

height of the Victorian era because they represented sur-

vivals

from more primitive stages of

plicitly

He ex'Many mam-

social evolution.

pursued the analogy with palaeontology.

malia [he wrote] which are extinct in Europe have representatives still

Much

living in other countries.

light

is

thrown on our

pachyderms, for instance, by the species which parts of Asia

by

still

inhabit

and Africa; the secondary marsupials are

fossil

some

illustrated

their existing representatives in Australia and South America;

and

in the

antiquities

same manner,

if

we wish

clearly to understand the

of Europe, we must compare them with the rude

implements and weapons

still,

or until lately, used by the savage

races in other parts of the world. In

fact,

the

Van Diemaner and

South American are to the antiquary what the opossum and the sloth are to the geologist.'

Some

forty years later this point of view

fessional anthropologists

was expressed

still

when

pro-

had already begun to recognize

as a

more dogmatically by General Pitt-Rivers

at a

time

result of intensive field-work the unique value and integrity of the

INTRODUCTION culture of even the

world.

As

most primitive peoples surviving in the modern 1906 Pitt-Rivers could declare that 'the exist-

lately as

ing races, in their respective stages of progression,

may be

as the bona fide representatives of the races of antiquity.

thus afford us living illustrations of the social customs

.

.They

.

.

taken

.

which

belong to the ancient races from which they remotely sprang.'

Although there

no reason

is

for thinking that Pitt-Rivers

using the term 'race' in this context in tation, there

no doubt

is

its strict

biological

was

conno-

that in popular estimation material

backwardness has been linked with the possession of physical characteristics like skin colour or hair

form

distinct

from those of

the civilized peoples of western Europe. If this point of view still

expressed today

privilege.

is

recognized as a mere pretext for racial

it is

Archaeology has made

it

plain for those

whose eyes

are

not obscured by prejudice that differences in cultural attainment are the product not of biology but of history.

Prehistory

is

not merely something that

through a long time ago

hended allows us tive

more

to

all

it is

view our contemporary

From

men, whatever

plishment, are on

beings passed

by

situation in a perspec-

the study of our

own

the perspective of the last few million

their level

much

human

something which properly appre-

valid than that encouraged

parochial histories. years

:

the

same

of literary or technical accomCategories like savage,

level.

barbarian or civilized, so beloved of our Victorian forebears, pale into insignificance in relation to the potential difference

men and any

other kind of animal.

The

between

process of hominization,

the attainment of humanity, are immensely older and more

fundamental than the practice of husbandry or the or write. tions

To

be surprised that

from prehistory on

men

ability to read

can emerge in a few genera-

to the stage of

world history

is

to

be

unaware of what prehistory means. The capacity of the cultural apparatus to absorb, combine and transmit experiences and values and the growing efficiency of modern means of communication are

among

the

most promising omens

for the future.

INTRODUCTION The

possibility of reviewing

and appreciating the achieve-

ments of the human race and not merely of those peoples able to transmit their histories in writing

is

something made possible by

archaeology and modern science. In such a volume as

more can be

offered than an outline of

discovered. Vast areas remain untouched,

unsolved and

much work remains

to

this

no

what has already been

many problems

be done in the

the laboratory before prehistorians can relax

by

field

rem.ain

and

the fireside.

in

CHAPTER

I

MAN'S PLACE IN NATURE A major is

has

paradox to be faced when

man,

that

who

come near

we

consider our

engaged in extending

dually

He forms is

who

is

his

dominion into outer space,

is

subject to the

we

it is

essential to take

are to understand the

by means of their

which human

traditional culture. Equally

and develop

his culture,

it is

endowment acquired therefore

no

briefly, the zoological context

to

societies

man owes his

by means of which he

has achieved biological dominance, in the physical and mental

by man

account of the evolution of

his geographical setting, the setting to

cal evolution;

himself an

framework of a

material traces of his culture, the apparatus developed

ability to acquire

now

same processes of growth, maturity and

physical environment. If therefore

a unique degree,

even

part of the nexus of living things and indivi-

death. Like other animals he lives within the

adjust

origins

to complete mastery over the forces of external

nature as they confront him on this planet, and

animal.

own

through the power of his mind and imagination

first

instance to the

in the course

of biologi-

less vital to consider,

however

of the hominids and the emergence

of the several forms leading up to the species to which

we belong.

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN Although

for a thorough-going evolutionist there can be

logical point at

in fact

which

to begin

human

prehistory, this

book

no will

be limited to chronicling the achievements of a particular

group of primates, namely the hominids. Yet before we consider in briefest outline the zoological context of the hominids within the Primate Order,

it is

worth

reflecting

on what Charles Darwin

and his forerunners and successors have demonstrated 5

in scientific

MAN

S

PLACE IN NATURE

terms and for that matter on what primitive

and some that

the

human beings web of life. It

classified

system.

man has always known

of the higher reHgions have expHcitly taught, namely are only part, albeit the is

not merely that

all

most conscious part of

varieties

of

men

can be

and incorporated within an all-embracing zoological

Still

more important

human behaviour

the fact that

is

is

only a particular form of animal behaviour and can only fully be

understood as such.

The Primates

Of the two ally

sub-orders, into which the Primates are convention-

divided,

named

we may

confine ourselves to the appropriately

Anthropoidea, leaving on one side for inspection in the zoo

our exceedingly remote relatives the miniature and engaging Prosimii. Similarly,

we are entitled

to pass

by

the cages containing

the super-families of monkeys {Cehoidea and Cercopithecoides) and

concentrate on that labelled Hominoidea, comprehending apes

{Pongidae) and hominids {Hominidae).

The

physical similarities between

have long been

realized.

They

men and

anthropoid apes

are indeed so close as to leave

no

reasonable doubt about their near affinity in the classification of zoological forms. Similarities appear whether one considers the

general structure of the skeleton, the muscular anatomy or the disposition of the visceral organs, the evidence of serological reactions and metabolic processes, or even the structure of the

brain

itself.

Even

so,

no zoologist would have

tinguishing parts of the skeleton of

man

difficulty in dis-

or ape and not even the

layman can remain unimpressed by significant dentition and limb-proportions or

the brain in relation to

makes

it

by

diffisrences

in

the notably larger size of

body-weight on the part of man. This

easy to understand that, to judge from the

still

des-

perately incomplete palaeontological record, the hominids appear to

have diverged from the apes extremely

as fifteen,

twenty or even more

far

back, perhaps as long

million years ago.

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN From an evolutionary point of view one of the most emergence of the hominids seems

steps in the

assumption of an erect posture.

was

It

this

significant

have been the

to

which released the

hands from locomotion, making them available for tool-making

and the securing and preparation of food, and the head to be balanced

on top of

the spinal

in

due time allowing

column

suspended by heavy muscular attachments from tremity.

No

doubt also the growing

relieved the teeth of

many

upper ex-

of the forelimbs

functions and helped to bring about

characteristic changes in dentition. in the size

facility

rather than

its

At the same time

the reduction

and role of the teeth and of the musculature needed to

support the head affected the architecture of the

skull,

among

other things reducing the need for strong brow-ridges. Although it

was by means of

dominance,

it

his brain that

man was

to rise to biological

seems that our remote hominid ancestors had begun

had notably exceeded

to stand upright before their brains

volume those of the

gence of the hominids

is

that they

meet the conditions met with apes remained

more

in

adopted an upright posture to

open country, whereas the great

closely linked with forests in

specialized to a brachiating

in

A likely explanation of the diver-

great apes.

way of moving,

they relied to a considerable extent on

that

is

which they

one

in

which

the use of their arms.

The Australopithecines

The

Australopithecines, one of the

hominids are

now

two genera

generally divided,

interest precisely to the fact that

owe

a

into

which the

major part of

their

although their brains hardly

exceeded in absolute capacity those of the great apes they nevertheless held themselves upright

and walked on two

majority of the fossils belonging to this East or South Africa and a

number of

of Lower Pleistocene age. At

from south-east Asia, the thropus)

legs.

The great

genus have been found these

come from

deposits

come Megan-

the present time only one has

so-called Palaeojavanensis (cf.

from the Djetis beds

in

at

Sangiran in Java, and

it

may

be

MAN

PLACE IN NATURE

S

significant that these deposits are

now

phase of the Middle Pleistocene.

On

generally dated to an early

the face of

it

this

argues for

the predominating importance of Africa as the scene of early

hominid evolution, but during recent years,

far

it

has to be remembered that, especially

more

research has been devoted to certain

parts of this continent than to south-east Asia

and

in particular to

Indonesia.

Turning

now to

most striking

fact

morphology of the Australopithecines, the about them, apart from their small size, indicathe

and small brains,

tions of upright posture

is

the

number of detailed

which they share with other hominids.

features

may be noted

Among

others

the height of the skull above the orbits, the contour

of the forehead and upper

facial area

and the conformation of the

mastoid process. Their dentition also shows a number of points

of agreement.

The

teeth are relatively small

and arranged

in the

form of an evenly curved parabolic arcade, the canines spatulate

and there are no diastemic gaps on

are

Although

either side.

do so

the Australopithecines share these characteristics they

in

varying degrees. During the early phase of discovery some investigators

were a

their fossils.

little

For present purposes and pending the discovery and

description of a

much

it

groups.

From Lower

tein

will

larger

and more complete volume of

be enough to mention three or four distinctive

material

species:

too free in bestowing distinctive names on

Pleistocene deposits there are

two main

from the South African locaHties of Makapan, Sterkfon-

and Taungs

we have

pithecus africanus; and

the relatively small-toothed Australo-

from an early

lacustrine deposit at

Olduvai

in Tanzania the remains of A. hoisei (formerly Zinjanthropus).

Middle Pleistocene beds Africa

at

Kromdraai and Swartkrans

have yielded a third

species

A.

robustus

in

South

(formerly

Paranthropus).

Another hominid discovery is

that deserves

mention

comprised by fragments obtained from bed

I

at this

in the

point

Olduvai

sequence belonging to a form having smaller teeth and a larger

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN

Abderrahman Yenangyau

Olorgesailie J

0/ofduvai

\

Kanwa«

L. Eyasi

\

%

Alakapan ,wSierkfonicin \

Taungs*

\f.

^— ~"~ I.

brain

The

than

,

^^

Wallace Line

prehistoric

world

to the

Uninhabited zone

end of the Middle Pleistocene

any Australopithecine yet known to

us.

Some

palaeontologists prefer nevertheless to classify the fossils as be-

longing to an extreme form of the species A. africanus. Others

have argued for recognizing

one to be

classified as a

it

as

belonging to a

man under

new

the designation

species

Homo

and

hahilis^

a being not only larger-brained than an Australopithecine, but

provided with hands capable of exerting a power grip of the kind

needed for shaping

effective pebble tools.

The mere

fact

of

this

divergence of view only serves to emphasize the close relationship existing

between the two genera, Australopithecus and Homo.

MAN

S

PLACE IN NATURE

Present andformer designation of the main groups

offossil hominids Modern

Former designation

des'wnation

Pleistocene

Homo

sapiens

Upper

Homo

sapiens

Homo

sapiens neanderthalensis rhodesiensis soloensis

Homo Homo Homo

sapiens

neanderthalensis rhodesiensis soloensis

steinheimensis

Homo

Middle

erectus

Australopi-

Lot;

thecus

Pithecanthropus africanus or Atlanthropus

ajricanus heidelbergensis

Pithecanthropus heidelbergensis

javanensis

Pithecanthropus erectus ox javanensis

pekinensis

Pithecanthropus pekinensis or Sinanthropus

robustus

Paranthropus

boisei

Z'njanthropus

afncanus

Homo

The genus

habilis

Homo

In recent years

it

has been widely agreed that forms of hominid

other than the Australopithecines should be classified under the single

genus Homo. This means that the numerous

localities in Africa,

from

fossils

Europe, North China and Indonesia formerly

grouped within the genus 'Pithecanthropus^ or even accorded separate generic status have species of

man,

Homo

that Neanderthal

erectus.

been transferred to form a

Another concept

and other more or

showing characteristics

men

now

that

new

to be discarded

less closely related

is

forms

mark them off from the living races of The modern view is rather that

qualify as a distinct species.

they form sub-specific varieties of sapiens neanderthalensis or soloensis, sapiens sapiens

is

Homo

sapiens, such as

and that modern man

Homo Homo

merely the sub-species that happens to have

been living during the

last thirty

thousand years or

ID

so.

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN

Homo

erectus

Since fossils of what was then

were

first

found

in the Trinil

known

as Pithecanthropus erectus

beds in Java, the island has yielded

further specimens and there can be

no doubt

that the species

living there during the Middle Pleistocene.

blage of fossils

is

Choukoutien near Pekin,

more important because

the

implements and

More

posits.

was

largest assem-

undoubtedly that from Middle Pleistocene beds

filling the rock-fissures at all

The

traces

a discovery

of fire, together with stone

bones came from the same de-

utilized animal

recently traces of the

same

Atlanthropus mauritanicus) have

species (needlessly termed

come

to light in Pleistocene

deposits exposed in a sand-pit at Ternifine near Palikao, Algeria.

The northern margin of the range a mandible

is

completed by the old find of

from Mauer near Heidelberg,

cene age. Morphologically these

also

of Middle Pleisto-

show as a group a notable mean of three crania from

fossils

increase in the size of the brain : the

Java gave a capacity of 860 cubic centimetres and that of four from

Choukoutien 1075 cubic centimetres, placing the group more or less intermediate

between Australopithecus and

show

the other hand they

them

a

Homo

from

off decisively

number of

Homo sapiens. On

characteristics that

sapiens.

Thus

mark

the skull (A.I)

has a low vault and frontal flattening, a marked ridge at the junction of the cess

is

two main

side bones,

smaller; the palate

is

and thick walls; the mastoid pro-

enormous and there

is

marked

alveolar prognathism, the lower part of the face projecting notice-

ably; the mandible the teeth, though

is

massive and, in the case of the Java

human

in general arrangement,

show

fossils,

tendencies

for the upper canines to overlap the lower ones and for a diastemic

gap to appear between the the mandible

is

incisors

and canines ; and the weight of

matched by a correspondingly massive develop-

ment of the supra-orbital and occipital brow-ridges, which, together with the flattened forehead, would probably strike us most forcibly were

we

to

meet an individual II

in the flesh.

MAN Homo

S

PLACE IN NATURE

sapiens

Homo sapiens can be presumed to have developed from the old Homo erectus stock. One of the few fossils of Homo sapiens type known for certain to date from the Middle Pleistocene is the Thames

incomplete cranium from Swanscombe in the Lower basin. It

is

particularly unfortunate that the frontal part

but since the surviving portion agrees more or

is

absent,

less closely

with

more complete cranium from Steinheim dating from an interstadial of the Riss glaciation, it is on the whole likely that it shared the massive brow-ridges of the German fossil, a feature

a

and heavy jaws.

that usually goes with large teeth

Much the most numerous fossils belonging to this stage in human evolution are those named after the original discovery at Neanderthal in the Rhineland. is

It is

important,

if a false

not to be formed of the characteristics of

this

impression

group, that

should be realized that the descriptions found in the early ture are based

represented

on what

by

now

it

litera-

appears to be an aberrant form, that

the early French finds at

La

Ferrassie

and La

Chapelle-aux-Saints. This classic west European form, which dates

from the

first

monly regarded as and to some extent

onset of the

Wiirm

glaciation,

is

now com-

a genetic variation in a territory marginal to isolated

by

ice-sheets; and, indeed, in indivi-

dual cases pathological deformation has to be taken into account.

The

leading features of this form of the Neanderthal sub-species

include, as

is

well

known,

a short stocky build, a flat-vaulted head

with pronounced brow-ridges

set rather

column, and massive chinless jaws Neanderthaloid

fossils

set

forward on the vertical with large

from more remote

teeth.

The

territories like those

from North Africa, the Levant, Iraq and Uzbekistan and those

from such European

localities as

Ehringsdorf in Germany and

Saccopastore in Italy that date from the interglacial preceding the

Wiirm

glaciation share these characteristics but to a less pro-

nounced degree. 12

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN Although they show a

clear continuity

of development from

the preceding stage, this whole early sapiens group, including the

aberrant Westerners, exhibit an outstanding advance in respect of

of brain; the cranial capacity of the Neanderthalers was well up to that of the average for modern man. There can hardly be any question, if we leave aside the aberrant form, that this group of fossils marks a significant stage in human evolution. size

A

point which will no doubt be further underlined as discovery

proceeds

is

that this evolution

Europe or contiguous of analogous forms

Ngandong on

was not by any means confined

parts of Africa

and Asia. The occurrence

Broken

as far afield as

to

Rhodesia and

Hill in

the River Solo in Java has already

made

this

plain.

Homo Men

sapiens sapiens

of modern type must have emerged from the sapiens stock

just described,

though hardly from the aberrant Chapelle-aux-

Saints form.

There

took place

any

pied

by

men

of

at

is

no need

the Neanderthaloids.

Homo

Advanced

to

assume that

particular locality within the

What

can be said

this

development

wide range occuis

that the earliest

sapiens sapiens type appeared in the context of

Palaeolithic culture,

which

itself

occupied a territory

extending from western Europe along either side of the Mediterranean to the Iranian plateau. In general the to use the lithic

name of a well-known

find

context in the Dordogne, was

slight build,

and a

Cromagnon

type,

from an Advanced Palaeo-

characterized

by

a relatively

fully upright posture; the skull lacked signs

strong muscular attachments; the forehead

of

was steep and well-

rounded; brow-ridges were only developed to a moderate degree and were never continuous; the teeth were relatively small; and the chin prominent. According to the overwhelming consensus

of professional opinion the existing races of

same

species that

years ago.

first

men belong

to this

emerged probably around forty thousand

MAN

PLACE IN NATURE

S

The modern races of man

When

and where did the various races of man diverge? The

question

is

particularly difficult to answer, because so

leading criteria

by which

as pigmentation

from

characteristics into

stance the type

as can hardly

such

be studied

Attempts have been made to read

some Advanced

first

many of the

racial differences are distinguished,

and hair form, are such

skeletal material.

first

Palaeolithic remains

—

racial

for in-

recognized from the Grimaldi Caves near

Mentone has been variously

interpreted as Negroid or primitive

Mediterranean and that from the rock-shelter of Chancelade in the

Dordogne has even been held

Eskimo

to be

in type

—but

the

dangers of drawing conclusions from such limited evidence are it is wisest to admit that we do not yet know when the races of Homo sapiens sapiens came into being. What seems most likely is that they arose as a result of gradual

obviously very great and

genetic diversification following

and colonization of new the final major

on the widespread migrations

territories that

glacial cycle.

occurred some time during

The degree

to

which the distribution

of certain well-defined pigmentation types specific environments, after due allowance

is

in

with that of

made

for the effect

fits

of migration since the period of characterization, close to suggest that differences of pigmentation to

some degree

adaptive: thus in the

is

sufficiently

must have been

Old World blonde

fair-

skinned people tend to go with a cool, cloudy habitat; brunettes

with the strong sunlight and bright skies of climates

like that

of

the Mediterranean area; the darkest skinned with the hottest,

non-forested regions (for example, the savannah of Africa) ; and those with yellowish skin and crinkly hair with the tropical rainforests

of Africa and south-east Asia. Again, there are sound

reasons for Hnking width of nasal aperture with climate, since

it is

a function of the nose to mitigate the temperature of the air before it is

drawn

into the lungs

:

it is

therefore not at

all

surprising to

observe the narrow nostrils of the Eskimo or even the North 14

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN European, the medium ones of the Mediterranean or the broad ones of the Negro. Yet it would be quite wrong to suppose that geographical variations were necessarily adaptive, since the

all

which must have increased

isolation

man

as

extended his geo-

graphical range could well in itself have been sufficient to pro-

mote genetic

A

last

variations.

point to

make

is

that

was only during the

it

final stages

man spread over the greater part of the of men were confined to the warmer parts

of the Pleistocene that

The

earth.

early types

of the Old World

from Algeria

their remains are

:

Cape;

to the

Europe

in

England and central Germany; tains

in

and as

far east as the

divide

A. R. Wallace.

It

Makassar

Strait,

moun-

was not that

until

some time

Homo sapiens

and spread on the one hand into the into Australia

glacial

occupied northern Eurasia

New World and on the other to New Zealand.

human

settlement over progressively wider

one of the major themes of the prehistory of Late-

is

and Neothermal times

book:

collaborator,

he had emerged

after

and Tasmania and across Polynesia

extension of

territories

coinciding with the great

by Darwin's

recognized

first

modern form

in his

this

north as lowland

as far

western Asia up to the

of northern Iran; in India, south-east Asia and Indonesia;

biological

The

found widely over Africa

it

to

be treated in

was made possible by the

later chapters

character of Homo sapiens as a biological species, but above the possession of culture,

of

relatively unspecialized all

by means of which man has been

by

able

to adapt himself to the widest range of environments.

ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE For human beings the Pleistocene or Quaternary epoch has the supreme as

interest that

organisms and

it

spanned the crucial stage in

at the

same time witnessed the astonishing

was

growth

in their culture that

literacy

and some awareness of

2

their evolution

to lead

their 15

own

them fate

in

due course to

and destiny.

If

CWP

we

MAN include within

it

S

PLACE IN NATURE

the last ten or twelve thousand years constituting

the Recent or Holocene, the Pleistocene

epoch

in geology.

far the briefest,

Equally and with the same proviso,

it

was by

whether we allow half a million or a million and a

two million years

half or even

was the most recent

for

its

duration.

Even

so

it

was

a

period of profound and often repeated climatic change, change

which can hardly have done other than affect more or less markedly the physical and cultural evolution of mankind.

The major on

divisions of the Pleistocene have been distinguished

a basis of palaeontology. Deposits dating

Pleistocene are consistently

kind

first

recognized

at

marked by

fiom the Lower

a faunal assemblage of the

Villefranche-sur-Mer, including such well-

defined forms as Dinotherium^ Stylohipparion^ Sivatherium and

Elephas {Archidiskodon) meridionalis.

By

the Middle Pleistocene

had disappeared and new ones had arrived new genus of elephant, Elephas {Palaeoloxodon) The emergence of a developed form oi Elephas (Mam-

these archaic forms

including a antiquus.

muthus) primigenius was one of the distinguishing marks of the

Upper

Pleistocene.

On

the other

hand the Recent or Holocene

epoch, during which the environment as a whole assumed

its

present character, witnessed the disappearance of this as of other species

now

extinct. If

analysis, the transition

we

accept the findings of potassium/argon

from the Lower

to the

Middle Pleistocene

occurred some four or five hundred thousand years ago.

seems to be generally agreed

which

least is

known and

have been taken tially

longer,

is

that the

in the course

in the process

most probably

Lower

What

Pleistocene, about

of which

vital steps

must

of hominization, lasted substan-

at least three

and possibly even four

or five times longer than the rest of the epoch. Precisely

Upper Pleistocene began has not

when

the

yet been determined, but pro-

toactinium/ thorium analysis indicates an age of around 108,000 years for the peak of the glaciation that introduced

carbon dates are only available for the years and only for the

last thirty

last fifty

do they

16

fall

it.

Radio-

or sixty thousand

within an acceptable

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN range of probability. Nevertheless

it seems likely that the last major glaciation (Weichsel/Wurm of Europe) began within a few thousand years of 65,000 before the present and that within this

glaciation the

first

major

interstadial

(Laufen/Gottweig)

fell

with-

in the period 40/50,000 years ago.

Subdivisions

When we

of the

Ice

Age

we no

apostrophize the Pleistocene as the Ice Age,

longer imply that the expansion of ice-sheets was a once-and-forall

phenomenon.

whole

series

On

the contrary the Pleistocene witnessed a

of glaciations interrupted by

interglacial periods

during which temperatures rose above those prevailing in recent times. In the present temperate zone

and

at

higher altitudes even

we may judge from

in the tropics, there were, if

the evidence

obtained from cores taken from ocean beds, some fifteen major phases of increased glaciation during the Quaternary period. this recurrence

of

glacial

and

It is

interglacial episodes that offers the

best possibilities of subdividing the main chapters of the Pleisto-

Once again, it is important to emphasize that so far as the Lower Pleistocene is concerned the geological record is woefully incomplete on dry land where alone it can be related directly to the archaeological record. This is understandable when we concene.

sider the destructive effect of the repeated glaciations of

geological traces survive.

Even so

Europe the main

that in areas as well studied as

story are reasonably complete

which

there are reasons for thinking

at least for the

outlines of the

Middle and Upper

Pleistocene. If

it is

true that the explanation for glacial fluctuations

cosmic order, linked with changes in solar radiation, that they should be

This least

is

still

very

it

is

of a

follows

more or less synchronous wherever they occur.

much

in the realm of hypothesis but

it is

at

encouraging that radiocarbon checks have already demon-

strated the contemporaneity of certain episodes in the later stages

of the Upper Pleistocene. There

is

17

a real

hope

that

more

intensive a-2

MAN Main

S

PLACE IN NATURE

Pleistocene sequences in

Europe

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN deposits like laterite. Tliis

means

worked

out,

that they offer possibilities for

When more

establishing local sequences.

when radiocarbon and

been applied to them and above

of these have been

other methods of dating have

when

all

greater understanding

has been reached about the explanation of their causes possible to incorporate

geochronology.

What

them

a

in

beyond

it

may be

world-wide framework of

major changes in precipitation occurred in these regions they must have affected

more or

less

is

cavil is that in so far as

profoundly the circumstances of Hfe for

prehistoric communities.

Geographical and biological changes in the Ice Age

The

fluctuations of climate dramatically symbolized

by

the ex-

pansion and contraction of ice-sheets transformed the setting of

man

early

across

its

whole range. For

instance, the alternate

locking-up and release of vast quantities of water as ice-sheets

over the world alternately expanded and contracted

—and

all

one

has to remember that the largest ice-sheets might be thousands of feet thick

—

affected ocean-levels, not

merely

in glaciated areas

but

over the whole world. Periods of glaciation were in general

marked by

by

their

the eustatic lowering of ocean-levels and interglacials

corresponding

rise.

Although

formation of major ice-sheets passed

by

of

and

ice

whole was

this

local isostatic depression

in regions central to the

might be

offset or

alternate recovery, the effect over the

its

to alter,

sometimes quite

even sur-

of the land under the weight

drastically, the

world

as a

shape of land-

masses. For instance during glacial phases in areas immediately outside isostatic depressions continents were

most of Indonesia was joined shelf;

more

to south-east Asia

by

extensive: the

Sunda

New Guinea and Tasmania were both attached to Australia;

north-east Siberia was linked by a broad land-bridge to Alaska;

mention an example on a smaller

and

to

on

wide front

a

that if climatic

to the

scale Britain

European continent.

change was

sufficiently

19

It

was joined

goes without saying

pronounced during the

MAN

S

PLACE IN NATURE

Pleistocene to alter the basic geography of the world

can also be

it

expected to have had the most profound influence on living

on man himself and on the animals and

things,

plants

on which

directly or indirectly he sustained Hfe.

The and

fluctuations of climate implied

interglacial episodes involved

tional

and faunal

distributions.

shifts in

vegeta-

For example, when ice-sheets and

must have happened with every

forests

the succession of glacial

encroached on formerly temperate zones,

periglacial conditions as

by

corresponding

meant

glacial advance, this

had to give place to open vegetation and that

that

in the animal

world sylvan species were replaced by ones adapted to steppe or tundra; and, conversely, during interglacial or interstadial phases, as well as during the

Recent period following the

the ice, the situation

was

reversed. Further,

it

last retreat

of

need hardly be

emphasized that ecological displacement was by no means confined to territories immediately adjacent to the ice-sheets. glacial periods

it

displaced, but to

was not merely the temperate zones

some degree

nearer the equator.

must

in turn

During

that

were

the sub-tropical arid zones shifted

At such times

also the equatorial rain forests

have undergone some contraction. Conversely dur-

ing interglacial and interstadial periods, not forgetting the Recent period, the equatorial rain-forest expanded, the sub-tropical arid

zone moved further away and the forest spread again over

terri-

by open vegetation. The impact of such changes on early man can only be fully imagined when it is remembered how closely his life was linked tory formerly occupied

with that of the animals and plants on which he depended for subsistence.

Men, no

ecosystems.

They have

less

than other species, must needs Hve in

to establish

the habitat (soil and climate) and life)

in

definite

which they

exist

transmissible

structured.

The

some kind of relationship

biome (vegetation and animal

and being men they have

patterns

by which which

cultural apparatus of

these

to evolve

relations

are

archaeologists study

the surviving traces embodies the patterns developed

20

to

by

particu-

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN lar It

communities for coping with particular ecological situations. follows that any drastic change, whether this occurs in the

sphere of the habitat or biome or for that matter in the sphere of culture,

must have involved readjustment,

either

through migra-

tion or cultural innovation, as the only alternative to decline and

ultimate extinction; for natural selection in a

way applies no less

to

human

however roundabout

societies than to

any other societies

of living organisms.

much more complete

Until a

picture of ecological change has

been built up

in different parts of the world it follows that our understanding of the underlying causes of the movements and cultural changes of which prehistory is composed must remain

imperfect.

Neothermal climate

The Neothermal acquired

its

era, in the

course of which the environment

present character and

secure basis for subsistence

from there went on

men

achieved a more

first

by developing a farming economy and

to create distinctive

urban

civilizations, did

not begin until between ten and twelve thousand years ago. In the northern hemisphere, where tions,

it is

it

was marked by

Post-glacial condi-

commonly defined by the moment at which

cene ice-sheets began their navian ice-sheet sediments laid

it

final retreat.

has been established

down

the Pleisto-

In the case of the Scandi-

by counting

the varved

in melt-water that the retreat

Fenno-scandian moraine began

c.

8300

from the

a date confirmed

B.C.,

by

the radiocarbon age of the transition from Late-glacial to Postglacial vegetation (zones III

hand

and IV of Table,

in territories comparatively

glaciation

it

looks as

if

p. 23).

the final and quite brief pause in the con-

traction of the ice-sheets, corresponding with the

of the European sequence,

may

Quaternary sequence. In these

where the

On the other

remote from the centres of

decisive steps

not have registered in the

territories,

were taken 21

Younger Dryas

in the

which include those emergence of civiliza-

MAN

S

PLACE IN NATURE

Neothermal conditions evidently began about the same time

tion,

as the abortive onset

of temperate conditions in the north

as the Aller0d oscillation (zone II

The

of Table,

known

p. 23).

establishment of temperate conditions in territories for-

merly glaciated or subject to the influence of ice-sheets was both a gradual

To

and an uneven process.

but gradual

rise

followed by an Altithermal one

maximum some same

begin with there was a slow

of temperature. This Anathermal period was

when

temperatures rose to a

2|°C. higher than those prevailing today in the

latitudes. Finally

came the Medithermal period

of which conditions prevailing

at the

in the course

present day were established.

of Neothermal time there remains the possi-

For a

finer division

bility

of zoning the sequence of vegetation by means of pollen-

analysis.

The most complete

results obtained so far are those

gained from analyses of samples taken from successive sediments

formed

in the

beds of lakes since the withdrawal of the ice-sheets

(Table, p. 23).

of the

effect

period

From

the earliest sediments

final oscillations

when

possible to see the

it is

of climate during the Late-glacial

the ice-sheets were beginning to contract.

The

Allerod oscillation for example was sufficiently pronounced for trees

—

birch and even in

some

localities

—

pine

to colonize the

landscape previously occupied by Dryas vegetation, a vegetation

without precise parallels today but which combined with pre-

dominantly tundra species others of Alpine and even steppe

During the Anathermal, when

a Boreal type of climate with colder

winters and brief summers that became progressively

time went on prevailed in what forests

birch, willow

gradually was trees

is

which established themselves

an open landscape were

at first

now in

possible for the

warmer

as

temperate Europe, the

what had formerly been

composed

and pine that could it

habit.

exclusively of trees like

tolerate cold conditions; only

warmth-demanding deciduous

and the shrub hazel to establish themselves. By contrast,

during the Altithermal

when an

Atlantic type of climate with

higher temperatures and a diminished contrast between 22

summer

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN Periodiiadon of the Late-glacial and Post-glacial in north-west Europe Radiocarbon dates B.C.

CHAPTER

2

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS Tool-making as a

criterion

of man

Although most palaeontologists agree

that the assumption of an

upright posture was sufficiently important to justify separating the hominids from the great apes, few possible to distinguish

those hominids that remained attained the status of

To

man.

so to say, to justify himself

much

biological so

interrelationship

biological

may

prehuman and those

qualify as

by works

as cultural.

must

would maintain

that

it is

on purely zoological grounds between

exist

Yet

;

it

human,

a

that

had

hominid

has,

the criteria are

no longer

remains true that a close

between cultural achievement and

endowment. The adoption of an

erect posture,

which

well have been a response to the thinning of forest and the

consequent need to cross open country between one area of woodland and another, in

itself facilitated

the acquisition of culture;

the freeing of the hands from locomotion made them

available

and ultimately for tool-making; and these

activities

for tool-using

stimulated the development of the brain. facilitated

it

by modifying

At the same time they

the architecture of the skull: the

diminishing role of the teeth for eating and manipulating had the effisct

of reducing their

size,

the weight of the jaw and the strength

of the brow-ridges and muscular attachments. the two-footed stance had

hominids survived

its

who made

weapons. Indeed the

On

the other hand

dangers, and ultimately only those

an intelligent use of tools and

ability to acquire culture

was evidently of

adaptive value in the sense that the strains most capable of doing so were those

whose genotypes were propagated most abundantly

in the course

of natural selection. This

24

may

well explain

why

the

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS increase in the size of the brain that permitted ever greater

advances in culture developed so rapidly in the course of Pleistocene times. Even the biological evolution of the most advanced

hominids was thus

in large

measure an outcome of developments

in culture.

In

many ways

most

make

tool-making

is

tools.

it is

striking of these,

and certainly the one is

the

Here the distinction between tool-using and

one that needs stressing:

grown out of the

has

most

likely to find reflection in the archaeological record,

ability to

By

the

other, but

as a fabricator that

the use of a tool

man is

it

may be

true that

one

important to emphasize that

it is

stands out from his fellow primates.

meant the

active manipulation

by an

organism for the furtherance of its aims of some object taken from the external environment: thus, to quote

Dr W. H. Thorpe's

example, a Californian sea-otter bringing boulders up from the

sea-bottom to crack molluscs

using a tool, whereas a gull drop-

is

ping a mollusc on a rock to break in the true sense can be traced far

of life, but

sticks

not doing

so.

Tool-using

back among quite lowly forms

does not of itself imply intelligence or insight. Even

it

the great apes, though showing

of

it is

and

strings

some

dexterity in the manipulation

and in the stacking of boxes, reveal grave

limitations in their behaviour.

For

instance, they

show

little

understanding of statics, and in the handHng of boxes rely almost entirely this is

on blind improvisation rather than

even more

significant

—

insight.

sively to securing visible objectives, so that even

preparation fit

—and

when some

involved, such as sharpening the end of one stick to

into a socket, the element of foresight and planning

very

is

really

By contrast, tool-making and the building of struceven among the most primitive human societies, are based

slight.

tures,

on

is

Again

their activities are directed exclu-

a precise

knowledge of raw materials and, within the

the technology prevailing, of how

Moreover,

much

it is

characteristic

of

most

limits

of

effectively to handle them.

human

beings that they have a

greater appreciation of the factor of time than the other

25

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS primates in their oral (and in due course literary) traditions they :

draw on memories of the cultural capital;

past,

which serve them

as a

kind of

and by taking account of the future they gain the

may in

impetus needed to undertake operations which

themselves

be long-drawn out, and to meet contingencies not always precisely foreseeable.

Even

so

it

is

worth

reflecting that the distinction

natural objects and artifacts tools

made under

between

not always sharply defined. All

is

primitive conditions were after

from natural objects and even the forms found

fabricated

all

in nature

had often

be broken or in some degree modified before they could be

to

conveniently handled. distinction.

When we

We

therefore have to

make an

arbitrary

ask ourselves what degree of modification

material objects have to exhibit before

we

can accept them as the

artifacts

of man, a useful reply might be: 'when they belong to a

class or

assemblage of objects modified according to a standard

pattern'. suit a

we

The odd

piece of bone or stone modified or

passing need need not of

itself

improved

imply humanity.

It is

to

when

can detect the systematic shaping of materials in accordance

with some arbitrary design that

we

feel

ourselves confronted

by

work of men conditioned by a cultural pattern, a pattern by belonging to a society rather than to a biological species. Even this may not be as simple as it sounds and we do the

acquired

well to reflect that

on the evolutionary hypothesis

the manufacture

of tools must have emerged without any clear break from the of natural forms.

utilization

While

it

may not be the case

were fabricated from

flint

from these have an overriding arises

that the earliest standardized tools

or other kinds of stone, artifacts interest to the prehistorian.

made This

mainly from their hardness and durability. They were the

dominant elements that they

in the

technology of early

were not only supremely

man

in the sense

eflective in their

own

right

but were also of vital importance for shaping the softer materials

used for a wide range of equipment. At the same time they were

26

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS main and

the

remote ages.

too frequently the only element to survive from

all

One of their few

disadvantages is that they were as capable under certain conditions of being shaped by purely

by human

natural as

forces. Critical study has

and again that some of the

demonstrated again

and stones on which early

flints

prehistorians relied as evidence for the

first

were

tools

in fact the

product of quite other forces. Thus, the so-called 'Cromerian' industry

is

now

regarded as the product of wave action on the

coast of Norfolk in eastern England;

many of the 'eoliths' of southern England and France are interpreted as the outcome of soil-creep or alternatively of pressure

solution of underlying strata; and

industry of Zambia was

made by

and movement

now seems

it

set

up by the

that the 'Kafuan'

rapids and waterfalls in steep

gorges. This has led prehistorians to pay special regard to material obtained

from

those exposed in bed

When

fossils

I

actual living-floors of early hominids, like in

Olduvai Gorge

of Australopithecus

was

it

As soon, however,

as traces

was responsible both boisei

The

that the

was

associated.

the

more economical hypothesis

more advanced type of hominid

for shaping the implements

human

and for

killing

palaeontologists to agree whether the

hominid should be regarded merely

it is

new

pithecus or

species of man,

as a variant

Homo

Homo

plausibility

—

new

of A. africanus or

habilis. If for

the sake of

admitted that on morphological grounds the

might with equal

—

was responsible it

conclusions to be drawn from this are complicated by

classified as a

true

as

along with the other food animals represented on the

the failure of

argument

which

known

assumed by

of a hominid anatomically closer to

man came to light in the same bed was favoured, namely

floor.

at first

prehistorians that this form of hominid

for fabricating the stone implements with

A.

in Tanzania.

boisei (originally

Zinjanthropus) were found in this bed

some

lithic

fossils

be assigned to the genus Australo-

a possibility not so

remarkable

if

evolution

is

the question arises whether the issue might not be decided

by taking account of behavioural 27

factors.

The

practice of making

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS Stone industries to socially determined patterns might well be held to

be an index of behaviour of great diagnostic value. The mere

fact that

H.

hahilis

industry of bed

I

at

was responsible

for the chopper

Olduvai might from

taken as evidence that H. hahilis

is

this point

and

flake

of view be

well named, since there

is

no

evidence that any of the primates unequivocally classified under the genus Australopithecus

made

flint

or stone implements to

purposive and therefore recognizable patterns. Fossils of Australopithecines are frequently found in deposits

from which no stone

and contrariwise when they do occur

tools have been claimed

with these they either accompany traces of more man-like Primates or belong to the Middle Pleistocene plentiful. If the

bed

at

I

view

is

taken that the

when such were

more man-like

Olduvai ought nevertheless to be included

fossils

in the

Australopithecus^ this does not greatly alter the picture.

merely mean

It

from

genus

would

that stone tool-making to purposive patterns

was

achieved at a stage of hominid evolution immediately antecedent to the It is

emergence of the

earliest

generally accepted

by

men.

primatologists that not merely the

Australopithecines and man, but great apes

also gibbons,

monkeys and

were anatomically adapted to a certain

mental activity; and such

activity has in fact

level

the

of imple-

been observed

among non-human primates in the wild. It may well be that natural objects of wood or other organic materials were systematically if

so

shaped to conventional patterns by Australopithecines, but

no evidence

for this

is

available.

suggestion that A. africanus

What we do have is a strong

made use of

selected animal bones.

Analysis of the animal bones recovered from the cave of Maka-

pansgat in South Africa in association with suggests that these formed a far from

contrary they

show evident

fossils

of this primate

random sample.

On

the

signs of having been selected with

a definite preference for forms that might have been particularly useful as tools or weapons.

man

did precisely

this,

It

was claimed long ago

although in the 28

latter case

that

Peking

of course a

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS recognizable stone industry was also being produced. Yet

needs to be emphasized that there

no suggestion

is

it

that A. afri-

more than break the bones he selected with a view to making them easier to use: there is no sign that the bones were

canus did

shaped by working to purposive and standardized patterns. As a matter of fact

shaping bone tools was a comparatively

facility in

development

late

in prehistoric technology.

The evolution offlint- and stone-working

By

far the greater

bulk of the evidence relating to the culture of

man comprises the artifacts of flint and stone upon way of life ultimately depended. These and the tech-

Palaeolithic

which

his

nology of which they are the products and expression provide the only thread that runs

all

through the early prehistory of man.

Fortunately evolutionary forces were as active in the sphere of

technology as they were in that of biology. The mere technology was concerned with sustaining and process of living ensures that selection in the

same way

which provided

a

replace those

more

as

it

in the

long run to

organisms by and large techniques :

effective

which were

was subject

fact that

facilitating the

form of livelihood were

The

less effective.

likely to

trend was for obso-

technology to drop out in favour of innovations acquired by

lete

was thus

the transmitting generation. Progress

system. Yet, as prehistory shows,

it

built into the

proceeded slowly enough

even in regions most productive of innovation since inevitably opposed role

was

by

the conservative forces

whose

men from

the other animals.

It

was

essential

to ensure transmission of the cultural heritage

alone distinguished

it

is

which hardly

surprising that these forces were strongest where the social in-

heritance

was most exiguous. That

is

why

progress was so ex-

tremely slow during the earlier phases of prehistory.

Yet

it

is

Palaeolithic

As

is

possible to observe a clear progression during the

Age

in the technology of

working

flint

and stone.

only to be expected of the product of an evolutionary pro29

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS cess, the discernible stages are rarely clear-cut. It is

one form of technology gave place

that

not so

much

to another as that techni-

cal possibilities

were enlarged by the adoption of new processes.

The degree of

overlap argues that the changes on which pre-

historians rely for periodization

were

brought about by

as a rule

the spread of ideas rather than as a result of actual

people. Again, to

more often than not

movements of

particular industries are seen

combine techniques from more than one stage of development.

Among

on the same time-

the factors that caused peoples living

plane to retain or discard old forms while adopting

were of course variations

in the

to adapt. Before listing the

major stages

the

Old Stone Age

to

new ones

which they had

technology during

in lidiic

needs to be emphasized with some vigour

although they formed a homotaxial sequence in the sense

that,

that

it

environment

however incomplete the succession the order was invariably

the same, they were only on rare occasions and as

chance synchronous in different

follows the succession of stone technologies

with the major phases of the older Stone

is

Age

monly conceived of in Europe and contiguous

it

were by

In the table that

territories.

equated broadly

as these are

com-

parts of Africa

and

Asia.

A point that needs emphasis is that although these modes were homotaxial they were by no means universal. For one thing the territories

occupied by early

man tended

to increase in the course

of prehistory as cultures were adapted to an ever-widening range of environments. For another the competition, which in the long run ensured technological advance, only applied to regions accessible to the spread

mote from those

in

of new

ideas. In territories relatively re-

which innovations

first

appeared old forms

of technology might survive from the mere

mained without challenge. Industries

in

mode

fact that i,

they re-

which must have

been practised over an immensely long period of time, are found over the whole territory occupied by early man.

on the other hand

failed

Mode

2 industries

to reach south-east Asia or China.

30

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS Conventional divisions of

Dominant

lithic technologies

Mode

5

:

microlithic

Mode

4

:

punch-struck blades with steep retouch

Mode

3

:

flake tools

Mode

2.:

bifacially flaked hand-axes"!

Mode

I

chopper-tools and flakes

Mode

:

components of composite

artifacts

Mesolithic

Advanced

from prepared cores

3 industries still did

East, but

Lower

\

Palaeolithic

J

not penetrate these regions in the Far

Russia and Inner Asia. This makes

men

first

it

less

first

into

European

when way of Indonesia tradition in Mode i.

of a surprise that

spread into Australia by

they should have carried with them a

When men

Palaeolithic

Middle Palaeolithic

on the other hand extended northwards

for example

Age

the older Stone

spread into

lithic

more northerly

parts of

Eurasia they brought with them industries of these were carried successively into the

New

Europe and

modes 4 or

5

and

World.

Physical evolution and cultural progress

made

Seeing that tool-making

exceptional calls

correlation of hands, eyes and brain,

it

on the accurate

would be surprising

if

no

broad degree of correlation existed between the appearance of successive advances in the manufacture of

flint

and stone tools

and the emergence of progressively more advanced types of men. Yet there was no precise link between the two. For instance

H.

erectus continued for

tradition that

some time

to develop the chopper-tool

was apparently inaugurated by H.

habilis,

but he

went on to evolve the hand-axe. Again, the hand-axe tradition

was

H.

its

peak of development by early forms of

was H.

sapiens in his broadly Neanderthaloid

carried forward to

sapiens, but

it

phase of development tradition. It

who was

responsible for the prepared core

might therefore be wrong to read too

fact that the final stages in Palaeolithic lithic

with

highly significant

much

into the

technology, along

break-throughs in the sphere of 31

human

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS awareness, were associated with the appearance of (//. sapietis sapiens).

both

after all

The biological and

modern man

cultural evolution of man

unfolded in the same temporal medium. As

we have

seen there was in general no close linkage between the successive

types of

men and

There

no

is

particular stages of technical achievement.

justification for the idea that

reason or another were as the inhabitants

the Middle and earlier stage

that

left

people

who

one

for

temporarily behind at a technical level,

of east Asia apparently were during much of

Upper

Pleistocene,

must have continued

of physical evolution. Nothing

is

more

in

an

certain than

even the simplest and apparently most primitive cultures of

modern times were borne by people whose claim to the status of H. sapiens sapiens was just as valid as that of the anthropologists who discovered them. The physical characteristics of men including their present racial characteristics are one thing. Their cultural characteristics

which can be transmitted quite rapidly through

social contacts are quite another.

Some

basic elements

of Palaeolithic economy

If the systematic manufacture of implements as an aid to lating the also

environment was a characteristic of the

earliest

was the form of their economy. To judge from the

materials recovered

from

manipu-

men, so

biological

his settlements in different parts of

Europe, Africa and Asia Palaeolithic

man

enjoyed even from the

remotest periods a diet far more nearly omnivorous than that of

any of the surviving non-human primates. In particular early

man was

a meat-eater.

Whereas the

great apes,

though not averse

to an occasional taste of animal food, are predominantly vegetarian,

the earliest

men whose food

debris

is

known

to us

able to secure a wide range of animal meat. If

mainly restricted to comparatively small game, applies to

H.

erectus,

whose

ability as a

were evidently

H.

this

hahilis

was

by no means

hunter stands in striking

contrast with the poverty of his material aids. There seems

doubt that

man found

no

himself and emerged as a dominant species 32

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS first

and foremost

of his

as a hunter.

One

result

of enlarging the range

was in the long run to make it possible for him to much wider range of environment, something in which

diet

explore a

he was greatly helped

as time

went on by the development of his

Another was

material equipment.

to initiate the sub-division

of

labour that was to prove one of the mainsprings of gress : whereas

human promen pursued game and when necessary fought one

another, their mates concentrated on nurturing the family and

gathering plants and small items of animal foods such as eggs and insects. It

was the economic partnership of the

than anything else underlay the

which grew

human

sexes that

more

family, an institution

in importance with every increase in the scope

and

range of the culture which each generation had to acquire in

The importance of nurture is reflected in the growing importance of the home base. Palaeolithic man remained preinfancy.

datory: he bred no animals and grew no plants but depended on

what he could catch or

collect

he needed extensive areas for

had to

live in small

enough

necessary for

him

his support.

It

follows that

This meant that he

widely dispersed groups, comprising

man

adults to

from wild nature.

to

the hunt.

Even so

it

at

most

would generally be

move, sometimes over extensive

territories,

in the course of the year exploiting natural sources of food as

these ripened and matured. Yet the

home-base

far

most primitive man needed a

more permanent and substantial than the nightly

nests of chimpanzees.

The longer the young needed for protection

and education the more equipment was needed in daily

life,

the

more important cooking became, the more vital it was to secure a base close to game and water and congenial for living where the tasks essential for

Articulate speech It

human

and self-awareness

can be assumed, even

slight, that early

world to

living could be performed.

if

the surviving evidence

is

necessarily

man must have owed his domination of the animal much less tangible than his technology or

qualities

33

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS mode of subsistence. ability to

In particular he must have

his experience

and ensure the proper functioning of the

One of the

defined societies in which he lived.

which he

owed much

to his

understand his environment, accumulate and pass on

classified his

artificially

principal

ways

in

surroundings, pooled and transmitted his

experiences and developed traditional

modes of behaviour was of

course articulate speech. Students of the great apes are agreed that one of their greatest

drawbacks

is

the lack of speech,

which alone

them acquiring the elements of culture.

It is

is

sufficient to

prevent

true that chimpanzees

have a wider 'register of emotional expression' than most

humans and

that they are able to

communicate

to

one another not

only their emotional states but also definite desires and urges; yet, as

Kohler has emphasized,

'

gamut of phonetics

their

is

entirely

"subjective", and can only express emotions, never designate or describe objects'. In this connection

it is

interesting that in their

famous enterprise of bringing up the chimpanzee Viki from the

Dr and Mrs Hayes found

age of three days to three years, possible to train her to certain

months of intensive hands and

feet'.

commands, but

tuition to get her

'

it

failed after eighteen

to identify her nose, eyes,

Until hominids had developed

words

as

symbols,

the possibility of transmitting, and so accumulating, culture

hardly existed. Again, as Thorpe has remarked, man's prelinguistic

counting ability or squirrels in control

:

is

only of about the same order as that of birds

serious mathematics, with

of the environment that

it

all

the

portends,

immense advances

first

became possible

with the development of symbols. Speech, involving the use of symbols, must have been one of the Its is

first

indications of humanity.

only drawback as a criterion for the prehistorian

no hope of being

able to verify

its

is

that there

existence directly for the

remotest ages of man. Despite suggestions, to the contrary, the best palaeontological opinion

is

against the notion that articulate

speech can be inferred either from the conformation of the

mandible or from study of

casts taken

34

of the inner surfaces of

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS skulls.

Probably the best clue

is

the appearance of tools of

standardized and recognizable form, since these can have been popularized

it

is

hard to see

how

and transmitted without the use

of verbal symbols. Palpable evidence of increasing self-awareness

from

a comparatively late stage of prehistory. It

we

Upper Pleistocene

that

burial of the dead

by Middle

towards the end, first

at a

get the

first

is

first

appears

not until the

evidence for systematic

Palaeolithic

man.

And

it

is

only

time of rapid technical innovation, that

we

encounter evidence for self-adornment and the practice of art,

in each case in the context of

H.

sapiens sapiens.

Chopper-tool {mode i) industries

Chopper-tools, which in most regions could most conveniently

be made by striking a few flakes from the side of a pebble in one or two directions, formed the most important element, along with their associated flakes, in the material

H.

hahilis

equipment not only of

but also of the various forms of H. erectus to flourish in

different parts

of Africa, Asia and Europe during the opening

phases of the Middle Pleistocene. Moreover, in those parts of eastern Asia that never adopted the hand-axe the tradition persisted in

some degree down

to the

end of the Pleistocene; and

it

looks as though the industrial tradition taken by the earliest colonists

into

Pleistocene

was

Australia at an advanced stage of the also basically of

mode

i.

Geographically this industrial tradition sive with the areas occupied

by

Upper

was broadly co-exten-

the earliest men. Their presence

in East Africa has already been remarked. In North Africa they have been particularly well studied in Morocco where they first

appeared in the context of a Villefranchian fauna and continued to develop through several stages of the Middle Pleistocene.

Recent discoveries have indicated that in the west they occupied territories as far north as central Europe, where for example well-defined chopper and flake tools 35

made from pebbles of

chert

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS and quartzite have been recovered with animal bones of Middle Pleistocene age in a travertine quarry at Vertesszollos in Hungary.

Indeed,

if

we

accept the

flint

industries

belonging to the same tradition, far as the

we

named

western part of the North European Plain.

their range also extends

The Soan

industries

differing

the

in the first

of

shown

a variety of industries

made

and sometimes intractable material, but conforming pattern, notably the

Tampanian of Malaya and In

among

be recognized, outside those of the North China

same basic

to the

the east

from Middle Pleistocene deposits

Plain. South-east Asia has

from

To

from the Tropics to the Temperate zone.

north-west of the Indian sub-continent were their kind to

Clacton as

after

can say that they extended as

Anyathian of Burma, the

the Pajitanian of Indonesia.

many cases it is unhappily

the case that the stone implements

themselves and the geological deposits in which they are found

provide us with the only source of information about the people

who made selves

To H.

them. Sometimes

we

get remains of the makers them-

and quite often traces of the animals

on which they

judge from what has been recovered from bed habilis

had already gone some way

diet characteristic

and

it

The men of

Olduvai

at

to adopting the omnivorous

of man; he not only caught

game, but certainly managed animals.

I

lived.

fish,

birds and small

to secure the carcasses of large

Vertesszollos had a pronounced meat diet

seems evident from the charring of some of the discarded

meat bones

that they

had the use of

with more certainty to the early

North China Little is

known

exists

The same

applies

(//. erectus pekinensis)

and

of the

Plain.

from Chanchiawo mation

men

fire.

yet in detail about the in Shensi.

Lower

Pleistocene finds

On the other hand a wealth

of infor-

about the finds from Choukoutien. The

earliest

deposits at locus 13, dating from early in the Middle Pleistocene,

yielded a typical chopping tool

made by

alternate flaking

from a

The main

fissure

chert pebble, giving a sinuous working-edge. (locus

i),

dating from rather later in the Middle Pleistocene and

36

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS the source of remains of upwards of forty representatives of

Peking man, has produced a wealth of stone

artifacts

intractable materials like green-stone, coarse chert

must be admitted

that

many of these were

It

so crudely fashioned

would hardly have been recognized

that they

made from

and quartz.

as

human

if re-

covered from an ordinary geological deposit. Nevertheless the industry,

much of the

material of

which was brought

and which was intimately associated with

human

traces

of fire and other

activity, has certain well-defined characteristics

tools comparable to the hand-axes of Africa

no

Europe and south-west Asia; pebbles and

to the site

flakes

:

there are

and parts of

were employed

flakes

had sometimes been formed

by crushing nodules between two

boulders, resulting in signs

as materials for tools

of percussion irregular;

and the

at either

end; secondary retouch was scarce and

and the leading tools were intended for chopping and

scraping, the former generally

few

made from

pebbles, from

which a

had been struck to form irregular working-edges, and

flakes

form smooth edges.

the latter

by trimming lumps or

With

rudimentary stone equipment, supplemented by such

this

tools as he

was

living largely

able to shape

on the

flesh

by

flakes to

its aid,

Peking man succeeded in

of his competitors in the animal world.

To judge from the animal remains associated with him, Peking man depended largely on venison, since two-thirds of them belong to

two

species of deer,

daxis grayi. Yet he

namely Euryceros pachyosteus and Pseu-

by no means

restricted himself to this

meat

and his victims seem to have included elephants, two kinds of rhinoceros, bison, water-buffaloes, horses, camels, wild boars,

roebucks, antelopes and sheep, not to mention such carnivores as sabre-toothed tigers, leopards, cave bears and a huge hyena.

How

he managed to secure

only speculate.

No

this varied selection

of game

we

can

specialized projectile-heads have survived in

the archaeological record, but to judge from evidence from else-

where he would have had hardened in

fire

and

it

available

wooden

seems likely in

37

spears with the tip

view of the character of

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS some of his victims

that he

The meagreness of

his material

would have used primitive

pit-traps.

equipment only emphasizes the

important part that team-work, based on articulate speech and

on

a conscious

network of social

must have played even

relations,

of development, when groups were so small and

at this early stage

we should recognize the immense who in the face of powerful and made their way and our way in the

so sparsely scattered. Equally

courage of these primitive men, largely final

unknown

resort

by

forces

—

vanquishing animals larger,

One of their most discoloured

most of

—

prowess as hunters, by confronting and

their

faster

and stronger than themselves.

important aids was

fire

and

it

was

in layers

by burning and mixed with ash and charcoal that was found. Fire would have been keeping wild beasts at bay, for warming the cave, for

their discarded refuse

of value for

hardening wooden weapons and of course for roasting meat. In addition to meat, wild animals provided skins and, in their bones, teeth

and

antlers, potential

raw materials

for

weapons. There seems no doubt that Peking

making

man

tools

and

utilized certain

of these, though not to the extent that has sometimes been claimed.

Deer

antlers

were certainly detached from

beams were sometimes cut no doubt

into sections

for use. Again, flakes

their frontlets, the

and the

tines

removed,

from the long bones of various

animals have the appearance of having been used and even trim-

med by flaking. On the other hand there is no sign that Peking man fabricated well-made artifacts from these materials. Both the way in which the bones of Peking man himself occurred and their condition throw light on other aspects of his behaviour. There can have been no question of burial, since the

remains were distributed in the cultural deposit in just the same

way

as animal

bones. This, indeed, taken together with his

primitive appearance,

was enough

nent authority that Peking

more advanced human most

to suggest to at least

one emi-

man was himself the victim of some The fact remains that, despite the

type.

careful search of thousands

38

of cubic metres of deposit and

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS the recovery of an impressive

man, no If

be accepted that Peking

it

view

this

body of material

relating to

Peking

single trace of his supposed overlord has ever been found.

now

is

man was

—and — then

himself the hunter

unquestioned by leading authorities

the

condition of his bones argues strongly that he was a cannibal as well as an avid consumer of animal flesh: his long bones are

normally

split

exactly as were those of wild animals to facilitate

the extraction of marrow, and the aperture at the base of the skull

way as among the who favoured human brain as a

has habitually been enlarged in just the same

Melanesians of recent times delicacy.

Hand-axe {mode

The most

2) industries

striking technical innovation to appear during the

Middle Pleistocene was the hand-axe, the

whole of both

faces in such a

edge round the greater part of

way

its

over part or

a tool flaked as to

produce a working-

perimeter and apparently in-

tended to be gripped in the hand. There seems no doubt in the face

of stratigraphical sequences

Tanzania that the ling those

earliest

like those studied in

Morocco or

and most primitive hand-axes, resemb-

from the French

locality

of Abbeville in the

Somme

Valley, developed from evolved forms of pebble-tool having two-

way flaking. flaking

from

All that

was involved was

the knappers learned to

hand-axes v/hich, thinner,

the extension of secondary

the edge to the surface of the tool.

remove shallower

like those

As time went on

flakes

from St-Acheul

had a more regular working-edge, were

with precision and needed

and turn out

in France,

were

easier to handle

a smaller quantity of

raw

material.

Evolution thus proceeded in the direction of greater effectiveness

and lower requirement of

material. It

was adaptive

in the sense

whoever made or adopted such improvements benefited relation to those who failed to do so. This may also help that

in

to

explain the remarkable degree of uniformity to be observed in the production of hand-axes whatever sources of

39

raw material

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS happened to be

To

available in particular localities.

ask where the

hand-axe was invented and what regions witnessed the appearance of different stages in

meaningful; nor would

it

its

evolution

is

first

not particularly

be sensible to interpret the growth of

move-

technical innovation over long periods of time with the

ments of particular groups of people. One

faced, not with a

is

series

of events to be accounted for in terms of human immigra-

tion,

but rather with processes which transformed

nology by insensible gradations over extensive

Although hand-axes

are the

most noteworthy elements of the

stone industries in which they occur, they are

only ones. The point has

lithic tech-

territories.

first

made

to be

by no means

the

that chopper-tools,

although for some purposes rendered out of date, had not suddenly lost all utility;

indeed in territories as far removed from one

another as central India and Morocco

it

has been remarked that

they continued to be made throughout the period during which

hand-axes were in use. Again, the mere production of hand-axes

must have yielded numerous this

or

flakes

and there

has been observed with care, that

if

own

not in

all

was

evidence, where

cases shaped at least used as implements

account. Furthermore, and

more evolved

is

some of these were shaped,

more

on

their

particularly during the

stages of cultures of Acheulian type, the tool-kit

further enriched

by narrow

pick-like forms, steep core-

scrapers and cleavers, the broad, sharp working-edges of

were formed by the intersection of two or more

which

flake-scars.

mode 2 never exmode i. They pre-

Geographically the hand-axe industries in

tended over the whole territory of those in vailed extensively over Africa

and southern Europe, but

only in restricted areas of the south-west.

From Egypt

in Asia

the hand-

axe territory extended into the Levant and Mesopotamia and

thence to the Indian sub-continent southward from the basin. Further east over

industries continued in

own

territory the

Narmada

much of China and south-east Asia stone the old mode i tradition. Within their

makers of hand-axe industries were by no 40

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS means undiscriminating

of hunting-ground. In

in their choice

Africa where their distribution has been closely studied in relation to palaeoecology

country and

it

seems plain that they preferred savannah

at least to

begin with eschewed the dense

Like their predecessors, the makers were adept hunting. For this reason

it is

no

at

forest.

big-game

surprise to find that they con-

Thames and the Somme, Narmada or, again, at

centrated in the valleys of rivers like the

the Nile, the Vaal, the Zambezi or the

Olorgesailie in East Africa, at Karar in Algeria, Torralba in Spain

Hoxne sites show or

The animal bones recovered from their enough their interest in meat. The Olorgesailie

in England.

plainly

people for example killed and ate giant baboon, giant pig and large kinds of horse

and hippopotamus;

at

Karar remains were

found of elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus,

warthog and

giraffe,

and

gazelle;

at

buffalo,

zebra,

Torralba straight-tusked

elephant, rhinoceros, wild ox, stag and horse. Although, as with

the hunters of Choukoutien, their methods of hunting must

remain to a large extent a matter of conjecture,

one piece of evidence the

fire,

that they

less

nearly 2*5 metres long found

complete specimen of

among

a straight-tusked elephant, at Lehringen, near

the rib-bones of

Verden

Saxony, Germany, and dating from the Riss-Wiirm In this connection

it is

at least

used wooden spears hardened in

namely a broken but more or

yew wood

we have

interesting to note that the

Cameroons have been accustomed

to

in

Lower

interglacial.

pygmies of the

elephant with a

stalk

wooden spear not much more than six feet long, which they thrust into the animal's body with both hands; as the animal tries to escape the spear works in more deeply and the trail of blood allows the hunters to keep on his track. beast

is

collect

made among such people

from

far

and near to

it

is

When

a

kill

of a large

customary for folk to

feast off the meat.

During the Stone

made and expendable, it is likely that these would often be worn out and discarded at the site of a kill and it seems easiest to explain in this way finds like Age, when implements were

easily

41

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS that at site

HK in bed IV

at

Olduvai, which yielded no

than

less

459 hand-axes and cleavers blunted by use and lying amid the disarticulated skeleton of a hippopotamus.

Prepared core and flake {mode 3) industries

As we have

already noted, the production of flakes was an

inevitable concomitant of the manufacture both of chopper-tools

and of hand-axes; and there are indications

that their use for

ing ancillary tools was well understood.

What

stage in technology

aim

first

is

when

and foremost

at

the

flint-

mak-

indicates a

new

or stone-worker appears to

producing flake

tools,

and to

this

end

goes to particular trouble to prepare cores from which they could

be struck in a finished

state.

One of the

prehistorian's difiiculties

knapper may not always be may well be indeed that at an early stage a certain ambivalency may have existed. The controversy between those who interpret the large lumps from Clactonian industries in south-east England as cores and those who see them as choppertools may well be unreal. The position is much clearer during the early part of the Upper Pleistocene when we have industries like that first recognized at is

that the intention of the prehistoric

apparent.

It

Levallois, a suburb of Paris, in

which

flake tools are

found

together with the tortoise-shaped cores from which they were struck.

Here there can be no doubt

the knapper

was

that the

to produce flake tools, the

accurately determined

primary object of

form of which was

by preparatory work on

the core.

The

technique was one that was developed on the northern margins

of the hand-axe province, though as penetrated

this.

we

shall see

it

also inter-

Middle Palaeolithic industries based primarily on

the Levallois technique are found in relatively pure form round the southern and eastern shores of the Mediterranean from

Africa to the Levant, penetrating

by way of Iraq and

North

Iran into

western Asia. Further north the culture named after the rockshelter

of Le Moustier in the Dordogne also made prominent use 42

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS of

flake tools,

disc-like cores

scrapers

by

though these were commonly made from smaller and were often trimmed into points or side-

a special technique that led to step or resolved flaking.

Many variations exist in the Mousterian industries which extend from the Atlantic seaboard to the area north of the Black Sea and Inner Asia. In western Europe for example Middle Palaeolithic industries

normally included elements

in

mode

including

2,

hand-axes of small triangular or heart-shaped forms, whereas further south these declined greatly in importance.

of

this

territory

from the south of France and

Over much

Italy to central

Europe, the Crimea, the Don-Donetz region and the coastal zone

of the west Caucasus the loss or minor importance of the handaxe was compensated by a great variety of flake tools, which then included hand-awls and steeply flaked ribbon-flakes; again, and especially in the east

from Greece

to

South Russia, the inventory

included points having shallow flaking on either face and either leaf-shaped or sub-triangular in form with concave base.

at

Although the notion of concentrating on implements struck one blow from carefully prepared cores is one that seems to

have been developed

in the northern part

world and to have characterized lithic

of the Lower Palaeolithic

in particular the

Middle Palaeo-

Levalloiso-Mousterian province, the crucial technique cer-

tainly spread further afield.

For instance

flakes struck

from pre-

pared cores form a significant component alongside hand-axes

and cleavers of the Fauresmith culture adapted to the savannah

and high grasslands of South Africa, Kenya, South Abyssinia and the Horn. In the complementary Sangoan

that flourished to

begin with on the fringes of the equatorial rain-forest the flake struck from a prepared core did not late

or

become obtrusive

until the

Lupemban stage when for the first time man began effective

penetration of the rain-forest.

Even so

the leading artifacts of the

Sangoan continued to be bifacial, including core-axes, picks and

narrow lanceolate forms.

Owing

to their habit of

occupying caves, 43

we have

reasonably

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS full

information about the animals on which the Neanderthal and

Neanderthaloid peoples mainly depended for food, about the use they

made of bone and

related materials

and the way

in

which

As hunters these people show no any way more advanced than their Where, as in certain of the Mount

they disposed of their dead. sign of having been in

immediate predecessors.

Carmel caves

in Palestine, Levalloiso-Mousterian levels overlie

ones dating from early stages of the Palaeolithic, there cation that an extended range of animals

there

is

is

no

indi-

was hunted. Equally,

no sign of any marked improvement

in the

methods of

hunting; reliance evidently continued to be placed on proved

methods

like

wooden

spears, stone balls (probably used as bolas

on primitive

stones) and presumably

and there

pit-traps;

is

a

notable absence of specialized projectile-heads. Again, exceedingly limited use

was made of bone and

know from

later practice

by Stone

we

related materials which, as

Age

hunters, were capable of

providing a variety of spear-, harpoon- and arrowheads, as well as fish-hooks

and pointed fish-gorges, a variety of tools and many

kinds of personal ornament: pieces of dense bone, including phalanges, or toe-bones, were used as anvils for working

but there

is

no evidence

that

bone or

antler

was worked

to

flint,

make

well-defined implements or weapons of any description. Another

and possibly more

significant limitation

is

the absence of any

indication of a developed aesthetic sense: Middle Palaeolithic

man was

capable of producing a limited range of tools with an

astonishing

economy of

effort,

and the perfection of form and

degree of standardization that they achieved, often over great areas and despite

wide variations

in the qualities

of the raw

materials used, bear witness to firmness of intention and a definite

sense of style; but as far as

we know he

practised

no

of carving or engraving for example has been found

art

wealth of bone and antler from Mousterian and kindred is

there evidence of even so

—no

sign

among all sites;

the

nor

much as a single bored tooth to suggest

that he fabricated ornaments to adorn his person.

44

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS In two significant ways however Neanderthal

man made im-

portant advances. For one thing he extended the range of setde-

ment well

to the north of the frost-free

had confined themselves and Precisely

how

far

zone to which

this at a

he reached has

still

earlier

men

time of glacial intensity.

to be settled in detail, but

there are indications that he colonized parts of Siberia for the first

time,

though probably not

even reached as

far as

as early as

The

China.

Wiirm

times,

I

presence of well-made

and flint

scrapers as an important element in his standard equipment suggests that he found

animal skins, ditions of

it

at least

Wiirm

I

necessary in his northerly habitat to wear

out of doors.

was probably the cold con-

It

times, also, that caused the Mousterian

and

Levalloiso-Mousterian people to occupy caves where these were available.

The

other marked advance

his treatment

phase of the

shown by Neanderthal man was

in

of the dead. Certain discoveries from the closing last Interglacial

seem indeed

to indicate the con-

tinuance of cannibalism, notably the Neanderthal skull from

Monte

Circeo, Italy, with the base broken open for the extraction

of the brain, and the mass find

at

Krapina in Yugoslavia, where

remains of upwards of a dozen individuals, male and female,

young and

old,

were discovered mixed up

in the cultural deposit

with wild animal bones and treated in the same way, having been

broken up for the extraction of marrow, partly burnt and so on.

On

in the fire

the other hand the Mousterian deposit at

La

Chapelle-aux-Saints was found to overlie a grave, cut into the

rock floor and containing the crouched skeleton of a Neanderthal

man;

similar burials have

been found

at

La

Ferrassie, likewise in

the Dordogne, and also at Kiik-Koba in the Crimea. significant evidence

Mount Carmel,

was uncovered

in the

form of a

with remains ranging from a

man

over

fifty

years of age.

at the

Even more

Mugharet

es-Skhiil,

veritable cemetery of ten graves

girl

As

of three and a boy of four to a at

La Chapelle-aux-Saints the

graves were only just big enough to accommodate bodies with 45

1

1

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS Table of radiocarbon determinations jor the

Mousterian and allied cultures

1

2

fGrN 4334

Les Cottes, Vienne, France Grotte du Renne, Arcy-sur-Cure, Yonne,

3o,350± 400 35,650± 700 32,65o± 850

)GrN GrN

4217

GrN \GrN

4494 2526

32,1501b 700

GrN

2438

36,450

4421

France 3

La Quina, Charente, France

4

RadoSina, Czechoslovakia

j

33,300± 530

+2800

— 2100 6

Nietoperzowa, Poland Broion Cave, nr. Vicenza, Italy

7

Iird,

5

Hungary

10

Regourdou, Dordogne, France La Cotte de St. Brelade, Jersey Gibraltar (Gorham's Cave G)

1

Lebenstedt,

12

Mussolini Canal, Italy

13

14

Haua Haua

15

Tabun

16

el

8

9

GrN GrN GrN J I GrN GrN GrN GrN GrN GrN

Germany

±1240

2181

36, 5 50

4638

38,65o±i20o

±

830

471

37,400

4444 4308 2649

42,3 50 ±1400

2572

43>55o±i8oo 45,o5o±i50o 45,750±i5oo 53,29o±ioio 55,95o± 500

GrN GrN

2564 2023

4i,45o±i3oo 45,o5o±32oo

GrN GrN GrN

2534

37,750

2561

39,050 ±1000

4121

40,050 ±1700

NZ

76

4i,050rh2000

2579 2527

4i,8oo±i50o 44,950±i5oo 48,650^3000

1473 2083

NORTH AFRICA Fteah, Cyrenaica (level xxviii) Fteah, Cyrenaica (level xxxin)

SOUTH-WEST ASIA B, Israel

Kebarah,

Israel

17

Geulah Cave A,

18

Jerf Ajla, Syria

19

Ksar

20

Shanidar, Iraq (level

21

Ras el-Kelb, Lebanon Al Ghab, Syria

22

NOTE.

'Akil,

It is likely

Israel

GrN (GrN IGrN GrN GrN

Lebanon

D,

top)

that these cultures first appeared at a period

1495

2556 2640

±

800

> 52,000 > 53,000

beyond the present

useful

range of radiocarbon determination.

the arms and legs flexed.

No red ochre or personal ornaments were

found, but the jaw-bones of a large wild boar were seen to be clasped in the arms of the old man. exceptional interest

is

that

A

more

recent discovery of

of a Neanderthaloid child in the cave

46

LOWER AND MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC HUNTERS S.W. Asia 22 21

20 19

Europe

Africa

18 17 16 15

14

13

II

[2

10

9

8

7

6

5

4

3

2

30 -

35

I

- 30

-

- 35

• • - 40

45 -

- 45

-

- 50

50

• A

A 55

-

-

chart of radiocarbon determinations (millennia Mousterian and

55

B.C.) for the

allied cultures.

of Teshik-Tash, Uzbekistan, the head surrounded by

six pairs

of

horns of the Siberian mountain goat, which had evidently been stood upright in a

Quite clearly

circle

men of

while

still

attached to the frontal bones.

the Neanderthaloid type had developed

concepts well beyond what one might have expected from their

lowly material culture.

47

CHAPTER

3

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE A

new phase of prehistory opened with

the appearance between

thirty-five and forty thousand years ago of hunting peoples

equipped with a more complex technology and showing signs of a

more developed

Advanced their

own

intellectual culture.

on account of

achievements, but because they gave birth to the

whose bearers developed

agriculture and so provided the civilizations in

hindsight

description of these as

Palaeolithic seems justified not only

Mesolithic cultures

World

The

it is

not

stock-raising and

economic base on which Old

due course developed. With the benefit of

difficult to see that the

Advanced

Palaeolithic

peoples of Europe, western Asia and Mediterranean Africa stood

on the main

line

of progress and marked a palpable advance over

the cultural stages described in our last chapter.

General characteristics

The most widespread element of Advanced Palaeolithic culture comprises flint industries of mode 4, that is industries based first and foremost on

less parallel flake-scars.

covered very

much

The

flint

ability to

blades having

make

flint

more or

blades was dis-

earlier: flint industries featuring these

indeed been recovered in

mode

narrow

relatively

stratified

have

caves at levels antedating

3 industries of Levalloiso-Mousterian character both in the

Levant and

in Cyrenaica.

Yet

it

was not

until

much

later that

punch-struck blades became important and indeed replaced the flake industries

over by

far the greater part

did this time-lag occur.^

of their extent.

The answer must

Why

surely be that the

punch-struck blade was not further developed until the need for

48

it

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE was

sufficiently strong. It

was because the blade was better adapted

than the mere flake to serve as a blank for the multifarious

flint

forms needed for a more advanced form of technology that

came

ultimately

Advanced

were distinguished from what

Palaeolithic cultures

went before by

their

more dynamic

character.

They changed

comparatively rapidly and more especially in their

showed

it

into the ascendant.

later

phase

a rich regional diversification. Nevertheless certain traits

characterized

them

collectively. In the field

of technology they

displayed a notable facility for devising artifacts suited for specialized functions.

Although used on

their

own

account,

flint

blades formed convenient blanks for a considerable variety of

implement. Thus, whereas the Levalloiso-Mousterians made do

with comparatively few forms of scrapers made by trimming the edges of

fairly

broad

flakes, the

made a variety of convex

Advanced

scrapers

Palaeolithic knappers

on the ends of blades of varying

lengths as well as concave ones

made by

flaking hollows or

notches from the edges of blades. Very great importance was paid to tools

made by applying

rahattu) to

a

way

a steep, almost vertical retouch {d dos

one edge of a blade or

as to

to parts

of both edges in such

produce well-defined forms, each combining a sharp

edge or edges with the strength that came from the thickest part of the blades. Objects made

in this

the points of projectiles. Another

way

included knife-blades and

artifact

made from

blades was

the graving-tool or burin, a tool having a sharp chisel-like

ing-edge of

great strength, suitable in

cate engraving or for

The the

vital

main

striking

work-

various forms for deli-

dismembering and shaping

edge was formed by axis

its

antler or bone.

one or more blows into

of the blade. The character and potentialities of

individual burins and classes of burin depended

on whether

blows were struck from one or two directions; whether they were aimed obliquely or at right-angles to the blade; whether the blade

was

intact or

working

had been snapped across or trimmed by secondary

to give a straight,

convex or concave prepared edge; 49

3-2

or,

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE again,

whether the flint-worker had

core for conversion into a burin.

chosen a blade or a

in fact

The technique of detaching

secondary flakes so as to form a sharp but strong working-edge

was

after all

an old one.

It is

working extremity of some Lower other hand

it

on the

for instance sometimes present Palaeolithic hand-axes.

was not developed on any

scale to

On the

produce

flint

burins until a powerful need had developed for these implements, as

it

appears to have done in the context of Advanced Palaeolithic

culture.

Much

remains to be learned from microscopic studies of wear

on burins before we can be sure what they were used tools of similar

Eskimo hands flint

for

working

antler

it

this

purpose.

It

could

has not yet been proved, that there was a func-

tional relationship

more ambitious

effective in

and bone and experiments with

ones have confirmed their value for

well be, though

but iron

for,

form have quite recently provided

between the adoption of burins and

utilization

a

much

of antler and bone. In view of the

central importance of hunting in the

life

of Palaeolithic

man

it is

not surprising that animal skeletons should from early times have

provided a significant source of material for cated use of these materials in the context of

was comparatively

Advanced

specialized flint tools

and convert them into

tools.

Yet a sophisti-

late, first

appearing

Palaeolithic culture alongside the

needed to cut them into convenient shapes a variety

of forms. These included different

kinds of working tools, such as spatulae, scraping-tools, awls and needles, projectile-points

and personal ornaments. The prepara-

tion of such things as beads, pendants and arm-rings tant innovation because

self-awareness. for the

first

No

it

is

indicates a notable advance in personal

less striking in this respect

was the appearance

time in the archaeological record of musical instru-

ments and manifestations of graphic or sculptural execution of

Advanced

an impor-

some of which burins may Palaeolithic cultures

western Europe and above

all

were

also

first

in the region

50

art

in the

have been used.

explored in detail in

of south-west France

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE centred on the Dordogne. This at

first

led prehistorians to

suppose

that France was the birthplace of Advanced Palaeolithic culture and that the succession of industries as a standard. Neither

found there could be accepted

of these ideas can any longer be sustained.

Archaeological exploration of central and eastern Europe, of

Union

the Soviet

and beyond into Siberia and

to the Urals

Japan, of Italy and Greece, of Cyrenaica and of western Asia

from the Levant

to the Zagros

and Afghanistan has shown

that

south-western Europe was not central but marginal to the

Advanced

Palaeolithic world;

was

there

moreover

at

any

particular period

a veritable mosaic of variegated cultures over this

extensive territory. Again, although radiocarbon dating has

been very unevenly applied this character

it is

still

already apparent that cultures of

appeared both in Cyrenaica and in parts of western

Asia before they did in the Dordogne.

The

earliest

Until far

Advanced

Palaeolithic cultures

more radiocarbon determinations have been made at Advanced Palaeolithic world it will not be

different points in the

possible to be sure where the

Although

in

many

new technology

first

developed.

Ad-

regions the transition from Middle to

vanced Palaeolithic appears to have been

a sharp one, indications

are multiplying that acculturation occurred, a fact hardly surpris-

ing

when

it is

remembered

that the

new technology sprang up

within the territory of the Middle Palaeolithic flake cultures.

It is

already evident as sequences are established in different areas that these were largely the product of indigenous development modified

from time

wide. ture,

The

to time

by

earliest manifestations

although

all

of Advanced Palaeolithic cul-

simple, are distinguished from one another

various details. Thus, the

Levalloiso-Mousterian in aica

fashions and devices that spread far and

by

Dabban which immediately overlay the the great cave of Haua Fteah in Cyren-

was already distinguished before

the end of

its initial

phase

by the appearance of chamfered blades terminated by oblique 51

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE burin-like blows. In the Levant the initial culture of the Palaeolithic sequence, the Emiran, resembled in

the all

Dabban, but the ensuing Antelian,

Atlitian

many

by

respects

and Kebaran were

local to the region. Further east the Baradostian

region was distinguished

Advanced

of the Zagros

the presence, alongside polyhedric

burins, rods and backed blades, of the Arjeneh point, a refined

version of a Mousterian form; in

terminated around 25/26000 tions, the Baradostian

in the size

B.C.

later stages,

its

by

apparently

the onset of glacial condi-

was marked by

a progressive diminution

of backed blades and scrapers.

The French Sequence

The sequence

French caves which, because of its priority

in the

the history of research,

its

diversity

and

cultural wealth

must

in

still

claim special attention, began several thousand years later than in parts of south-west Asia

and probably

also in Cyrenaica.

The

Chatelperronian with which the French sequence opened clearly distinguished

by

a large

is

and presumably hand-held knife-

blade having a convex back with steep blunting retouch. In exist-

ing collections Chatelperronian assemblages often include Mousterian forms,

material

but

this

could well be due to admixture with

from underlying deposits before excavators had gained

their present skills : if in fact the two elements

do belong

to the

same

industry the question might arise whether to interpret them as indicating a local evolution for the Chatelperronian or as the result

of the impact of an intrusive blade and burin tradition on

an indigenous Middle Palaeolithic tradition.

The ensuing markedly

stage,

different.

named

after the

cave of Aurignac, was

Many scrapers and burins were made on

cores

rather than blades and were characterized by parallel fluting; and

end

—and hollow—

scrapers and points were

made on

substantial

blades with a heavy retouch. In addition the Aurignacian disposed

of very distinctive tapered bone points having the base allow for the insertion of a

wooden 52

shaft. Flint industries

split to

resemb-

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE ling the Aurignacian occur in central

Europe and the Balkans,

in

the Levant (in the local form of the Antelian) and as far afield as

Karar Kamar in Afghanistan. Even the split-base bone point extends as far as Bulgaria.

A

point of particular interest

identical points occur in the context

Hungary, from

all

is

that

of the Szeletian culture of

appearances the product of acculturation be-

tween Aurignacian and Mousterian.

The

next stage in the French sequence, the Gravettian,

marked by terized

is

a strongly contrasted tradition of flint- work, charac-

above

by backed blades and

all

narrow rods and more or

bladelets,

including

symmetrical points with convex

less

blunted back, some of them so small that they must have been

some French prefrom the highly

hafted in composite equipment. Although

historians have sought to derive the Gravettian localized Chatelperronian, uniting

them

in a

'

Perigordian

tion that ran in part alongside the Aurignacian, likely in

it

'

tradi-

seems more

view of the extremely wide spread of Gravettian-like

industries in south

and central Europe and over much of Euro-

pean Russia that

represents an intrusive tradition.

it

Before returning to industries of Gravettoid type from regions outside France, a

word must be

said

about two traditions which

overlaid the Gravettian in France and contiguous areas.

of these, the Solutrean named

was confined

in

spreading in

its later

it

its earliest

after the rock-shelter

The

first

of La Solutre,

stages to south-western France,

though

ones into several parts of Iberia. In France

has every appearance of having been an indigenous develop-

ment. For one thing the production of cave

art

appears to have

continued without interruption from the Gravettian through the Solutrean to reach

its

climax in the context of the overlying

Magdalenian culture; and for another the laurel-leaf points with flat

flaking

on

either face, often taken as a

trean, apparently

one

face only

worth

symbol of the Solu-

developed from points with shallow flaking on

of a kind that appeared in the Early Solutrean.

recalling that laurel-leaf points,

53

It is

which can hardly be con-

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE nected directly with those of the Middle Solutrean, appeared in the Szeletian of lithic industries

Hungary and

of the Advanced Palaeo-

in several

of south Russia, in both cases stemming from

Middle Palaeolithic traditions of flint-work.

The

of the Solutrean was marked in eastern Spain

final stage

by what appear to be barbed or tanged arrowheads and in France by backed bladelets and eyed needles of types also present in an early phase of the ensuing Magdalenian. In

phase, the latter

marked by

its

Early and Middle

antler spear-throwers carved in the

form of ibex and other animals, the Magdalenian was confined the Franco-Cantabric region.

The

Late Magdalenian, marked

to

by

barbed harpoon-heads with basal swelling, spread further east into Switzerland and south afield as

Germany and

its

Poland and Czechoslovakia.

influence

To

was

the north

felt as far

numerous

reindeer-hunting groups have been identified from the Lateglacial period, including

notably the bearers of the Hamburgian,

Ahrensburgian and Swiderian cultures that extended across the

North European Plain and

in the latter case

along the northern

and eastern slopes of the Carpathians. All these groups,

like those

dating from the same period in North Africa, the Levant and parts of south-west Asia,

On

local distribution.

were

distinctive cultures

the other

of relatively

hand over much of southern

Europe from

Iberia to Greece a relatively

tian culture

of eastern origin prevailed

homogeneous Gravet-

down

to the

end of

Pleistocene and into Neothermal times.

Eastern Gravetdan In parts of central Europe, notably on the loess of Czechoslo-

vakia and again along the great rivers of South Russia, archae-

ology has brought to

light a rich material

resembling in several

significant respects that first identified at the

Gravette.

The

fact that the

earlier in the east

brought out

French

site

of La

Gravettian tradition began markedly

and the general pattern of

in the distribution

its

diffusion, well

of the so-called Venus figurines

54

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE (map

combine

2),

mere episode of

to suggest that

appearance in France was a

its

quite marginal significance.

For a number of reasons the East Gravettian area merits separate treatment on its own account. For one thing there is a notable difference in the nature of the sites occupied Palaeolithic inhabitants. In western

by

ready-made homes

even within such

that

Advanced

and southern Europe these

were predominantly caves or rock-shelters. Such natural,

the

—though

there

is

provided

sites

increasing evidence

man sometimes found

shelters early

it

necessary to build screens to protect himself and his fireplaces.

To

prehistorians they have been particularly valuable because

they were often settled successively over long periods of time by

people of markedly differing cultural traditions. In the great river basins of south Russia, however, such natural shelters did not exist.

This explains

why knowledge

about Advanced Palaeolithic

settlement in this territory for long remained so exiguous and also

why

even

now

detailed succession.

it is

On

proving a laborious task to establish a

the other hand improvements in archae-

ological technique have recently

made

recover traces of settlement on open

Advanced matter

Mousterian

social structure. is

possible to detect and

now plain

that the

—and —constructed

artificial

Palaeolithic inhabitants of south Russia

their

dwellings from which

them

it

sites. It is

One

it is

predecessors

possible to learn something of their

reason

that the floors

for that

why

it

has been possible to detect

were often scooped out of the

subsoil,

by winds which during much of the glacial period would have blown over substantially open landscapes. Both in south Russia and on the loess of Moravia

possibly to reduce the draughts caused

individual dwellings were curvilinear and often irregular in plan.

This makes

on the

it

most unlikely

that their superstructures

principle of a timber framework.

that they

built

likely suggestion

is

were sometimes covered by joined animal skins sup-

ported by movable poles and weighted

meter by

A

were

mammoth bones and

down around

the peri-

tusks like those found at Gagarino. 55

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE Such

a Structure recalls those

down

boulders to hold

hold

of the Eskimo,

who

used stone

the tent and support the poles needed to

up, an arrangement which to judge from the boulder

it

settings

found

Borneck and Poggenwisch in Schleswig-

at sites like

Holstein was apparently favoured

by

the reindeer hunters of the

Late-glacial period in that part of the world. Tent-like structures

had the obvious advantage that they could

On

mantled and transported.

with low

built

ported

by

the other

walls and provided with pitched roofs sup-

Whatever remains it is

to be learned about

methods

already evident that the Eastern Gravettians

number of primary

which reminds us of the need

some

hand there are indications

mud

posts.

lived in settlements comprising a

people

dis-

of Dolni Vestonice that huts were sometimes

of construction,

fact

be

site

Moravian

at the

fairly easily

who depended

to

cases settlements

for

group

families, a

activity

among

any extent on hunting big game. In

were made up of

number of

a

discrete

dwellings, but in others individual units seem to have coalesced either longitudinally or in a cluster. it

seems that each living unit had

assumption that

it

its

Three main phases have so

stratified

which

II-IV

at

far

Kostienki

at

on the same

of a loessiform

own

hearth, and

a fair

it is

was members of primary family groups who

warmed themselves and cooked by basin, phases

Whatever the arrangement

site.

The

these individual fireplaces.

been distinguished I in

first

particular have been

consists of sites

clay, including level

V

at

Don

found

from the base

Kostienki

The second comprises

Telmanskaia.

in the

and

I

levels

those incorporated

in the loess of the second terrace, including levels II-III at

Kostienki

I

and

level

which, to judge from variation, stands in

the loess

Kostienki to

at

its

Telmanskaia.

The

third

and

last

first

it

is

sites in

flood-plain terrace, such as level

Alexandrovka (Kostienki IV) and Kostienki

chronology

phase

duration and the wide range of cultural

need of further subdivision, includes

loam of the I,

I

suggestive that pollen from the

argues for a relatively mild climate, and suggests that 56

III.

first

it

I

at

As

phase

may have

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE begun during the

interstadial whose close seems to have accompanied the onset of Advanced Palaeolithic culture in many widely spread territories. It is suggestive that the lowest level (level V) at Kostienki

yielded triangular points with shallow bifacial

I

flaking remarkably similar to those terian site

of Ilskaya. In

this

from the Caucasian Mous-

connection bifacial flaking techniques

were applied sporadically during each stage of the Don sequence up to Alexandrovka. This has nothing directly to do with the French Solutrean.

It

merely reminds us

that, as

we have

already

seen in the case of the Szeletian of Hungary, fruitful contact existed outside western

and Mousterian

quence began early

Molodova

V

on

B.C., correlates

Europe between Advanced

cultural traditions.

se-

suggested by the fact that level VII at

is

the Dniester, dated

by radiocarbon

on archaeological grounds with an

the third phase of the

Palaeolithic

That the south Russian

Don

to

c.

21,000

early part of

sequence.

A feature of the Advanced Palaeolithic cultures of south Russia is

the varied use

made of the

materials derived

of animals hunted for food. This

Don

stage of the

is

from the skeletons

especially true of the third

sequence and of contemporary

sites in

the

Dniester (Molodova level VII and upwards) and Desna (Avdeevo

and Mezine) nuances of

basins.

style,

were

Palaeolithic cultures

by Advanced

Certain forms, though distinguished

common between

the later

of western Europe and those of south

Russia, for instance perforated needles and shaft-straighteners, awls, reindeer-antler clubs, and in die final stage barbed harpoon-

heads. Others, notably a range of handled scoops and heavy chisel-like

forms made of

peculiar to

Advanced

the east.

mammoth

ivory,

to

have been

Personal ornaments, another feature of

Palaeolithic culture in general,

fine flat bracelets

seem

from Mezine,

hunters with a ready supply of

a

abounded and included

form particularly

mammoth

57

ivory.

feasible for

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE Advanced

A

Palaeolithic art

point to be emphasized about the Gravettians, both of eastern

and western Europe,

their

is

achievement in the

made

Allusion has already been

to the so-called

which extend from south Russia

to central

field

Venus

of

art.

figurines

Europe and thence

south Germany, north Italy and France (map

2).

These

to

figurines,

only a few inches long, were carved from ivory or stone or occasionally

were made of baked

The heads

clay.

as a rule are represented

by mere knobs: hair is rarely and features still more rarely indicated The figure is shown with full breasts and buttocks

(Frontispiece).

and

is

commonly pregnant;

apart

from

a girdle at the

one of those from Kostienki and a fringe

at the rear

back of

of that from

Lespugue, the figurines are unclothed. The arms are generally

puny and may be folded

across the breast, and the legs taper

well-filled thighs, the feet,

from

where these have not been broken

being suggested rather than shown in

detail.

the figurines were coloured with red paint.

In

The

two

off,

cases at least

selective

emphasis

with which these figurines have been shaped suggests that they

were connected in some way with a ideas centring definite

or

on

fertiHty,

cult or at least

and the

fact

that

with a body of

all

those with a

provenance came from settlements, whether from caves

artificial

dwellings, argues for their domestic rather than public

or ceremonial significance. In addition to the Venus figurines, the Gravettians carved and modelled figures of various animals in a

more or

less naturalistic style.

Thus

most famous of the south Russian

at

were cut rather crudely from the same chalk material

Venus

figures, together

with the heads of

including lion, bear, and wolf,

some with

I,

one of the

of

mammoth

as

two of the

Kostienki

stations, figures

many partly

kinds of animal

human

features.

The Gravettians of Czechoslovakia were similarly fond of carving animals, and in addition modelled a considerable variety

—mam-

moth, rhinoceros, cave bear, reindeer, bison, horse, lion or tiger, wolf

and lynx

—from

clay

which they hardened on the

fire like

pottery.

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE

2.

Europe

in the last Ice

Age:

glaciated areas

shown by

stipple,

'Venus' figurines by dots (large dots indicate three or more)

The

movable objects by

eastern Gravettians also decorated

engraving and occasionally, as in the case of the

from Mezine on the Desna, by

Some of

painting.

geometric patterns used by them were also

Europe. Others

like the

conventionalized repertoire.

figures are not

Conversely the delight in

found the

jaws

the simpler

common

meander patterns applied

human

mammoth

to western

to bracelets

and

in the western

of

representation

animals by engraving so clearly displayed in the western art does

not seem to have been expressed in the tians

east.

were not averse to representing animals

just seen

they carved and modelled

Even more Cave

art

Yet the

mammoths and

to the point they painted

east

as such.

them on cave

Gravet-

As we have

other animals. walls.

can indeed no longer be regarded as a monopoly of the

Franco-Cantabric province where tinctive province

of cave

art

it

was

first

recognized.

A

dis-

has been recognized in the Medi-

terranean territory of the Gravettians, notably in Italy, where 59

it

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE occurs near

Rome, Otranto and Palermo and on

of Levanzo

at present off the coast

joined to

Even more noteworthy is

it.

the small island

of Sicily though the discovery

one time

at

on the

far side

of the east Gravettian province some 2,500 miles from the

Dordogne of the frieze deep in the Kapova Cave near bend of the Bielaya River

mammoth painted known in France and

and

bear, deer, horse

similar to that long is

the southern

South Urals that shows cave

in the

in a style surprisingly

northern Spain. There

indeed a strong case for believing that the Gravettians played a

leading role in the genesis of Palaeolithic

On

the other

hand there can equally be no doubt of

richest effloresence

this art,

movable

The

in the Franco-Cantabric region. artists,

no

less

that the

whether applied to the roofs and

walls of caves and rock-shelters or to

Cantab ric

art.

objects, occurred

liveliness

of the Franco-

than the rich diversity of cultural expres-

sion found in other fields in this region, reminds us that during

was exceptionally favourable

the Late-glacial period the territory for grazing animals

and

therefore for the

preyed upon them. Details of the cannot be given here, but dalenian phase

notably on

when

articles

on spearthrowers,

As

it

it is

reached

this

pieces

of note that in the

Mag-

its

peak

it

was displayed most

connected directly with the chase, for example shaft-straighteners

to the cave art proper,

view that

on movable

art displayed

worthy

who

advanced hunters

and projectile-heads.

most prehistorians now accept the

underwent a single cycle of development

in the

Franco-Cantabric region. With the most important exception of certain symbolic signs is

and a few tentative representations

found before the appearance of Gravettian

culture.

little

From

this

time forward there was a continuous development in the cave

art,

one which apparently ignored the changes in the forms and techniques of production of implements and weapons used

by

archaeologists

to

notable advance was

define

one 'culture' from another.

made during

the

life

A

of the Gravettian and

Solutrean cultures in the Dordogne, a period that witnessed lively

60

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE engravings like those of Pair-non-Pair in which special emphasis

was

on

laid

time of the

the back-lines of the animals depicted.

late

Solutrean and Early Magdalenian the

to engrave limbs as

artists

were made

ceased

of sculptures carved in

relief

on

first

art

appearance

the limestone walls as at

de Sers where the bison was shown in a forceful but climax of the cave

one can

in painting, as

see at Lascaux. This third phase also witnessed the

The

tlie

though they were hanging from the back and

particularly notable advances

style.

During

Le Roc

still

was reached during the

archaic

four

last

or five thousand years of the Pleistocene during the middle and late

phases of the Magdalenian. Engravings and also relief sculp-

Cap

show

a greater degree of naturalism

in the representation of animals.

Outstanding advances were

tures, well seen at

made

The

which

in painting,

contemporary

Blanc,

at Font de Gaume, Altamira and other shows a more developed sense of modelling.

sites

phase of the Magdalenian displayed

final

Le Portel and

Isturitz

at sites like

Limeuil,

an even more notable degree of naturalism in

the representation in line and paint of individual animals.

during

this last stage, also, that the

movable objects reached

its

climax.

The impression given by

products of Late Magdalenian culture primarily

by hunting

to

art at the

Neothermal climate

thirds of the

Many art;

it

is

the

of a population living

reindeer under highly favourable ecological

conditions. This impression

appearance of the

was

It

carving and engraving of small

is

reinforced

very time

at the close

way through

when

by

the sudden dis-

Late-glacial gave

way

of the Pleistocene about two-

the ninth millennium B.C.

explanations have been offered to account for the cave

has been explained as a

way of decorating

the

home;

as

an

adjunct of hunting magic; as symbolic of the complementarity of the sexes, in itself heightened in significance

an advanced hunting economy; and, tion

by which

social

early

round kept

environment.

To

man

by the development of

latterly, as a

system of nota-

ensured that his economic

activities

and

in step with the seasonal variations in his

determine the relative importance of these 6i

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE would

require far

into here. Instead,

more extended it is

has

all

can enter

perhaps worth emphasizing a few of the

salient implications of the art it

we

discussion than

itself.

As we have

already suggested

the appearance of being the product of hunters living

under exceptionally favourable environmental conditions,

men

who were moreover exploiting this environment with exceptional success.

No one can examine the manifestations of this art without

being aware of the outstanding powers of observation which implies, powers which must powerfully have

it

assisted success in

the hunt. Again, art has important implications for the mentality

of

Advanced

creator.

its

man

Palaeolithic

evidently had the

imagination needed to depict in an increasingly

life-like

manner

the animals on which he depended and with which he identified

himself in an extraordinarily intense manner. Representational

and symbolic

which

it

was

art, like

the concern with personal decoration with

associated,

was the outcome of a marked

intensifica-

tion of awareness, both of self-awareness and of awareness of the

environment in relation to the

self

and

social group. It is

not so surprising that agriculture and

should have emerged for the

among

the

Advanced

immediate

first

complex

perhaps

literate societies

time within the territory of and

of peoples possessed

descendants

of

Palaeolithic culture.

Expansion of Advanced Palaeolithic culture: Siberia and

the

Far

East

By providing Palaeolithic

himself with

artificial shelter

man, equipped with

a

mode

and clothing Middle

3 lithic

technology, had

human settleman occupied

already extended notably the northern frontiers of

ment

in the

Old World. Advanced

large tracts of

to

human

was apparently during were first occupied by man.

European Russia and

Late-glacial times that parts of Siberia

Although the

Palaeolithic

total extent

settlement was

it

of the territory

is

so vast, the area open

in fact limited in the north

by

the exis-

tence of a great zone of lake and marsh south of the northern

62

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE glaciated zone,

between the Urals and the Yenisei and on the

south by the mountain zone of inner Asia,

much of the outer rim of which was glaciated. Traces of Advanced Palaeolithic settlement have so

far been found in the Upper Ob and Yenisei, the Angara and Selenga basins near Lake Baikal and the Upper Lena River up to latitude 6i° N. To judge from the fauna, two phases

—an

earlier

a later

one by

of Late-glacial settlement appear to be represented

one by Mal'ta and Buret'

in the

Angara Valley and

Afontova Gora near Krasnoyarsk

in the

upper Yenisei

—and

by one of Neothermal age well seen at Verkholenskaia Gora. The flint industries from Mal'ta and Afontova Gora are both basically Mousterian in tradition with these were followed

typical tortoise cores, points

and side-scrapers.

the presence of blades, burins and, at the latter

On the other hand site,

of microlithic

points with battered backs points clearly to a contribution from

Advanced

the

which

tion

is

Palaeolithic blade

and burin

tradition, a contribu-

emphasized by the wealth of antler, bone and ivory

artifacts (including

eyed needles, slotted bone handles, perforated

batons, and objects of personal adornment such as plaques and

pendants decorated with

and

still

more by

pits as well as tubular

to account for this apparent mixture

moving

east

and disc beads);

the presence of female figurines. is

to

The

easiest

way

suppose that Gravettians

from the south Russian Plain came

in contact

with

descendants of the Mousterians spreading northward fromUzbekistan.

The wealth of ornaments found with

of a child

at Mal'ta

region had

which

come

to judge

suggests that the early settlers of the Baikal

to satisfactory terms with their environment,

from the fauna shared

steppe and tundra. the cold winters

One way

was

in

certain characteristics of

which they managed

its

basic character

the circumpolar zone. Another, testified

needles and

from a

by a

to survive

to build semi-subterranean houses with

entrance passages, a type which in in

the ceremonial burial

figurine

by

still

survives

the fine-eyed

from Buret' on the Angara River, carved

mammoth tusk and

apparently clothed in furs, was the use 63

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE of sewed skin clothing, for which there the other end of the

Advanced

is

good evidence

also

Palaeolithic

world

in the

at

Magda-

lenian of western Europe.

One of the main

of these early Siberian industries

interests

is

that they provide an obvious source for those earliest intruders

North America who

into

New World

laid a basis for the prehistory

of the

as a whole. In this connection especial significance

attaches to the presence already at Mal'ta of bifacially flaked points

many

of a kind that emerged from similar antecedents in the

Old World.

glacial

Up

to the present

it is

true that

no

sites

parts of

of Late-

age have been encountered north of latitude 6i°, but

research in this remote part of the Soviet

days and

it

Union

should not be overlooked that

plain to the north of the inhospitable

in its early

is still

much of the

mountainous

low-lying

interior of

easternmost Siberia, a plain that once linked Alaska with the

Lower Lena

Valley, has been

submerged by the

rise

of sea-levels

during the Neothermal period. It

must

have been by way of Siberia that Advanced

also

Palaeolithic influences penetrated

North China and ultimately

Japan. Sometimes, as in the upper cave

Choukoutien, there

at

appeared as enrichments, for instance in the form of perforated beads and needles, of a basically archaic tool-kit. Alternatively,

we

find, in the

Advanced

cave of Hsiao-nan-Lai in

Honan

a well-defined

Palaeolithic lithic assemblage, including backed blades

and microliths, associated with a Late Pleistocene fauna including Rhinoceros tichorinus. In the same

retouch and flat-flaking industries

all

way

blades, burins, vertical

occur in variants of the early

lithic

found in Japan. The influence of Advanced Palaeolithic

culture evidently

made

itself felt all the

the Pacific, not to mention

its

way from

impact on the

New

the Atlantic to

World.

African survivals Lithic assemblages of mode 4, characterized

a variety of forms

made by

by

blades, burins

a vertical retouch, a

64

and

mode commonly

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE associated with a relatively sophisticated use of antler,

ivory as materials for

artifacts

and over extensive

bone and territories

associated with the use of personal ornaments and the practice of

were confined

art,

to the northern parts of Africa including

Cyrenaica, Nubia and the northern zone of the Horn.

of the continent industries of

rest

flakes struck

mode

3

Over

the

based primarily on

from prepared cores persisted down

to the close

of

the Pleistocene.

North of the Sahara and centred on Algeria and Tunisia a local outgrowth of the Levalloiso-Mousterian, known after the Tunisian points,

site

which

of Bir-el-Ater as the Aterian, was marked by tanged to judge

from

as arrow-tips. Discussion

and those found

their size could well

have been used

of the relationship between these points

in the Solutrean

of Parpallo in eastern Spain has

sometimes centred on the question whether the eastern Spanish Solutrean was due to an Aterian incursion or vice versa. Since the context of the two sets of points as a

component of a mode 3

,

is

quite different, one occurring

the other of a mode 4 lithic technology,

the question of an intrusion from one region to the other need not

be discussed further.

What

cannot be excluded

is

some kind of

contact leading to the appropriation of a well-defined cultural trait

over a major technological boundary.

South of the Sahara one enters the territory of the African Middle Stone Age sharing a basically

(c.

10,000-35,000 years ago). Although

mode

3

Saharan Africa exhibit certain differences that appear to the varying ecological are found.

The savannah and

nostic feature of which

the other

relate to

endowments of the territories in which they grassland territories of both South

and East Africa supported the

On

all

technology, the cultures found in sub-

was the

hand the Congo

Still

Bay

culture, a leading diag-

bifacially flaked leaf-shaped point.

forests

were occupied by an out-

growth of the Sangoan in the form of the Lupemban culture, as seen for example in the upper level at Kalambo Falls. In this culture a significant element of heavy axe-like tools 65

(mode

2)

1

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE Table of radiocarhon determinations for Advanced Palaeolithic sites in western

Europe with two early ones from south west Asia WESTERN EUROPE

Magdalenian Vache, Ariege (level

1

Grotte de

2

Vache, Ariege (level IV) Schussenquelle, Swabia, Germany Angles-sur-l'Anglin, Vienne, France

3

4

Grotte de

la

II)

la

5

Cueva

6

Altamira, Santander, Spain

7

Lascaux, Dordogne, France

del Juyo, Spain

Solutrean 8

Laugerie-Haute, Dordogne, France (top)

9

Laugerie-Haute Dordogne, France (base) Laugerie-Haute (E.), Dordogne, France

10

Gravettian 1

Abri Pataud, Dordogne, France

(level III)

12

Abri Pataud, Dordogne, France

(level

13

Abri Pataud, Dordogne, France (level V)

IV)

Aurignacian

15

Grotte du Renne, Yonne, France La Quina, Charente, France

16

Les Cottes, Vienne, France

17

Abri Pataud, Dordogne, France (level VII)

18

Abri Pataud, Dordogne, France

(level

XII)

19

Abri Pataud, Dordogne, France

(level

XIV)

14

Chdtelperronian

20

Les Cottes, Vienne, France

21

Grotte du Renne, Yonne, France

SOUTH-WEST ASIA 22

Kara Kamar, Afghanistan

23

Shanidar, Iraq (level C, base: Baradostian)

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE Western Europe

s.w. Chatel-

Asia

Aurignacian

Gravettian

Magdalenian

Solutrean

perron 23 22

18

19

17

16

15

14

12

13

II

10

9

76 54 321

8

B.C.

B.C.

—

10,000

—

15,000

-

-

20,000

25,000 -

—

25,000

..«

10,000

• I •

15,000 -

20,000

- 30,000

30,000 -

• • - 35,000

35,000 -

Chart of radiocarbon determination sites in

occurred as well as more elegant

group

(b.c.) for

Advanced

Palaeolithic

western Europe with two early ones from south-west Asia.

it is

bifacial points.

Among this latter

interesting to note tanged forms that

may

indicate the

passage of influences from the Aterian during the period of higher rainfall

and cooler temperature that prevailed

the last

two thousand years or so of the

in the Sahara during

Pleistocene.

That the Middle Stone Age industries of sub-Saharan Africa served their makers in gaining a living from the various territories

they occupied requires no argument: they would not have continued to exist

if

they had not done so; and the mere fact that they

varied in accord with ecological differences only confirms the

truism that early

man

what he could from

extracted

ment by means of whatever technology he had adapting

this to local conditions.

This does not

under way

in the

moment

by

alter the fact that

sub-Saharan Africa remained a cultural backwater

changes of the utmost

his environ-

at his disposal

at a

time

when

to the history of mankind were

Mediterranean and further

67

east. It is surely

no

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE Table of radiocarbon determinations for Advanced Palaeolithic sites in south, central

west Asia

and

east

Europe with two early ones from south-

ADVANCED PALAEOLITHIC CULTURE accident that the decisive shift from hunting and food-gathering

was accomplished within the sphere of

to food-production

mode 4 and

indeed

s.w. Asia

24 23

B.C.

mode

rather than a

5

Central and Eastern Europe

mode

Greece

22- 1920

18 17

16

15

14

1}

12

II

10

9

8 6-7

3

a

technology.

Italy

54321

B.C.

10,000

—

—

10,000

15,000

-

-

15,000

—

25,000

—

30,000

• • 25,000

-

30,000

-

:»

(b.c.) for Advanced Palaeolithic Europe with two early ones for

Chart of radiocarbon, determinations sites in south, central

and

east

south-west Asia.

69

CHAPTER

4

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING IN THE OLD WORLD During the Pleistocene

Ice

whole of his history from

by appropriating different

Age, that

is

throughout almost the

a temporal point of view,

man

the natural products available to

has lived

him

in the

environments to which he was able to adapt through the

medium of his

culture. Subsistence during this

enormously long

period was based on two complementary sources of food: on the roots and other plant foods which, together with

fruits, seeds,

insects, eggs, shell-fish

women and

the

main by

on

the larger

Since

it is

and various small game, were gathered

game

the children for

whom

they cared ; and

animals, fish and wild-fowl hunted

common form

to designate these

in

by men.

ways of gaining

a liv-

ing as parasitic and by implication inferior to those centred on the

production of food by means of various types of farming or manufacture,

it is

perhaps worth emphasizing that their successful

pursuit in the wide range of environments into which

penetrated

by

men had

the end of the Pleistocene implied a detailed

ledge of the whereabouts and habits of a

much

know-

greater variety of

animal and plant species than farmers had to concern themselves with; moreover, as the cave art so well able ecological conditions, hunting interesting,

exciting and

Garden of Eden had

its

in

illustrates,

was capable of sustaining an

some measure

own, very

under favour-

leisured

life.

The

definite attractions.

The implications offarming All the able to

was

same

it

work

who were way of life

has to be admitted that, except for those their

way

out of

it,

the hunter-fisher

essentially a dead-end. Individual

70

groups

like the Late-glacial

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMINGIN THE OLD WORLD reindeer hunters of Europe or the recent salmon-catching Indians

of the north-west Pacific coast of North America were able, because of particularly favourable circumstances, to enjoy a certain leisure

narrowly

and indulge

tied to subsistence.

was based

exclusively

number of

in a

beyond those

activities

Yet no community whose livelihood

on hunting,

fishing or gathering has been

whose was securely based on farming. The history of man

able to share in the historical possibilities open to those

subsistence

during the

last ten

thousand years shows that there was something

may

to be said for eating of the fruit of the tree of

knowledge.

be that the epoch of farming has been brief

in relation to pre-

history, but until bilities

men had

were painfully

learned to farm their historical possi-

restricted.

Conversely, within a few thou-

sand years of the sowing of the literacy

had been crossed

It

first

crops, the threshold of

in several distinct territories

and some

of the great historic traditions of mankind had been launched.

What was needed above

all

for rapid

development

in the sphere

of culture was an assured surplus of food: a main reason for the

importance of cereal grains

is

precisely that they

were capable of

being stored for long periods without serious deterioration, and so in effect formed an important kind of capital.

of

this capital

made

it

It

was possession

—and animal herds were only another kind—

that

possible for large groups of people to live together in

permanent settlements, and so allowed a combination of economic specialization with large-scale organization.

That

is

why

pre-

come to view the attainment of farming as a phenomenon comparable in importance with the industrial and historians have

scientific

made

revolutions which within a few thousand years

it

possible.

was no doubt because of its widespread implications over the whole range of social life that prehistorians a few years ago were It

so ready to accept the idea that the invention of farming constituted a veritable revolution.

Yet to

treat a process so long-

drawn out and involving so subtle a change in the attitude of men 71

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING to animals series

and plants in the same terms

as

an invention or even a

of inventions in the sphere of technology

misunderstand

nature. Again, as will shortly be

its

is

surely to

made

clearer,

the development of farming can hardly be described as Neolithic' '

since

it

preceded the appearance of communities practising a

scale Neolithic technology, as this has

hundred

years. Historically

it is

been defined for over a

easy to account for the hypothesis

of a 'Neolithic Revolution' appearing when

of

scientific

full-

did: the expansion

it

archaeology into south-west Asia between the two

world wars yielded a flood of new information from a territory

which on a been the

upon

grounds was considered most

priori

home of agriculture; and

earliest

a profession

this

have

information broke

brought up to accept a sharp

Palaeolithic hunters

likely to

antithesis

between

and gatherers and Neolithic farmers. Re-

newed exploration and excavation during

the last twenty years or

so has put the matter in a rather different light.

It

has

shown

that

the transition from hunting and gathering to stock-raising and cultivation

was

long-drawn out process

a

thousand years; and

it

that spread over several

has further revealed that the technology of

the peoples mainly responsible for this transition conformed to the

same pattern

as that

of the Mesolithic peoples, explored a

generation previously in north-western Europe.

Revolution' was neither a revolution nor was rather, a transformation

carried through

by

it

begun by Advanced

The

'Neolithic it

was,

Palaeolithic

and

Neolithic:

Mesolithic communities.

Before considering in more detail the history of this slow and

indeed barely perceptible process appreciate

more

way of doing so and

clearly is

to

compare the

to obtain their

increase of animals

might be

available,

perhaps worth trying to

what was involved. Possibly the simplest

after the transformation.

which they had

it is

situation of communities before

During the long periods during food by appropriating the natural

and plants wherever and whenever these

men had normally

to

move over

considerable

distances during the course of the year and could only exist in

72

IN

THE OLD WORLD

small widely distributed groups.

By contrast communities of much more restricted terri-

farmers were able to concentrate on a

tory and a narrower range of animals and plants, to maintain these within close reach of permanent settlements and to select for

breeding the varieties best suited to their requirements;

this in

turn meant that they were able to lead settled lives in communities at

once larger and more closely distributed, communities in which

specialization

and the

made

possibility of large-scale organization

possible the development of progressively

more complex

cultures.

Specialised hunting

An important

step towards domestication

was taken when

certain

groups of hunters began to concentrate on particular species of

game animal instead of going for whatever was available. The risk taken by concentration by putting almost all the eggs in one basket was offset by the close attachment, amounting almost to

—

—

symbiosis, which a group of hunters was able under certain conditions to establish with particular herds of grazing animals.

Having

said this

it

will

be easy to see

why

this concentration is

taken as a step towards domestication, a state of affairs which was ultimately to lead to complete control over certain categories of

animal. This narrowing

down of

the range of interest in respect

of animals taken for food can be noted among several hunting

groups in different parts of the Advanced Palaeolithic world. The reindeer hunters of western and northern Europe during the period

between ten and

fifteen

thousand years ago provide

a well-documented example. Analysis of the larger

game animals

represented in the food-refuse of the Late Magdalenians

who

German cave of Petersfels for example they obtained more than four-fifths of their meat from

sheltered in the south

shows

that

even greater concentration can be seen on the summer hunting stations of the Hamburgians and Ahrensburgians reindeer.

sited

An

on the margins of

glacial

tunnel-valleys in

Holstein. In this case over 99 per cent of the larger

73

Schleswig-

game animals

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING were of a single

species.

The evidence

suggests that other animals

were the victims of chance encounters and

that the only serious

quarry was the reindeer, an animal which as

well

By attaching themselves

is

known is highly

to a herd of reindeer a

group

of hunters would not only possess themselves of a walking

larder,

gregarious.

comparable up to a point with a domesticated herd, but also a source of many of the most important raw materials they needed, skins for clothing and tents, antler and sinew for hunting gear.

There

is

way of determining whether,

of course no

would have modified

the hunters

with the reindeer herds:

given time,

their already close relationship

from the point of view of basic subsis-

tence a highly satisfactory relationship was already in being; and

when much zone

it

them.

later reindeer

was primarily

The

question

were domesticated

to harness

is

in

them

in the

circumpolar

to sledges or

even to ride

any case academic because quite sud-

denly, in the course of a few generations, the ecological setting

changed: as Late-glacial gave place to Post-glacial climate and glaciers entered

on

their final retreat, forests

encroached rapidly

on the open grazing grounds formerly occupied by shall see (pp.

reindeer.

As we

79-83), the hunting peoples of the North European

Plain reacted in part

by

of previous ages, but

in part

reverting to the mixed hunting

by developing

economy

special skills in fishing

and winning food from the sea-shore.

Although the evidence has not been so

clearly

worked out

in

south-west Asia there are signs that specialized hunting was carried

on

in

some regions

at the close

of the Pleistocene and

at

the beginning of Neothermal times. For instance analysis of the

animal bones from the sequence excavated in the Mugharet

Wad, Mount Carmel, shows

that gazelles

and fallow deer

el-

alter-

nated as the most important quarry during the Late Pleistocene,

but that

at the

beginning of the Neothermal gazelles were so

overwhelmingly represented

that they

must have been the object

of highly concentrated attention on the part of the Natufian hunters occupying the coastal zone of the Levant at this time.

74

IN

THE OLD WORLD

Again, there are signs that the hunters of the Zagros around the close of the Pleistocene and the beginning of the Neothermal specialized in hunting goats, significant as a possible prototype

of domesticated forms.

Wild prototypes of early

cultivated cereals

Recent excavations

at

the east Syrian site of Mureybit have

that wild barley

and two-seeded einkorn were systematic-

shown

by hunters of wild

ally

harvested

The

cereal crops principally cultivated during the seventh

ox,

onager and

gazelle.

and

eighth millennia B.C. included two-rowed barley {Hordeum spontaneuni)^

emmer wheat

boeoticum).

Modern

{Triticum dicoccoides) and einkorn

distributions of wild prototypes give

clue to the earliest foci of domestication, but too

much

(7".

some

reliance

should not be placed on these. For one thing the climatic changes

of the

last

ten thousand years must have caused shifts in the distri-

bution of plants. Again, no reliance can be placed on stray occurrences since weed races must almost certainly have spread since agriculture began. Reliance

on

is

therefore placed

much more

the occurrence of natural stands of wild cereals and even so

must be recognized

that domestication

is

more

likely to

it

have

occurred on the margins of these where the natural harvest was less readily available.

Nevertheless

it

seems to be reasonably cer-

tain that wild prototypes of the early cultivated cereals were most

readily available

on

the hilly flanks of the Fertile Crescent

from

the Levant through eastern Anatolia to the Zagros range of

northern Iraq and western Iran. In each case the wild and vated forms are

still

made. Where they

differ is in respect

each of the wild forms has a all

culti-

so closely allied that easy crosses can be

of grain dispersal. Whereas

brittle rachis that disperses the seed,

the cultivated ones have tougher ones : in the case of einkorn

on threshing and with barley and emmer This means that whereas wild grains disperse them-

the rachis breaks only

not even then.

selves spontaneously cultivated ones need to be intentionally sown.

75

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING So

far as

wild cereals are concerned significant differences have

been observed in different parts of the territory where natural stands

still

exist.

In the case of barley, which because of its relative

intolerance to cold rarely races exist

on

grows above 1500 metres, separate

different parts of the

mountain flanks of the

The two most important of these are

Crescent.

Fertile

the Zagros and the

Levant. In the case of einkorn the main distinction

is

that

between

the small-seeded aegilopoides species found in west Anatolia and

where

the Balkans, tats,

it

occurs merely as a weed of disturbed habi-

and the large two-seeded thaudor

species, the best stands

which occur in south-east Turkey. Emmer, which was

demanding

in its requirements

indicator, occurs in Iraq, Iran

and

is

areas,

namely

and proximate parts of the USSR, where

where

a robust variety

particularly

thus a sensitive ecological

two well-separated

sporadically with einkorn and wild barley, and the Valley,

of

grows

it

in

Turkey,

occurs only

Upper Jordan

in massive stands.

The

evidence of contemporary wild cereals suggests therefore that domestication took place in more than one zone of the relatively small area that supported the earliest farming economies of the

Old World. Einkorn was almost certainly cultivated first in southTurkey, still the main focus of the thaudor species, whereas emmer was most probably taken in hand first of all in the Upper

east

Jordan Valley. In the cases of two-rowed barley there for preferring either the Zagros or the Levant that cultivation

was

and

started independently in the

it

is

no reason

could even be

two

regions.

Climatic change: from Late Pleistocene to Neothermal It

might be judged improbable on a priori grounds that major

changes in the basis of subsistence and in technology should have coincided with significant alterations in climate without there

being any link between them. Indeed, fact that

we

if

we

take account of the

are dealing with comparatively primitive subsistence

economies, the burden of proof

lies

on the other

side: the

only

reasonable assumption must be that the relationship between

76

THE OLD WORLD

IN climatic

and It is

change and cultural innovation was indeed one of cause

effect.

This

is

not by any means to adopt a deterministic view.

never the case that patterns of subsistence are determined in

normal human

by narrowly

societies

climatic or other environ-

mental factors. Equally, on the other hand,

almost invariably

it is

true under the conditions of primitive society that these patterns

from derogating

are adjusted to local ecological conditions. Far

from the dignity of man

this

merely emphasizes his humanity,

man owes

for as

we have

much

as anything else to his ability to adapt to a far wider range

seen again and again

of environments than other mammals.

through

He

his superiority as

is

of culture by which he

his possession

able to

do

this

fulfils his social

needs in whatever context he finds himself. Whereas other animals

were often unable to adjust quickly enough change,

even to

to environmental

man was able to meet new stresses in his environment and turn new conditions to his own profit. One way in which

he was able to do

this

was

to

modify

his

technology and

alter the

pattern of his subsistence.

Within the

territory

of the Advanced Palaeolithic peoples the

end of the Ice Age, the transition from Late Pleistocene

to early

Neothermal, was marked by environmental changes of widely varying character. These were on the whole more drastic in territories

near the borders of the old ice-sheets. Thanks to

Quaternary research a good deal

is

already

known about

the

course of events. In particular pollen-analysis has revealed in clear outline the history

of vegetational change. The Pleistocene

ice-sheets appear to have

begun

ten thousand years ago. able for

human

for settlement,

their final retreat rather

From one

point of view this was favour-

settlement because

more

more than

it

opened up new

particularly in Scandinavia

territories

and the northern

parts of the British Isles. Yet the approach to temperate conditions

was no unmixed

blessing.

Admittedly

in the

long run when

temperatures had reached their maximum the possibility opened up

of introducing farming. Yet for the 77

first

few thousand years or so

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING conditions were worse in the sense that the herds of reindeer, on

which the

specialized

and almost

self-sufficient

hunting of north-

west Europe was based, were no longer able to graze a unique Late-glacial flora. Adjustments

and

forest trees

sistence

it

Much

less is

rise to

in territories

as yet

in the sphere of sub-

the Mesolithic cultures

on the North European

known

much more

Until

was the changes involved

and technology that gave

so well developed

change

had to be made to the spread of

Plain.

about the course of environmental

more remote from the former ice-sheets. work has been done in the way of

detailed

Quaternary research the course of climatic history in the Mediterranean basin and in the parts of south-west Asia crucial to the early history of farming that there

is

marked by

must remain obscure. Yet

a period of greater aridity.

remains from the Cueva

dell

Pyrenees for instance point

dry fluctuation

Haua Fteah

it

can be said

evidence from some areas that the transition was

at the

fairly

end of the

in Cyrenaica

The

pollen and animal

Toll between Barcelona and the strongly to a relatively warm,

Ice

Age. The

and of gazelle

at

rise

of bovids

at

the

Mount Carmel may

well be the result of selective hunting, but at least they are consistent

cated

with dry conditions. Again, increasing aridity was indi-

by

the pollen in Shanidar

Cave and

there are clear, if not

yet precisely dated, indications of climatic change in the sediments in

Lake Zeribar

in the Zagros.

Over

the extensive territory in-

volved even quite minor changes of climate

may

well have re-

sulted locally in changes of widely varying character. Details will

have to wait on research. In the meantime

that the period

it

may be

noted

around ten thousand years ago was marked by

climatic adjustments that

the sphere of subsistence.

may well have posed acute problems in What mainly needs emphasizing is that,

whereas in northern Europe environmental change ran counter to the trend towards concentrating

west Asia

it

on

particular species, in south-

may well, if anything, have encouraged intensification

of the food-quest. 78

THE OLD WORLD

IN

Mesollthic hunter-fishers It is

no accident

practising a

that the

mode

lithic

5

most

clearly defined

hunting groups

technology are those that flourished on

the North European Plain in territories most severely affected

environmental change

at the close

of the Pleistocene.

by The Neo-

thermal inhabitants of this region had to adapt to a landscape

transformed from park-tundra into closed available to herbivorous animals

were

forest.

now

The

pastures

restricted to forest

and the margins of lakes and of the sea-shore.

glades, river courses

People could no longer support themselves by hunting a single species. Instead Mesolithic

man was

driven to extending his quest

for food to include a

wide range of animals and

information about this

is

filling

take their

where

on

muds and

peats

the old lake-beds favoured for settlement.

Information

who

preserved in the organic

plants. Useful

is

particularly rich in respect of the

name from

their culture

the

first

on

Mullerup

in the

west to eastern

and were

marshy region now covered by the North

and North German

Plain,

northern Russia

as far as the

Sea,

and the west Baltic area including

Denmark and south Sweden;

lake shores

at

recognized. Their hunting-grounds

Flanders with outliers as far as Ulster,

the

this territory

Maglemosians

bog {magle mose)

North European Plain extended

England and centred

was

the big

in the east they occupied parts of

Ural mountains. Over the whole of

they were fond of camping along river banks and

on

the margin of the encompassing forest, a favoured

resort of certain

game

animals, including notably elk, as well as

of wild-fowl, water-plants and

A useful insight into

fish.

the sources of food available to the

Mag-

lemosians at the close of the birch period around the middle of the is given by the find at Star Carr in Yorkshire. the preferred game, but aurochs {Bos admittedly was Red deer primigenius) and elk were also hunted rather commonly, as were

eighth millennium B.C.

also roe deer. It 4

is

plain that already hunting

79

had reverted to the cwp

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING ancient unspecialized pattern. Water-birds were also taken but there is

no evidence

that fishing

was

carried

was occupied, even though from sian tradition there

is

on when the camping-place

later settlements

good evidence

of the Maglemo-

for the systematic catching

of pike. Although evidence for plant food

is

can hardly be any question that nuts,

seeds and rhizomes of

different kinds

fruits,

only indirect there

were gathered and eaten. The only trace of domesti-

cation relates to the remains of dog recovered from Star Carr itself

and from certain

sites in

Denmark. The dogs from

these Magle-

mosian contexts were characterized by large teeth in short jaws.

They could of course be

the product of local domestication from

wolves. Alternatively they might have

where agriculture was already being

come

in

from centres

practised, a reminder that

cousins of the Mesolithic hunter-fishers of Europe were already

developing a farming economy in parts of south-west Asia.

The material equipment from Maglemosian sites clearly reflects the way in which they adapted to form a comprehensive hunting and fishing economy in a forested environment. The flint industry on which

their

and foremost

technology was ultimately based was aimed

at

producing the

artifacts

first

needed for hunting game,

preparing skins and cutting up the bone and antler and felling

and shaping timber. Microliths made from narrow bladelets the fashion of mode

5

were used

and arming the edges of probably used for cutting

Advanced

among

up

antler

adze-blade.

that

main

for tipping, barbing

and knives. Scrapers were

other things for preparing skins and burins

and bone

Palaeolithic cultures.

though one

in the

projectiles

in

as they

A

had already been

particularly

in

noteworthy item,

was not of great numerical importance, was the

This was often chipped

down from

a

nodule,

sharpened by a burin-like transverse blow and mounted in a sleeve

was

made of wood or antler through which the wood handle The appearance of this form already during the first

passed.

phase of the Maglemosian rapidly

men

adapted to the

is

interesting because

new 80

it

shows how

forest environment.

The

felled

— IN birch trees

THE OLD WORLD

on the lake-edge

tiveness of such tools,

at Star

Carr bear witness to the effec-

which must have been used

dug-

to shape

out canoes like that from Pesse in Holland and probably also the paddles found at Star Carr and other

wooden bows were used nocked and fletched

at

single-piece

"Wooden arrows were

for hunting.

one end and

Long

sites.

barbed and tipped with

either

microliths or in the case of those intended for birds or small fur-

bearing animals provided with

flat

made of antler or bone were mounted both hunting and

fishing.

Barbed points

bolt-like heads.

as spearheads

Equipment

specifically

by bark

fishing included seine-nets supported

floats

and used for designed for

and weighted

with stones, fish-hooks notable for having barbless points, and basket wheels; and no doubt

it

was

largely for fishing

on inland

waters that canoes and paddles were employed.

The Maglemosians found time teeth,

—even

the

wore necklaces made up of perforated deer

Star Carr hunters

and

to adorn themselves

sections of bird-bone, shale pebbles and lumps of amber

also,

more

especially in the

West

Baltic region at the heart

their culture, to practise art. This took the

of

form mainly of engrav-

ing objects of daily use as well as pendants or amulets and antler staves apparently of ceremonial or other social use; but

lumps were sometimes carved forms.

The

in the

round

amber

to the shape of animal

techniques employed included line engraving, some-

times so fine as almost to escape scrutiny, and pits neatly drilled into the surface.

The commonest motives were

linear chevrons,

hatched zones, criss-cross lines and various kinds of barbed

line.

Alongside these abstract designs occasional schematic representations of

men and

animals

single individuals.

may be

seen.

As

a rule these were of

Occasionally, as on a piece from Fiinen,

anthropomorphic designs were knit together

in

such a

way

as

perhaps to suggest generations; and in the case of engravings

on an aurochs bone from Ryemarksgaard we

find a definite if

enigmatic scene in which an animated individual with outstretched

arms appears

at

one end of a row of four more restrained figures 8l

4-2

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING by

lacking arms and backed

three vertical chevrons. In the case

of some of the geometric designs the suggestion has been made

may

that they

perhaps relate to a system of calendrical notation

of a kind particularly useful to people

who had

to take account of

the seasons of maturation of a wide range of animals and plants.

The Maglemosians were unique among in

Europe

for the vigorous

the Mesolithic groups

and creative character of

On

ment

to forest conditions.

their

economy, the widespread use of the bow, the

mode

5

the other

their adjust-

hand the general form of practice of a

technology and the generally abstract

flint

features general to the hunter-fisher groups of

art

were

much of Europe

during early Neothermal times. Although some of these, and

most notably the Maglemosians, made culture of

all

these groups

significant innovations, the

stemmed from Advanced

Palaeolithic

sources and represented substantially the result of adjusting to

Neothermal conditions.

It is

how

interesting to see

rapidly this

adjustment was made in the heart of the Franco- Cantab ric region

where reindeer hunting gave place other forest animals and tion of

new

to the hunting of stags

and

how this was accompanied by a configuramade from

forms, including harpoon-heads

antler, sufficiently distinct to cause archaeologists to

stag

speak of

named after The designs painted on selected river pebbles found in such large number at the name-site are even more passing from a Magdalenian to an Azilian culture,

Mas-d'Azil in Ariege.

abstract than the designs engraved is

interesting to observe analogies

morphic representations

in the

on Maglemosian

objects, but

it

between the schematic anthropo-

two

territories.

To

judge from the

general impoverishment of material culture found in most parts of

Europe in the context of Mesolithic communities of hunter-fishers, the break-up of herd-hunting and the reversion to mixed hunting

and gathering reduced the

One way

in

possibilities

open

to

most peoples.

which Mesolithic man could compensate

Neothermal environment of most of Europe was, seen, to develop fishing.

For the most part 82

this

as

in the

we have

was confined

to

IN inland waters, but to

make up

on

THE OLD WORLD

the coast maritime resources were brought in

for the reduction of grazing

spread of forests.

Much of the

ground caused by the

evidence for this

lies

submerged by

the rise of ocean levels due to the continued melting of ice-sheets

during the Post-glacial period. For the Scandinavian peninsula itself the position is better.

the ice-sheets melted levels.

As

Here

isostatic

more than

recovery of the land as

of ocean

offset the eustatic rise

a result the old beach-lines

formed during temporary

periods of relative stability are available for study. This has

shown

from West Sweden to Fosna on the west coast to Finnmark on the north coast of Norway settlement during that at intervals

the early and middle part of Neothermal times

on the sea-margin. that can

It

seems a

fair

was concentrated

assumption, though not one

be proved owing to the lack of organic

early sites, that those

who

settled

traces

on the coast did so

on the to take

advantage of two environments, that of the interior and that of the actual beach and of inshore waters. There for this

is

plenty of evidence

from the middens dating from the height of the Postwest Baltic and around the Atlantic coasts, for

glacial period in the

instance in western Scotland, Brittany and the

mounds, themselves composed

in large

Tagus

estuary.

measure of the

The

shells

of

marine molluscs, contain the bones of land mammals, side by side with those of marine

The

fish

and on occasion seals and toothed whales.

earliest farmers in the

Whereas

Old World

in north-western,

and for

that matter in central, eastern

and southern Europe peoples equipped with microlithic dustries of

mode

5

flint in-

continued to depend on hunting, fishing and

gathering for subsistence, other groups sharing the same basic

technology

laid the

foundations of settled

life.

They

did so in

those parts of south-west Asia where prototypes of the earliest

domesticated animals and plants existed in a wild state and where, as

we have

seen, the concentration

on

particular species as sources

of food, already begun during the Late Pleistocene, was not 83

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING

Hacilar

V

gatal

"

Cayonu^Tapesi^

Huyuk

Ma,-;., Mersin

^ TH

Ras Shamra »r

"

1

\l

TellHalaf

9 •

^Shanidar

Hassunai

Belt

Cave

^ Palegawra

Jarmo

• Asiab

siaik

^Tepe Guran

3.

Key

sites in the transition to

farming in south-west Asia.

Land below 200 m. shown

interrupted but if anything stimulated that

marked the

transition to

by

the ecological changes

Neothermal climate. Here the

tion could be effected broadly

millennia B.C.

in shading.

transi-

between the ninth and seventh

by peoples having the same transitional or Mesolithic

character and basically the same technology as their cousins in

Europe condemned that

poor existence

to eke out a

in an

environment

from the point of view of hunters had undergone

for the

worse

at the

a

change

end of the Ice Age.

Zagros

Evidence has been found both on the Iraqi and Iranian sides of the frontier for the transitional phase in farming before pottery

been taken into

common

use.

To

take

first

had

the Kurdish zone, the

evidence comes from both rock-shelters and open settlements.

Layer B in the cave of Shanidar

is

84

particularly instructive. In the

THE OLD WORLD

IN

lower portion (B 2) dating from around 10,000 dustry of the type

first

B.C. a lithic in-

recognized at Palegawra occurs with re-

mains of wild goats that seem to have been hunted

may have been

as a

herd and

systematically culled. In the upper part (B i) be-

longing to the early half of the ninth millennium the same

though

tradition persisted,

now

enriched

by blades

lithic

for slotted

reaping-knives. Bones of domestic sheep bear witness to herd-

maintenance and such

traits as

querns, baskets and reaping-knife

blades point to the harvesting of cereals.

The same

people,

it

appears, also inhabited open stations at this time, notably at

Karim Shahir and Zawi Chemi Shanidar. The most fully, though still incompletely explored village relating to this phase is that of Jarmo, which most probably dates from the first half of the seventh millennium B.C. The settlement, situated

on a promontory

in the

Kurdish

hills,

can hardly, to

judge from the thinness of its deposits, have lasted for more than a very few centuries.

probably consisted of about twenty-five

It

houses huddled together, each having an open alley or small court on two sides. small rectangular built

The houses

rooms

themselves, which had several

each, were constructed of packed

up course by course, each being allowed

mud

to dry in the sun

before the next one was added. Clay ovens and the bases for silos

were

built into each

these were covered slight extent

about

5

house and marks on the floors showed that

by

plaited mats.

—

by hunting

The

villagers lived

only to a

the bones of wild animals account for

per cent of the whole

—and depended mainly on mixed

farming: two-rowed barley, emmer, spelt and peas were certainly cultivated

and sheep and goats were herded and maintained.

A

Palegawra-like array of microliths reflect the continuance of hunt-

ing and whole blades showing the friction

cereals

with corn

tell-tale

gloss that

stalks, as well as milling-stones,

were harvested, cereals which we know were

cated in the sense that they had been improved systematically sown. Since mats were

85

made

it is

came from

confirm that

now domesti-

by breeding and highly probable

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING that baskets

were

as well,

but although figurines of

animals were modelled from unfired clay there the

main part of the deposit

any evidence for

was found

textiles.

that pottery

On

in the top third

the other

is

women and

no sign from

was made, nor was

hand the

fact that

there

pottery

of the deposit, taken in conjunction

with the original radiocarbon dates, suggests that the Jarmo settlement belongs to the

phase of farming before the develop-

last

ment of formal Neolithic culture

in the region.

Recent excavation in south-western Iran has brought to light important evidence bearing on the evolution of farming in the provinces of Khuzistan and Luristan. Three classes of settlement

have been recognized permanent villages of mud-walled houses :

occupied by up to a hundred persons; seasonal camps without

permanent structures; and caves, which

like

Shanidar

itself

were

probably resorted to seasonally by herding units belonging to

permanent

villages.

At

least

two phases of farming settlement

antedate the appearance of the earliest pottery in this region

round about 6000

B.C.

The

initial

Bus Mordeh phase witnessed

the systematic collection of seeds, including those of wild alfalfa,

spring milk vetch, wild oats and other wild cereal grasses and the fruit

of wild capers. Indeed, wild seeds often of very small

of a kind that must have been shaken into a

fine basket

size,

or tray,

made up over nine-tenths of those recovered in carbonized form. The remaining fraction included grains of emmer wheat and tworowed barley which can be presumed on account of their size to have been planted. The fact that seeds of the sea club-rush occurred mixed with cultivated

cereal grains suggests that crops

been grown and harvested

and

it

may be

in close

must have

proximity to marshy ground;

significant in this regard that carp, water-turtle,

mussel and water-birds were included in the

diet.

Hunting

re-

mained important, gazelle being the principal quarry along with onager, wild ox and wild boar, but livestock were also maintained.

Goats were presumably introduced from the near-by mountains

and were herded on a considerable 86

scale.

Sheep had hardly begun

IN THE

OLD WORLD

to appear in

any number. The flint-work

base of Bus

Mordeh

economic

reflects the

society: micro liths point to hunting; and

blades for insertion into reaping knives to reaping.

During the succeeding Ali Kosh phase

cereal cultivation greatly

increased at the expense of plant-gathering and

emmer and two-

rowed barley accounted

for two-fifths of carbonized seeds. Goat outnumbered sheep. Increased prosperity based on higher production of cereals was reflected in larger houses that were now still

built

mud

of sun-dried bricks held together by

mud on

plastered over with floors

and the

villagers also

either face.

made twined

mortar and often

Mats were used on the baskets

some of which

they apparently waterproofed with pitch. Stone bowls became

more numerous and

diverse in form. Personal ornaments

included a tubular bead

made from cold-hammered

now

native copper.

Pottery on the other hand was not brought into use until the onset of the ensuing

Mohammad

Jaflar

phase around

c.

6000

B.C.

The Levant

At

the opposite extremity of the crescent in Jordan and Israel a

parallel

sequence of development can be observed from a hunting

and gathering economy to one

in

which farming played an

increasingly important role, a development associated with quite a distinct manifestation of a

Neothermal period after the

mode

5

lithic

industry. Early in the

we find a well-defined culture termed

Shouqbah

Wady

en-Natuf cave, where

it

Natufian

was

first

recognized. This was centred on a strip within forty miles of the coast

from Beirut

to the

Judaean desert with extensions to the

south-west as far as Heluan near Cairo and northwards to Syria

and even to Beldibi occupied

Turkey. The bearers of

both rock-shelters and

represented

and the

in south

by

latter

Mount Carmel

open

stations,

this culture

the

the Mugharet el- Wad, el-Kebarah and

by phase

former

Shouqbah

3 at

Nahal Oren on the west slope of

by

the earliest occupations at Tell-es-

as well as

Sultan (Jericho) and Beidha near Petra.

b7

— THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING As we have

already noted, the animal bones from Natufian

sites indicate a

concentration on gazelle so marked as to suggest

that the hunters concentrated

on herds of this animal

of their protein, but they supplemented

this

by

for the bulk

fishing

and more

importantly by the harvesting of cereals. Their material culture reflects their needs. Microliths, the

was the crescent with marked

ridge,

its

predominant form of which

back blunted by bipolar flaking giving a

were presumably used

to

arm weapons

for hunting.

The rich bone work included finely barbed spearheads and barbless fish-hooks closely similar in form to those of the Maglemosian

The importance of

in northern Europe.

harvesting

suggested

is

by the number of blades with lustre caused by friction with stalks and by the

bone handles

slotted

for holding these.

Numerous

mortars, some of them cut out of the living rock, as well as stone pestles, also point to the

importance of plant food. The numbers

of people found buried together in cemeteries adults) at

el-Wad,

c.

—87 persons

(64

50 at Nahal Oren and 45 at Shouqbah

suggests that the Natufians were able to live in sizeable groups.

Other evidence of a

certain prosperity lies in the wealth

sonal ornaments buried with the dead

of per-

who were presumably fully

These included head-dresses and thigh-bands made up of Dentalium shells, necklaces of beads made from the perforated

clothed.

and carved

articular

ends of gazelle phalanges, bored teeth and

twin-pendants of carved bone separated by Dentalium spacers.

Again, Natufian in the case

art,

although not very plentiful, occasionally, as

of a carved cervid from

Umm

ez-Zuetina, reached a

degree of naturalism comparable with that of the Magdalenian.

Other carved work included the ends of bone reaping-knife handles shaped into the form of animal heads and a small stone head of a human being.

The vitality of the Natufian more significant way by the

culture

fact that

further advances towards setded

of the

flint artifacts

made by

is

it

life. It is

the people

88

also witnessed in an

formed the

basis for

significant that

who built

the

even

first

many

massive

THE OLD WORLD

IN

defences of Tell-es-Sultan, comprising a rock-cut ditch 9 metres

wide and

3

metres deep backed by a stone wall with bastion-like

towers, were

made

in the

encampment round

the bricks

within the

tradition as the original Natufian

The original builders of the Jericho

the spring.

—known of used defended — A)

defences (stage the slope

same

as the

hogback-brick people, from

in building their beehive-shaped huts

are only

area

presumed

to

have farmed on

the grounds that they can hardly otherwise have afforded to

construct defences on such a scale. Stage

B

at Jericho

has often

been referred to as the plaster-floor stage on account of the use of lime-plaster for finishing the interiors of the rectangular buildings

which

now came

into use.

At both

stages

some form of skull-cult

seems to have been practised: the hogback-brick people packed very

skulls in nests

much

in the

same way

as the Mesolithic folk

of Ofnet and Kaufertsberg did in Bavaria; but the plaster-floor

makers showed greater sophistication

in

modelling the faces of

the dead in fine painted clay, marking the eyes in

some

cases

by

inset cowrie shells (Pi. III).

The humbler

settlements at Nahal

case overlaid Natufian

Jericho in

encampments and sequence.

their architectural

structures of stage

A

Oren and Beidha

in each

further agreed with

At Nahal Oren only

were well preserved. These comprised

round huts with dry-stone walls, well-defined entrances and interior fireplaces set

on

a series of artificial terraces

panied by clusters of rounded the other

hand

it is

examined, though tures of stage A. in plan

ancillary structures.

and accom-

At Beidha on

only the houses of stage B that have yet been it is

known

that these overlay

The houses of the upper

level

rounded

struc-

were rectangular

and each covered around 42 centiares (30 square yards). or cellar floors, which alone have yet been re-

The basement

covered, had very thick walls and central passages with rows of small chambers

ings of stage flint

on

either side.

As

at

Jericho the rectangular build-

B had been finished with white lime-plaster. The B at both sites shares a number of fea-

industry from stage

89

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING

common

tures in

with that

recognized at

first

Wadi Tahun,

notably chipped axe- and adze-blades sharpened by transverse

blows

like those

from Maglemosian

northern Europe and

sites in

long barbed and tanged flake arrows, often with shallow surface flaking, is

of a kind widely

known from

Anatolia. Stage

B

at

Beidha

particularly notable for producing the earliest precise evidence

about cereal crops in the Levant. wild barley

(//. spontaneuni)^

Much

commonest

the

which must

exceptionally fine natural stands or have been sown. the other

hand was

certainly domesticated,

cereal

was

have grown in

either

even

Emmer on if

the con-

spicuously wide range in grain size suggests that this had only

happened very pistachio

recently. Several

members of

the pea-family and

were among other sources of plant food

The Beidha B

to be gathered.

undoubtedly obtained a very high pro-

villagers

portion of their meat from goats and the high proportion of

young represented

the

in

example, in the case of gazelle

been

— —argues

substantially higher than, for

kill

that the herds

may have

and thus to some degree domesticated.

directly controlled

Anatolia

For

several reasons, not least

the Levant, Anatolia

is

for various reasons very

prehistory.

examined

Only one

—and

that

its

position between the Zagros and

an area of high strategic importance, but

site

little is

known about

from the

incompletely

critical

—

in

this stage

of

its

period has yet been

the

south-east

region

where einkorn was most probably domesticated, namely (^ayonii Tepesi near Ergani in the country west of Lake Van. Here the inhabitants built rectangular houses with grid-like stone foundations. flint

They made

clay figurines but

no pottery. Their work

in

and obsidian marks an extension of the Palegawran tradition

of the Zagros and Caspian regions. They made beads from malachite and their

drills

or reamers from native copper, but of course

technology was no more chalcolithic than that of the bearers

of the Archaic culture of the eastern United States of America. 90

IN

THE OLD WORLD

Information about western Anatolia things stand out. First there

and rock-shelters

still

two

scanty, but

the Antalya region for Mesolithic levels

in

intermediate between

is

evidence from a number of caves

is

Advanced

At

taining Neolithic pottery.

and others, con-

Palaeolithic ones

Beldibi and Belbasi these inter-

mediate levels have yielded crescents with bipolar retouch that indicate clear Natufian affinities as if to balance the Palegawran

of ^ayonii Tepesi; and from Beldibi pebbles with

affinities

vaguely anthropomorphic designs

way of

general

in red paint

remind one

paintings from Romanelli, but above

painted pebbles of Mas-d'Azil. Secondly, there

is

all

evidence from a

period near the end of the eighth millennium for a

later

tradition parallel in respect of its projectile points to the

V

of the southern Levant. Level

known in the

'

chalcolithic

B

'

mound,

levels in the

is

at Hacilar,

far

lithic

Tahunian

underlying the well-

marked by other

Levant as

in a

of the

features paralleled

south as Jericho and Beidha, in-

cluding the absence of pottery, the presence of rectangular houses

with plastered walls and floors and evidence for a skull diet

of these

earliest inhabitants

cult.

The

of Ha§ilar included meat from

wild animals and others of ill-defined status. Plant food included einkorn, cultivated

emmer and two-rowed barley as well as lentils.

That Anatolia was linked

montane crescent

that

culturally with

both arms of the sub-

gave birth to farming has recently been

emphasized by a study of obsidian. The most important sources of

this volcanic glass to

have been

utilized

during prehistoric

times in south-west Asia are located respectively in the Lake

Van-Kars-Erevan docian

districts

districts

of Armenia and in the West Cappa-

of Ciftlik and Acigol. That obsidian from Armenia

300-400 kilometres already during the

was passing south

as far as

Late Pleistocene

shown by its occurrence in a Baradostian level a final Advanced Palaeolithic one at Zarzi. The

at

is

Shanidar and in

traffic

gained markedly both in intensity and range during the

period of transition between 9000 and 6000 B.C. with which

we

are concerned, reaching as far as Ali Kosh, about 1,000 kilometres

91

THE BEGINNINGS OF FARMING Some key

radiocarbon dates for early farming

settlements in south-west Asia

and

north-east Ajrica

THE OLD WORLD

IN Iran I

4,000

Turkey

Iraq

4567

B.C.

3,000

^

3

8

9

Levant

10

12

11

13

N. Africa

14

15

16

17

18

B.C.

19

3,000

—

4,000

+ + 5,000

-

6,000

—

©

7,000

-

9,oco

-

+

h

0-

©

- 5,000

- 6,000

- 7,000

©

- 9,000

Some key radiocarbon

dates (b.c.) for early farming settlements in south-

west Asia and north-east Africa,

—

of the situation

and ideas may

O

indicates estimations.

aboriginal Australia that material objects

in, say,

travel great distances

attached to the

Indicates sites with pottery;

-f-

indicates aceramic sites;

soil. It also

among peoples

warns us of the

not yet firmly

essential futility

of

trying to identify precisely where within the vast arc of sub-

montane farming

territory over first

which the ecological prerequisites existed

developed.

As has

already been suggested

likely that particular wild cereals

where they flourished best is

worth emphasizing

it

seems

were taken into cultivation

in the wild state. In this connection

that,

although the

earliest

it

farmers were

equipped as might only be expected with a modified Mesolithic lithic

technology (mode

5), this

conformed

to

two

distinct tradi-

tions, the Palegawran extending from south-west Persia to

Armenia and the Caspian and the Natufian from south Anatolia through the Levant to Sinai and even the Nile Valley. The point to

make

is

that

it is

Anatolia, the

obsidian, that provides the largest

home

last

of both sources of

gap in our knowledge of the

prehistory of the zone of south-west Asia most crucial to our

enquiry between say 20,000 and 6000 93

B.C.

CHAPTER

5

THE ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION IN SOUTH-WEST ASIA NEOLITHIC SETTLEMENT THE HIGHLANDS Around 6000

B.C. the early

farmers whose beginnings were con-

sidered in chapter 4 had developed their at

which they were able

in their

submontane

IN

economy

habitats.

practice of periodically rebuilding their houses of

dried brick

on the same

sites

gave

on flint and stone and on

they could shape with tools

mud

and sun-

rise to the stratified tells

incorporate the material evidence of their history, for their technology

to the point

down permanently at fixed sites The peasant communities, whose

to settle

which

depended

the organic materials

The way in which predecessors was by their use

made from

they were distinguished from their

still

these.

of pottery for containers and cooking vessels. In some cases least

they also

wove

textiles

survived exceptionally. In a

even

if actual

word they were

fabrics

at

have only

fully Neolithic in the

sense that this has been understood for over a hundred years;

and the Neolithic character of their technology

is

hardly affected

by the use of copper for such minor things as pins and trinkets. The adoption of settled life in itself made for local differentiation and the fact that pottery was at this stage largely made on the site means

that

it

was

a vehicle for local variations of taste

fashion, rather as rugs have been in the

same region down

and

to the

present day. Regional and temporal variations in the make and

above

all

the decoration of pottery are properly subjects for

specialist publications.

No more

will

be attempted here than to

bring out the broad distinction between the cultural traditions of the

two main zones already recognized 94

for the period of transition.

NEOLITHIC SETTLEMENT IN THE HIGHLANDS Kurdistan, Iran and Turkmenia

The

Neolithic communities of the southern margins of Turk-

menia

south slopes of the Elburz facing the

(e.g. Djeitun), the

inner desert zone of the Iranian plateau (e.g. Sialk) and the

western slope of the Zagros from Kurdistan and Kermanshah to Fars and ultimately to Baluchistan, although differing in their pottery styles, were united by the basically Palegawran nature of

The normal

their flint-work.

and

built

of either

mud

made up of

seen that the village was thirty farmsteads

for another

dwelling was rectangular in form

or sun-dried brick. At Djeitun

and there

is

it

a concentration

no evidence

at this stage

could be

of about or indeed

few thousand years of large urban settlements

The animal bones show

part of the world.

in this

that the hunting

of

such species as antelope and goat contributed significantly to subsistence and liths

no doubt the continued manufacture of micro-

and notably of trapezes was

hand the cultivation of equipment for reaping. Djeitun and Sialk

bone handles pottery

made

I

cereals

It is

related to this.

the other

extremely interesting to see

flint-blades continued to

as they

On

involved the manufacture of

how

at

be inset into slotted

had been since Mesolithic times. Much of the

at sites like

Djeitun and Sialk was plain but some of

was painted with simple geometric designs; at the former vertical arrangements of wavy lines sometimes broken by hori-

it

zontal straight ones were favoured, whereas at the latter

chequer patterns and shaded

and

women were

There

is

triangles.

it

was

Clay figurines of animals

a recurrent feature.

comparable evidence for farmers

settling

down and

starting to make pottery containers and cooking vessels from many localities

to Fars

along the western slopes of the Zagros from Kermanshah

and on to Baluchistan. Long sustained systematic excava-

tion in Khuzistan has brought to light particularly impressive

evidence for a gradual evolution of farming and the appearance

around 6000

B.C.

of

fully

formed Neolithic 95

culture.

The

earliest

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION Mohammad

pottery, that of the

IN S.W. ASIA

Jaffar stage, included

slipped burnished vessels, but for the

most part

it

some

red-

was buff

in

colour, mostly plain, but sometimes painted with simple geo-

metric designs.

It is significant that

alongside reaping-knife flakes

and other forms related to farming the microlithic component continued

down

to the ensuing Sabz phase of the second half of

the sixth millennium.

Anatolia, Syria

The

and Northern Iraq

region extending from the upper Tigris far into southern

by

Anatolia continued to be distinguished

its

basic flint tech-

we

nology: instead, for instance, of trapeziform microliths projectile-points

find

and even dagger-blades made from heavy tanged

blades retouched over the convex and often over part of the under surface

by

flat

On

shallow flaking.

the other

hand reaping-knife

blades and polished stone axe-blades were both

The

ments.

earliest

(Jatal Hiiyiik,

where

pottery was uniformly

common

ele-

monochrome. At

was supplemented by abundant wooden

it

containers of varying shapes, the pots were of elementary ovoid

form, though provided with lugs or sometimes with bucket-like handles.

The

earliest villagers at

Mersin made hole-mouthed pots

and ornamented them with impressions from sometimes applied with also used to

Syrian

sites

a

which were

ornament monochrome pots of simple form of Ras Shamra and Byblos. That

province included northern Iraq lanceheads from the pottery.

shells

continuous rocking motion. Shells were

is

shown by

the earliest levels at Tell

As we

this

the

same

flint

Hassuna

the

at

cultural

and obsidian as well as

by

same community of cul-

shall shortly see the

ture obtained during the ensuing period

when copper came

into

increasing use.

The

possibilities

opened up by an assured supply of food are

brilliantly displayed

southern Anatolia.

at

The

13 hectares (32 acres)

(Jatal

Hiiyiik

on the Konya

very extent of the

and the manner 96

in

mound

Plain of

covering some

which the houses are

NEOLITHIC SETTLEMENT IN THE HIGHLANDS packed together

in the excavated area argue for a sizeable

com-

munity. Subsistence rested to a significant degree on the cultivation

and harvesting of cereal crops, including bread wheat

emmer and

as einkorn,

as well

Sheep and goats were kept, in

barley.

made

addition to dogs, but hunting

a big contribution to the

supply of meat. Wild ox, wild pig and red deer were the most important game.

The people

lived in rectangular houses built

contiguously but interspersed

at intervals

by

courtyards.

walls were built of large sun-dried bricks held together

summer

flat

The thick

and bones. The buildings were

layers of mortar containing ash

bungalows with

by

roofs that were doubtless used during the

many purposes other than serving as a means of The absence of doorways indeed suggests that access

for

circulation.

to the dwellings

was gained through holes

stepped timbers against one wall led

Indoor ovens were but open

in the roofs

down

to the

from which

ground

floor.

built into the walls so as to help retain heat,

fireplaces

were

near the middle of the floors.

set

Features of the houses were the carefully plastered benches used for sitting

dead.

The

and sleeping and not skeletons,

up

least as receptacles for the

to thirty or

more

family

in a simple bench,

appear to have been exposed some while before being buried, but

some of them have been set at rest in fairly good anatomical order. The twelve constructional phases noted by the excavators show that houses were frequently rebuilt and the remarkable evidence for continuity of tradition in successive levels suggests that rebuilding

took place

at

frequent intervals.

Although pottery was made from the very beginning, the good conditions of preservation encountered in

observe that

wooden

vessels

portant part as containers.

The

fact that

used for beads and trinkets in no wise

nology was

some

levels allow us to

and coiled baskets played an im-

basically Neolithic.

and obsidian provided

Flint

materials for lanceheads, dagger-blades

and blades for setting

the slots of antler reaping-knife handles.

97

copper and lead were

alters the fact that tech-

in

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION The

IN S.W. ASIA

blades of the axes and adzes needed for felling and shaping

timber were

made from hard greenstone

Blocks of obsidian were

split

to provide mirrors for the

metics. Antler artifacts,

polished to a sharp edge.

and polished with the utmost

women, who used

and bone were worked

skill

a variety of cos-

to provide a

wide range of

including spoons and ladles, needles, belt-fasteners and

handles of various kinds. Animal skins were prepared for garments. Woollen textiles were used both for clothing and

judge from certain wall-paintings

—

—

for rugs or hangings.

to

It is

impressive to note the wide area from which these early Neolithic

people drew their raw materials, and no

to observe the

less

extremely high standard reached in a variety of

absence of waste materials from the dwellings so

crafts.

far

argues that separate workshops existed elsewhere on the it

would seem

further than

likely that craft specialization

one

is

The

explored site

and

had gone much

accustomed to expect of a Neolithic com-

munity. Richness in material goods was more than matched in the sphere of art and

cult. Reliefs

and paintings were applied to the

rooms so richly as to denote their use as number and small size of these argues for domestic family cults: public temples manned by whole-time priests were still something for the future. The iconography of the wall art, as of the numerous small plastic figurines and stone carvings, plastered walls of certain shrines, but the

argues that worship centred round the generative forces of nature.

No emphasis was laid on the organs of sex, but the figures shown on the walls were either women or animals such as bulls or rams symbolic of male potency. These

last

were sometimes represented

only by heads and horns, as in scenes showing birth to bulls. figurines

one

Men and boys were sometimes

and one stone carving shows two

side a

women

represented in the

pairs in embrace,

goddess and her partner and on the other

her son. Conversely the theme of death counterparts

of the

jaguars

is

a

on

goddess and

symbolized by leopards,

of Mesoamerican 98

giving

iconography:

NEOLITHIC SETTLEMENT IN THE HIGHLANDS opposed leopards are shown figurines

one of a

woman

in

wall

in childbirth

and among the

reliefs

supported on either side

by leopards and another of a goddess holding

a leopard

on

either

arm.

Late Neolithic communities

was not

It

until

about the middle of the sixth millennium that the

fashion of painting pottery spread fairly rapidly over territories

where monochrome wares had existed for some

centuries. Simple

multichevron designs appeared on pots from northern Iraq

(Hassuna lb, c and

II

:

Nineveh

I) to Cilicia

(Mersin

XX-XXIV).

Further west more complex geometric designs occurred on

Can Hassan and from

pottery from

mound of Ha^ilar. The most brilliant

the fifth level

upwards

in the

manifestation of early painted pottery in

south-west Asia was that named after Tell Halaf. Halafian pottery is

outstanding on account of the variety of its forms and above

all

painted decoration and because of the excellence of

its

of

its

firing; it

was

but

it

was

still

no reason

to think

made by whole-time

potters.

hand-made, and there

necessarily or even probably

is

In addition to dishes and flasks the forms included bowls with

sharp-shouldered bodies and flaring necks and bowls and flasks

on hollow

stands.

like triangles,

quatrefoils

The

decoration comprised geometric patterns

chevrons, lozenges, chequers,

and

rosettes; stipples, including

stylized representations

of

based on the bull's head.

by

stars,

men and

It

Maltese crosses,

egg and dot; and

animals, including designs

was applied

to a bufl" or

cream

slip

glaze paint. At the climax of the industry the decoration was

polychrome; red, orange, yellow and black paints being used, sometimes highlighted by white spots. The pottery was apparently fired to

temperatures up to i200°C. in great

rectangular annexes,

like

walls and ceilings of clay

domed

kilns

with

those preserved at Carchemish, with

on stone

footings.

For some time Halafian technology continued to be based on 99

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION

IN S.W. ASIA

obsidian, flint and other kinds of stone tool with copper being

used only for small things for

some time

after

culture of southern Iraq. at

working hard

like beads,

and the tradition continued

copper metallurgy had spread from the Ubaid

The

Halafians were particularly skilled

which they made into button

stones,

seals,

beads,

amulets and small vessels, and they were accustomed to draw

raw

materials

from a considerable range of

territory.

At

its

greatest extent Halafian pottery extended as far west as the SyroCilician region

Shamra

it

it

occurred

(III), as far east as

Lake Van and tory

where

as far south as

at

Mersin (XVII-XIX) and Ras

Hassuna (VI-XI), Babylon. Over

as far north as

this extensive terri-

displayed similarities not merely in material equipment

but also in evidence of cult. As

at (^atal

we

find

on the one hand

female figurines and on the other symbols of masculinity such as

whose horned heads were in this case painted on pots and carved in the form of amulets. In addition double-axe amulets

bulls,

and representations on pottery betray the existence of a respect for thunder if not indeed for a thunder-god.

URBAN CIVILIZATION

IN

SUMER

Ubaid

Although

settled life, as

we have

seen,

first

developed over a

tract

of high ground extending from the Iranian plateau to Anatolia

and the Levant,

it

was on the

alluvial lands

valleys of Tigris-Euphrates, Nile

and

literate societies

of the great river

and Indus that the

earliest

urban

emerged. Whereas the highlands provided

abundant prototypes for the domestic animals and cereals on

which

settled life

stones, minerals

was based and

at the

same time were

rich in the

and timbers needed for creating the very

fabric

of a more advanced material culture, the river valleys were deficient in

extremely

these.

rich.

the possibilities

On

What

the other

hand they were potentially

they needed was the discipline to exploit

of irrigation. This discipline implied a higher lOO

URBAN CIVILIZATION

SUMER

IN

degree of political integration than was yet valleys.

And

known

in the

upland

the great rivers were themselves arteries capable of

knitting together unified states.

The

become Sumer lacked building-stone or

land that was to

even timber (apart from palm-stems), climate

was

arid

and

its

tions like those provided tunity.

The

soil

was

alone minerals;

let

its

rivers did not give rise to annual inunda-

by

the Nile. Yet

it

was a land of oppor-

potentially fertile and the water

was there

for

irrigation; given the level of technology' that had already been

reached over extensive tracts of south-west Asia and above

given the possibility

of public works on an adequate

scale,

it

all

was

capable of producing food enough to support societies at increas-

ing levels of complexity; moreover, the great rivers that gave the possibility

of exercising

political control also facilitated access to

sources of raw materials in the distant highlands.

To anyone

capable of profiting from these conditions the potentialities were

immense.

When The

the alluvial lands were

first

inhabitants well

Al Ubaid, a humble silt

first

known

village set

in the Euphrates Valley.

on

a

occupied

is still

to us are those

low mound or

These people

archaeological record in the latter part of the

uncertain.

named

after

island of river

first

appear in the

fifth

millennium

at

a time when the Halafian culture had for some centuries been flourishing in the north. The huts of the name-site were built of

the

most abundant raw materials of the

area;

some had a flat

roof,

the walls formed of reed mats suspended between palm-stems and plastered with

mud, and others

a

rounded one formed by bending

bundles of reed over from one side to another, creating a structure like a

Nissen hut.

The

peasants lived

were harvested by reaping-knives or like those

by farming:

sickles set

cereal crops

with

flint teeth,

used on the highlands and in the Syro-Cilician region,

or alternatively by sickles

bones have survived, the

made of baked clay; and, though no use of dung as plaster and the manu-

facture of animal figurines confirm that domestic livestock

lOI

were

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION kept. There

marshes and ends,

it

is

some evidence

rivers.

To

would appear

Potting was

also for hunting

and fishing

in the

judge from a clay model with upturned

that they

from bundles of reeds rivers.

IN S.W. ASIA

like the

still

were already using boats made

modern

helium to navigate the

mainly done by hand during the early

stage of the culture, but already the foot-rings added to certain vessels before firing

were being shaped on a slow-moving wheel

or tournette turned by the potter's hand. light buff colour

The

which turned when over-fired

were decorated by painting with

finer wares,

of a

to a greenish hue,

smooth ferruginous paint

a

having a matt surface, generally blackish but sometimes reddish in colour.

The

made up predominantly of relatively

patterns were

simple geometrical designs, such as zigzag

lines, triangles,

lozenges

and cross-hatching, but very occasionally animal motifs, those used

The

more

freely in the highlands,

picture of village

has been corrected

by

life

like

were employed.

given by the exploration of Al Ubaid

later

work on

number of town sites. Ur in the the north has shown that

a

Excavation of Tell Shahrain (the ancient Eridu) and south and of Tepe the Ubaid

Gawra (XII-XIX)

people also lived in

from sun-dried

bricks.

in

towns and erected

Another sign of their

their buildings

relative

advance over

predecessors in Mesopotamia was that they practised metallurgy. In the south few copper objects have been recovered from Ubaid

Tepe Gawra and Arpachiya and further afield at number of cast copper axes and other tools have been found; even at Al Ubaid the peasants made baked clay copies of copper tools, notably shaft-hole axes with expanded blades. The deposits, but at

Tell Halaf a

most

striking

monuments of

the

Ubaid people, not only on

account of their physical size but even more because of what they

imply

no

less

walls,

in social organization, are their temples.

than thirteen, the two bottom ones

were found

in

the

Ubaid

levels

1

(level

02

a

few

underlying structures

The earliest temple of XVI) was a small, nearly

dating from the third Dynasty of Ur.

which a plan could be recovered

At Abu Shahrain

known only from

URBAN CIVILIZATION square

room with

IN

SUMER

a door near one corner,

two short screens

suggesting a division of the inner space, an altar in a niche in the rear wall

and an offering-place showing signs of burning

middle; by level VIII, on the other hand, the a central cella flanked

been evolved. This

most Ubaid

layers

on

latter

in the

tripartite plan

with

by rows of small rooms had

either side

type occurred again in the two lower-

(XVIII-XIX)

at

Tepe Gawra and was

to recur

throughout the succeeding Warka and Protoliterate stages of southern Iraq.

The

construction and above

all

the frequent re-

construction of temples, which might be of very substantial

go

to

show

that the

Ubaid people had already so

size,

to speak created

the characteristic form of early civilization in Mesopotamia, the

whose economic,

sacred city

on

the temple and

social

and religious

life

was centred

its priests.

Warka

On

the

Ubaid foundation Sumerian

paratively rapidly in the south,

civilization

where

its

developed com-

progress can most con-

veniently be followed in the sequence of deposits found in the precinct of the

Semitic Erech). Here the the

bottom

Warka (= Sumerian Uruk, Warka stage proper is represented by

Eanna Temple

six layers

at

(XIV-IX), the succeeding

being assigned to the Protoliterate stage. The

six (VIII-III)

Warka

stage

is

marked by the spread of a new kind of pottery which first coexisted with evolved forms of Ubaid ware and then replaced this pottery is interesting

because

it

Anatolia and suggests an enrichment of Mesopotamia

from the north. Economically turned on facture

significance

had ceased to be a domestic

were found

No

craft

and was

in

that its

in the

was

it

manu-

hands of

architectural remains of outstanding in-

in the levels

god Anu. The

home

by impulses

is

of

this

phase

at the

Eanna

in another part a succession of temples was erected to the

at

a free-spinning wheel, generally a sign that

whole-time potters. terest

main

its

Culturally

it.

belongs to a ware

earliest

site,

at this

but

time

of these, represented only by a ramp, 103

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION may have been

XIV, but those whose

than Eanna

earlier

IN S.W. ASIA plans

have been recovered were probably contemporary with Eanna XI-

The culminating

VIII.

White Temple,

Warka phase was

structure of the

on the

built

traditional threefold

having on the central axis of the

cella

the

and

plan

a rectangular pedestal

with a low semicircular step bearing traces of burning, presumably in connection

with offerings or incense. The White Temple

measured 22'3 x

17-5 metres

and

it

was

set

on

a great platform

70 metres long, 66 metres broad and 13 metres high, built of rectangular the

mud

bricks.

The

of the temples erected during

size

Warka phase and above all,

perhaps, the frequency with which

they were rebuilt go to emphasize their importance in the social

Another feature

structure of the day.

to appear at this time,

destined to be of even greater importance in Sumerian society,

was the cylinder

seal,

which

occurred between two under-

first

lying building phases most probably of Eanna Protoliterate

The

X-IX

Sumer

Protoliterate phase at

Warka was marked by

activity in the construction of temples.

On

the

Anu

ziggurat or stepped platform was erected for the

Eanna VIII; on the Eanna

site

V

and above

it

a building with great free-standing columns; and site

a temple

was

a

renewed

site a true

first

time in

a tripartite temple was raised on a

limestone footing during period

of the

age.

built directly

on

IV

in period

on another

part

the level soil, the surface

being decorated by vast numbers of small cones of variously coloured stones pressed into

gypsum

plaster, that

of a vast mosaic covering not only the building wall round the court.

The phase

gave the

effect

itself but also

further witnessed a

the

number of

innovations, including the use of vessels of copper and silver,

monumental sculpture and pictographic

writing.

The uppermost

Protoliterate level at Warka (Eanna III) yielded an almost lifesize human head of marble and a number of large sculptures of animal heads. Again, from a hole beside an altar at Tell Asmar we have

104

URBAN CIVILIZATION a series of

human

represent in

from yellow limestone

figures (Pi. IV) carved

with the eyes inlaid by

shell,

SUMER

IN

which are thought

figures

temple they originally helped to furnish.

of the central role of the temple and society, that the earliest traces

It is significant,

Eanna IV and by Eanna

conventionalized. primitive scripts

III

combined

view

of writing and numeration befirst

appeared

they had become notably more

The numerical system

associated with these

features of the decimal

systems and emphasizes the

in

priests in Protoliterate

its

longed to the temple accounts. Pictographic signs in

to

most instances individual devotees of the god whose

way

in

and sexagesimal

which economic

activities

were controlled from the centre by the temple community. That

means of transport over land veloped

at

this

time

is

on

as well as

shown by

had been de-

rivers

among

the occurrence

the

pictographic signs of representations of wheeled vehicles and of

boats with upturned ends.

The Early Dynastic period

The

Early Dynastic phase of Sumerian civilization, which began

somewhere around 3000 B.C., was marked from view by an overall increase

innovations in the sphere of technology.

were already present

in the

a material point of

in wealth rather than

by any notable

Many of its basic as we have

Ubaid culture and,

the use of the wheel for potting and for transport, sculpture, cylinder seals

Among

seen,

monumental

and pictographic writing were

during the ensuing Protoliterate phases.

traits

the

all

added

most potent

signs of increased wealth should be mentioned the greater

abundance and elaboration of metal

and

vessels,

tools,

weapons, ornaments

among which forms were evolved

that spread in time

to Syria, Anatolia, the Aegean, the Caucasus, central

vast tracts of Russia.

By

Europe and

the end of Early Dynastic times the

Sumerian smiths were riveting and soldering,

as well as casting,

and were making bronze with a content of from 6 of tin. Quantities of gold and

silver

105

to 10 per cent

were used for ornaments and

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION vessels, as well as a

IN S.W. ASIA

wide range of more or

less

hard stones.

Representations on painted pottery, models and remains from

tombs give us more

detailed information about the

transport available at this time: chariots and

wheeled

waggons were

made from three pieces of wood held together by cross-pieces and bound by tyres held in place by copper nails, and drawn by Asiatic asses (onagers) or oxen harnessed by collars and yokes. From this time also enmounted on

evidently

solid wheels,

gravings on cylinder seals indicate that animal traction was being applied to light

The

wooden ploughs

rise in material

for cultivating the soil.

well-being was accompanied by major

changes in social structure, the most notable of which was the

emergence of kings or

officials

temporary war leaders, but the city states. rise

in

The immediate

of comparable

due course

status, at first as

as established rulers

of

cause of this was undoubtedly the

of warfare as an institution and

this itself

increase in wealth already noted: thus, the

was linked with the

growing

affluence of

the cities only served to increase their attraction to marauding pastoralists

of the highland and the desert; the citizens needed to

secure

raw materials

or

remote

less

territories inhabited

more

peoples; and, even

grew

in increasing variety

and volume from more

by poorer and more barbarous

to the point, rivalry

between the

cities

the opportunities for enrichment increased and this

as

occurred

time

at a

when armament was becoming more

effective

and the inhabitants found themselves able to support warriors.

Whatever the had by

this

so-called

'

factors responsible there can

be no doubt that war

time become a well-organized institution: on the

Royal Standard

'

of Ur

we

see depicted not only the

royal chariot with prisoners under guard, but three distinct grades

of combat troops, namely ass-drawn chariots riding

men down,

a phalanx of heavy troops helmeted and cloaked, and light

skirmishers in contact with the enemy. Eloquent insight into the status achieved

Tombs

at

by

the Sumerian rulers

Ur, which

show

that a

106

is

given by the Royal

whole procession of grooms,

URBAN CIVILIZATION guards, courtiers and funeral car,

women,

IN

SUMER

together with the oxen drawing the

were slaughtered to accompany the royal personage

to the next world.

Akkadians and Babylonians

Although the Sumerians had developed tive to ensure irrigation

policies sufficiently effec-

and the acquisition of raw materials from

a wide range of more or less distant sources, the level of organization

was

still

that

of city

At

states.

eleven of these, including

least

Ur, Erech, Larsa, Kish and Nippur,

at

one time supported in-

dependent and sometimes warring dynasties.

It

was not

until

2370 when Sargon and his Semitic-speaking followers founded the city of Agade only a short distance south-west of Babylon that we enter on an ampler stage of history. Although the paucity c.

of information surviving from contemporary documents and the opaqueness of subsequent legend have between them made difficult to establish

more than dim

Sargon and

clear that

only over Sumer tamia later

known

outlines of his reign,

his successors exercised a

itself,

it

it

seems

hegemony not

but over the northern part of Mesopo-

over Elam, and that their

as Assyria, as well as

influence extended over north Syria and probably even into

Anatolia.

The

extent of Akkadian influence and the fact that

lasted for several reigns suggests that

was founded on

it

far

it

more

than mere crude military force.

When

the

Akkadian dynasty was nevertheless overturned by

a incursion of Gurian highlanders

open

for a revival of

from the Zagros, the way was

Ur which under

what from many points of view was

its

Third Dynasty enjoyed

its

most splendid period.

Further waves of rough folk from without, Amorites from the

west and Elamites from the

opened

a period of

east,

the dynasty at

some confusion, from which

Mesopotamia and ultimately large in

by toppling tracts

Ur

the land of

of south-west Asia were

due course to benefit through the founding about 1990

B.C.

of the First Dynasty of Babylon. The succession of Hammurabi 107

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION about 1800

B.C.

commanding

as

IN S.W. ASIA

brought into a position of power an individual in his

whose reign more

way

Sargon of Agade and one about

as

details are

known. Under

his leadership

Baby-

lon rose supreme not only over the riverine zone of Mesopotamia

but also over the uplands of Assyria, the Zagros and Elam. The

and commerce spread even more

benefits of Babylonian law

widely. During Hammurabi's reign the use of cuneiform writing

and Akkadian speech for commerce brought extensive south-west Asia into that the

who

overthrow of the

First

sacked the capital in

c.

Dynasty of Babylon by the B.C.

1595

the east,

who

disaster

from the point of view of

up

in turn set

tracts

of

and peaceful contact. This meant

fruitful

their

own

Hittites

and by the Kassites from

dynasty, was not so serious

civilization in general as

it

might have been.

CIVILIZATION IN THE HIGHLANDS Anatolia and the Hittites

The

vast upland regions

that

gave birth to farming were

from Iran

to Anatolia

and the Levant

once too extensive and too

at

broken to encourage the early growth of centralized authority or of the higher

civilization

like writing or the use

only spread

later

Yet the mere

which

this

of cylinder

makes

and sometimes much

fact that

possible. Innovations

seals that

emanated in Sumer

later to these territories.

they were endowed with traditions based

on thousands of years of settled

life

as agriculturalists

the upland peoples were capable of absorbing

new

meant

even leaders speaking new languages without losing regional styles. This

The

is

nowhere

antiquity of settled

life

stressed earlier in this chapter. set

that

elements and their

own

truer than of Anatolia. in southern Anatolia has

No

attempt will be

been

made here

out details of the cultural history of this extensive region,

less to distinguish the differences exhibited

by each of

its

to

still

several

provinces, differences which contributed richness and texture to

108

CIVILIZATION IN THE HIGHLANDS the pattern as a whole.

The

points.

were the

set

first is

up

will

It

be

make a few general manned with Assyrians

sufficient to

that until trading posts

in central Anatolia there

was no rapid acceleration

tempo of cultural development. This can be seen

of time

it

in

in the length

took before metal tools began to take the place of stone

ones. Copper, as

we have

noted, was used in

native form for

its

beads and other trinkets from a very early stage in the develop-

ment of farming economy. The

metallurgical treatment of copper

moulds

ores and the casting of metal in

weapons and implements did not come

for the production of

until the fifth

millennium;

and the production of standard bronze based on the addition of tin alloy did

not begin until

c.

3000

B.C.

and then only

in favoured

localities.

The

next point to observe

is

that

some of

the

most striking

made their appearance already during B.C.) and that some were even concentration of wealth and power that

features of Hittite civilization

the Early Bronze older.

Age

3000-2000

{c.

Evidence for the

reached

its

climax under Hittite rule

great walled fortresses at

Troy

is

II

to

first

of all in the

and Kiiltepe (the ancient

Kadesh) dating from Early Bronze Age that the

be seen

II;

megaron type of public assembly

and

hall,

it

may be

noted

comprising a rec-

tangular structure with inner hall having a central fireplace and

outer porch, enclosed by these citadels also appeared in earlier and more modest surroundings at Troy I. Then, again, we have the

evidence for concentrated wealth in the great treasures from the royal

tombs of Alaca Hiiyiik

Priam's treasure of Troy

locked up in these that

II:

(level VII)

it is

calls for

and

in the so-called

not merely the value of the metal

remark, but

still

more

the high

standard of smithing and jewellery, and the evidence for social

rank embodied in the personal ornaments, metal utensils and

weapons of display. scrutinized

more

If the Early

closely,

we

Bronze Age metal-work

find evidence of the love

itself is

of poly-

chromatic effects contrived by inlaying, overlaying and incrusting silver,

electrum or even semi-precious stones on a bronze base 109

ACHIEVEMENT OF CIVILIZATION displayed in

work of the

dilection for bulls

Hittite period;

and stags exhibited

Age metal-work

alike

Hiiyiik, if not in

all

IN S.W. ASIA

and conversely the pre-

in Hittite

and Early Bronze

goes back to the lowermost level

at ^atal

probability beyond.

The Middle Bronze Age of Anatolia (c. 1950- 1700 B.C.) was marked most significantly by the arrival of Assyrian merchants.

One of

their trading posts

round the

raw

situated in the suburbs

of Kadesh, by

citadel

50-6 hectares (125 acres). traffic in

was

The

now

a

formed

town covering some

object of these posts

was

to regulate

materials to the south, notably copper and the then

extremely rare and precious iron, in exchange for manufactures

of which

on

textiles

were the most important. Merchandise was carried

the backs of donkeys organized in caravans and

we know from

business records not merely that silver in the form of rings and bars was used as a standard of value but even the equivalents in

terms of silver shekels of most goods Central Anatolia. dian

The

by an Assyrian cuneiform

by impressing cylinder

significant that

at the

time in

script

on clay

tablets

Akka-

and signed

seals. In other words central Anatolia was

brought within the sphere of literacy,

was concerned, by

common

records themselves were written in

at least so far as

commerce

virtue of direct contact with Assyria.

when

It

is

the Hittite rulers wished to record their

triumphs and conduct their correspondence they did so in Assyrian cuneiform script, even

if their

language was Indo-

European. Hittite

names began

to appear

first

in mercantile records

the closing phases of the Middle Bronze Age.

Much

from

controversy

surrounds the arrival of Indo-European speakers into Anatolia

and the directions from which they came, but the consensus that

some spread

into the south-west

by way of

is

the Bosphorus,

whereas others penetrated central Anatolia from the north-east

by way of Armenia. At

a stage of social

development when only

comparatively few people monopolized power and authority required no mass invasion to

infiltrate, seize

no

power and

it

establish

Hii^cm'^^^

Ill

skull with face modelled in clay from pre-pottery level at Jericho

f^

IV

Sumerian

^Mij^^

statuette of Early Dynastic times

from Tell Asmar, Mesopotamia

V

clay figurine from Early Neolithic

site

of Nea Nikomedeia,

West Macedonia, Greece

VI

Gold

funeral

mask of Agamemnon, Shaft-grave V, Mycenae

VII

Stone 'Janus' head from Roquepertuse,

Bouches-du-Rhone, France

Mil

Bronze dies for embossing helmet

plates,

showing Teutonic

personages of the Migration Period, Torslunda, Sweden

IX

Relief carving of

King Nar-mer on stone

Hierakonpolis, Egypt

palette,

X

Terracotta Negroid liead from Nok, Nigeria

XI

Stone carving of bearded

man from Mohenjo Daro,

Pakistan

5~^°7' Sankalia, to

H. D., Deo,

S. B.,

Ansari, Z. D., and Ehrhardt, S.

From History

Prehistory at Nevasa {1954-56). Poona, i960.

Deo, S. B. The Excavations at Maheshwar and Navdatoli 2952-3. Poona, i960. Sankalia, H. D. Prehistory and Protohistory in India and Pakistan. Bombay, Sankalia, H. D., Subbarao, B. and

1963.

Subbarao, B. The Personality of India. 2nd ed. Baroda, 1958. Vats, M. S. Excavations at Harappa. Delhi, 1940.

Wheeler, Sir R. E. M. Ancient India and Pakistan, London, 1959. The Indus Civiliiation. 3rd ed. Cambridge, 1968.

312

FURTHER READING CHAPTER

10

China

Andersson,

G. 'An Early Chinese Culture', Bull. Geol. Soc. China, no.

J.

5.

Peking, 1923. Children of the Yellow Earth.

London,

1934.

'Researches into the Prehistory of the Chinese', Bull.

Museum Far

Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, no. 15 (1943). Ame, T. J. 'Painted Stone Age Pottery from the Province of Honan, China', Palaeontologia Sinica, ser.

W. 'The

Bishop, C.

Neolithic

D,

vol.

Age

in

i, fasc. 2.

Peking, 1925.

Northern China', Antiquity (1933),

pp. 389-404.

Bylin-Althin, Bull.

M. 'The

Sites

Museum Far

of Chi' Chia P'ing and Lo

Han T'ang in Kansu',

Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, no. 18 (1946), 383—

498.

Chang, Kwang-Chih, The Archaeology of Ancient China. New Haven, 1963. Cheng Te-K'un. Archaeological Studies in S^echwan. Cambridge, 1957. 'The Origin and Development of Shang Culture', Asia Major, vi (1957), 80-98.

Archaeology

in China, vol.

I,

Prehistoric China.

Cambridge, 1958.

New

Light on Prehistoric China. Cambridge, 1966. Childe, V. G. 'The Socketed Celt in Upper Eurasia', Ann. Rep.

Lond. Univ. rgSj, Creel,

11,

Inst. Arch.

25.

H. G. The Birth of China. London, 1936.

Finn, D.

J.

Archaeological Finds on

Lamma

Island near

Hong Kong. Hong

Kong, 1958. Karlgren, B. 'Some Weapons and Tools of the Yin Dynasty', Bull. Museum Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, no. 17 (1945), 101-45. Li Chi et al. Ch'eng-tzu-yai, A report of Excavations of the Proto-historic '

Site

at

Ch'eng-tzu-yai, Li-ch'eng Hsien,

Shantung', Archaeologica

Nanking, 1934. Loehr, Max. *Zur Ur- und Vorgeschichte Chinas', Saelum, in (1952), 15-55. Maglioni, R. 'Archaeology in South China', /. East Asiatic Studies, 11 Sinica, no.

i.

(1952), 1-20.

Maringer,

Needham,

J. J.

Contribution to the Prehistory Science

and

of Mongolia. Stockholm, 1950.

Civilisation in China, vol.

I,

Introductory Orienta-

Cambridge, 1954. Nelson, N. C. 'The Dune Dwellers of the Gobi', Natural History, xxvi tions.

(1926), 24(>-5i.

Pei

Wen-Chung, 'On

a Mesolithic ()) Industry in the

Caves of Kwangsi',

Bull. Geol. Soc. China, no. 14 (1935), 383-412.

Teilhard de Chardin, P. and Pei

Wen- Chung. Le

Peking, 1944.

313

Neolithique de la Chine.

FURTHER READING Tolstoy, P. 'Some Amerasian Pottery Traits in North Asian Prehistory',

Amer. Antiquity, XIX (1953-4), 25-39. Torii, R. and K. 'Etudes Archeologiques et Ethnologiques. Populations

Primitives de la Mongolie Orientale', /. Coll. Sci. Imp. Univ. Tokyo, XXXV, art. 4 (1914), i-ioo. Watson, W. China. Ancient Peoples and Places. London, 1959. Willetts, W. Foundations of Chinese Art. London, 1965. Wu, G. D. Prehistoric Pottery in China. London, 1938. South-east Asia, Indonesia

and

the Philippines

Beyer, H. O. 'Outline Review of Philippine Archaeology.,.', Philippine J. Sci. Lxxvii (1947), 205-374.

Dunn,

F. L. 'Excavations at

Gua

Kechil, Pahang', /. Malaysian Branch

Roy. Asiatic Soc. XXXVll, part 2 (1964), 87-124. Goloubew, V. 'L'age du Bronze au Tonkin et dans le Nord-Annam', Bull. deVEcol. Franf. d' Extreme Orient, XXIX, 1-46. Harrisson, T. 'The Great Cave of Niah',

Man

(1957), no. 211,

Heekeren, M. R. van. The Stone Age of Indonesia. The Hague, 1956. The Bronze— Iron Age of Indonesia. The Hague, 1958. Heine-Geldern, R. von. 'Prehistoric Research in the Netherlands Indies',

Honig and

in P.

F.

Vendoon

lands Indies, pp. 129—67.

Mansuy, H. 'Contribution

(eds.) Science

New

a I'etude

de

la

Mem.

in the

Nether-

prehistoire de I'lndochine. IV.

Stations prehistoriques dans les carenes

(Tonkin)',

and Scientists

York, 1945.

Serv. Geologique de

du massif calcaire de Bac-Son

V Indochine,

xi, no. 2

Hanoi, 1924.

Mansuy, H. and Colani, M. 'VIII. Neolithique inferieure (Bacsonien) et Neolithique superieure dans le Haut-Tonkin', op. cit. xii, no. 2. Hanoi, 1925.

Sieveking, G. de G. 'Excavations at

Solheim,

W.

Gua Cha,

'Pottery and the Malayo-Polynesians 1964), pp. 360

Tweedie, M.

Kelantan, 1954, Part

I',

Museums

J. (Malaya), i-li (1954-5), 75-138. G. 'Philippine Archaeology', Archaeology (1953), pp. 154-8.

Federation

W.

F.

and 376-84. 'The Stone Age

'

Current Anthropology (December

in Malaya', J.

Malayan Branch Roy.

Asiatic Soc. xxvi, part 2 (1953), 1-90. Prehistoric

Malaya. Singapore, 1955.

Vemeau, R. 'Les

recentes

decouvertes

prehistoriques

en

Indochine',

V Anthropologie, xxxv (1925), 46-62. Japan Befu, H. and Chard, C.

S.

'Preceramic Cultures in Japan', Amer. Anthro-

pologist, Lxii (i960), 815-49.

Groot, G.

J.

The Prehistory ofJapan,

New

York, 195

1.

FURTHER READING Ikawa, F. 'The Continuity of Arctic Anthropology,

Kidder,

II,

Non- Ceramic

E. Japan. Ancient Peoples

J.

Maringer,

to

Ceramic Cultures

in Japan',

2 (1964), 95-119.

and

Places.

London, 1959.

'A Core and Flake Industry of Palaeolithic Type from Central

J.

Japan', Artibus Asiae, Xix, part 2 (1956), 11 1-25.

'Some Stone Tools of Early Hoabinhian Type from Central Japan', (1957), no.

Sugihara, S. The Stone

Tokyo,

Man

I.

Age Remains Found at Iwajuhu,

Gumma

Pref.,

Japan.

1956.

North-East Asia Chard, C.

S.

'An Outline of

tlie

Prehistory of Siberia', Southwestern J. of

Anthropology, XlV (1958), 1-33.

CHAPTER Australia

II

and Tasmania

Balfour, H.

'The Status of the Tasmanians among the Stone-age Peoples',

Proc. Prehist. Soc. East Anglia, v (1925), 1-15.

Basedow, H. The Australian Aboriginal. Adelaide, 1925. Bulmer, S. and R. The Prehistory of the Australian New Guinea Highlands ', Amer. Anthropologist {Special Puhl. New Guinea^ (1964), 39-76. '

Campbell, T. D. and Noone, H. V. V. 'South Australian Microlithic Stone Implements', Rec. S. Australian Mus. vii (1943), 281-307. 'Stone Axe Factories in the Highlands of East New Guinea', J.

Chappell,

Proc. Prehist. Soc. xxxii (1966), 96-121.

Davidson, D.

S.

Paintings. Gill,

E. D.

Aboriginal Australian and Tasmanian Rock Carvings and

Mem. Am.

Phil. Soc.

v (1936).

'Geological Evidence in Western Victoria Relative to the

Mem.

Antiquity of tlie Australian Aborigines', XVII (1953), 25-92. Hale, H. M. and Tindale, N. B.

Lower Murray

'

Notes on Some

Nat. Mus. (Melbourne),

Human Remains

Valley, South Australia', Rec. S. Australian

in the

Mus.

iv

(1930), 145-218.

Howells,

W.

H. 'Anthropometry of the Natives of Arnhem Land and the Mus. Arch, and Ethn.

Australian Race Problem', Papers Peabody

Harvard Univ. XVI (1937), 1-97. McBryde, Isabel. 'Radiocarbon Dates

for

Northern

New

South Wales',

Antiquity (1966), pp. 285-92.

McCarthy, F. D. 'The Lapstone Creek Excavation', Rec. Australian Mus. XXII (1948), 1-34.

—An Appendix',

'Stone Implements from Tandandjal Cave (1951), 205-13.

Oceania, xxi

FURTHER READING 'The Archaeology of the Capertee Valley, New South Wales', Rec. Australian Mus. (Sydney), xxvi (1964), 197-246. Australian Aboriginal Stone Implements. Sydney, 1967.

Macintosh, N.

W.

G. 'Archaeology of Tandandjal Cave, South-west

Am-

hem

Land', Oceania, xxi (195 1), 178-204. Meggitt, M. Desert People. Sydney, 1962. Mitchell, S. R. Stone-Age Craftsmen. Stone Tools

and Camping- Places of the

Australian Aborigines. Melbourne, 1949. Mountford, C. P. Arnhem Land, Art, Myth and Symbolism. Melbourne, 1956.

Mulvaney, D.J. 'The Stone Age of Australia', Proc.

Prehist. Sac. xxvii

(1961), 56-107.

Mulvaney, D.

and Joyce, E. B. 'Archaeological and Geomorphological on Mt Moffatt Station, Queensland, Australia', Proc. Prehist. Sac. xxxi (1965), 147-212. Noone, H. V. V. 'Some Aboriginal Stone Implements of Western Australia', J.

Investigations

Rec. S. Australian Mus. vii (1943), 271-80.

H. 'The Tasmanians and Their Stone Culture', Rep. 2S)th Meeting Australian Assn. Adv. Science, Hobart {ic)2cji), pp. 294—322. Roth, H. L. The Aborigines of Tasmania. London, 1890. Pulleine, R.

Spencer, B. and Gillen, F.

J.

The Native Tribes of Central Australia. London,

1899.

Thomson, D. F. Economic Structure and the Ceremonial Exchange Cycle in Arnhem Land. Melbourne, 1949. 'Some Wood and Stone Implements of the Bindibu Tribe of Central Western

Australia', Proc. Prehist. Soc.

Tindale, N. B.

'

xxx

(1964), 400-22.

Culture Succession in South Eastern Australia from Late

Pleistocene to the Present', Rec. S. Australian

Mus.

xiii (1957).

The Pacific Duff, R. The Moa-hunter Period of Maori Culture. Wellington, N.Z., 1956.

Freeman,

J.

D. and Geddes,

W.

R. (eds.) Anthropology

in the

South Seas.

New

Plymouth, N.Z., 1959. Gifford, E. W. and Shutler, D. 'Archaeological Excavations donia', Univ. of California Anthrop. Records, XVIII,

Golson,

J.

'Dating

New

i

in

New

Cale-

(1956).

Zealand's Prehistory',/. Polynesia Soc. LXiv (1955),

113-36.

Golson,

J.

and Gathercole, P.

'

New

Zealand Archaeology', Antiquity (1962),

pp. 168-74 and 271-8.

A Review of the Prehistoric Sequence in the Auckland Province. Auckland Archaeological Society, no. i. 1963. Groube, L. M. Settlement Patterns in New Zealand Prehistory. Anthropology Department, Otago Univ. no. i, 1965. Green, R. C.

316

FURTHER READING Heyerdahl, T. and Skjolsvold, A. Archaeological Evidence of Pre-Spanish Visits to the Galapagos Islands. Mem. Soc. Am. Arch. no. 12 (1956).

Metraux, A. Easter Island.

A

Stone-age Civilisation of the Pacific. London,

1957.

Douglas I. The Pacific Islands. Harvard, 195 1. O. 'Agricultural Origins and Dispersals', Am. Geogr. Sharp, A. Ancient Voyages in the Pacific. London, 1957. Solheim, W. G. 'Oceanian Pottery Manufacture',/. East Asiatic Oliver,

Sauer, C.

Soc. 1952.

Studies,

i,

(1950,1-39 Spoehr, A. Marianas Prehistory. Archaeological Survey and Excavations on '

Tinian and Rota', Fieldiana: Anthropology, XLVlll (1957),

Saipan,

1-187.

The Island Civilisation of Polynesia. New York, i960. The Archaeology oj Nuku Hiva, Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia. New York, 1961.

Suggs, R. C.

CHAPTER Bird,

J.

12

B. Preceramic Cultures in Chicama

and Viru, Mem.

Soc.

Am. Arch,

no. 4 (1948), 21-8.

'Antiquity and Migrations of the Early Inhabitants of Patagonia', Geogr.

Rev. XXVIII (1938), 250-75.

and Places. 2nd ed. London, 1963. The First Americans. London, 1968. Coe, William R. 'Tikal', Expedition, viii, no. i (1965), 1-56. Univ. of

Bushnell, G. H. S. Peru. Ancient Peoples

Pennsylvania.

Drucker,

P.,

Heizer R. F. and Squier, R.

Giddings,

J.

tiquity,

J.

Excavations at La Venta Tabasco,

Am.

Ethn. Bull. 170. Washington, 1959. Louis. 'A Flint Site in Northernmost Manitoba', Amer. An-

1955. Bur.

XXI (195

1),

255-68.

Men

of the Arctic. London, 1967. Green, F. E. 'The Clovis Blades: an important addition plex', Amer. Antiquity, xxix (1963), 145-65. Ancient

to the Llano

Com-

Archaeology of Eastern United States. Chicago, 1952. Handbook of South American Indians. Bur. Am. Ethn. Bull. 143. Washington, 1946. Haynes, C. Vance. 'Fluted Projectile Points: their age and dispersion'. Science CXLV (1964), 1408—13. Jennings, J. D. Danger Cave. Utah, 1957. Krieger, A. D. 'The Earliest Cultures in the Western United States', Amer. Antiquity, XXVlll (1962), 138-43. Kroeber, A. L. Cultural and Natural Areas of Native North America. Griffin, J. B.

Berkeley, 1939.

Lothrop,

S.

K. The Indians ofTierra del Fuego.

317

New York,

1928.

FURTHER READING MacNeish, R.

S.

'

Preliminary Archaeological Investigations in the Sierra

de Tamaulipas, Mexico', Trans. Martin, P.

S.,

Quimby, G.

L.

and

Am.

Phil. Soc. XLViii, part 6 (1958).

Collier,

D. Indians

before

Columbus.

Chicago, 1946. Mathiassen, T. Archaeology of the Central Eskimos. Copenhagen, 1927. Miles, S. W. *A Revaluation of the Old Copper Industry', Amer. Antiquity^

XVI (195 1), 240-7. S. G. The Ancient Maya. Stanford, 1946.

Morley,

Rex Gonzalez, A. 'Antiguo horizonte preceramico en las Sierras Centrales de la Argentina', Runa Arch, para las Ciencias del Hombre, v, 110-33. Buenos Aires, 1952. The Rise and Fall of Maya Civiliiation. Oklahoma, 1954. J. E. S. Vaillant, G. C. The Aitecs of Mexico. London, 195 1. Willey, G. R. An Introduction to American Archaeology, vol. I, North and

Thompson,

Middle America.

New

Jersey, 1966.

Wormington, H. M. Ancient Man in North America. Denver, 1957. Wormington, H. M. and Forbis, Richard G. An Introduction to the Archaeology of Alberta, Canada, Denver, 1965.

318

INDEX Abbeville, France, 39 Abraham, 114

Anasazi culture, 293 f. Anatolia, see under Turkey

Abri Pataud, France, 66 Acheulian industry, 39 f.

Andaman

Adena

Angles-sur-l'Anglin, France, 66

Angara

culture, 295

Islands, 250

valley, Siberia,

Anglo-Saxons, 176 f. antler and bone work,

Adrar Bous, Niger, 200, 205 Adriatic, 130, 152

Aegean, 115, 119, 122, 135-9, M3, 162

84, 98, 122

f,

244

11, 50, 52

131

f.,

f.,

Anyang, China, 227, 231

Afontova Gora,

Anyathian industry, 36

Africa, 2, 7

10-15, 27

f.,

39-43, 46, 48, 51 179-205, 263 Aggsbach, Austria, 68

f.,

f.,

30, 32, 35, 37,

64

ff.,

87, 92

f.,

ff.,

216,

222, 236, 244, 256, 274, 277, 297-300

Afghanistan, 51, 53, 63, 66, 69, 179, 208, 211, 220 Siberia, 63

63, 65,

ff.,

145, 185

apes, 6

24

f.,

28, 32

f.,

Arabia, 204, 220

Arcadius, 176

Agricola, 174

Archaic (N. Am.) culture, 91, 275, 277 296, 300

agriculture, see under farming

archery, 81

Ahar, India, 219

Ahmosis

I,

90, 144, 184-7, 189

f.,

f.,

see also

113

arrowheads, cross-bow

Arctic culture (Scandinavia), 144-7

Ajalpan phase, 283

Argentine, 272, 291, 301 Argissa, Greece, 1 22 f.

Arcy-sur-Cure, France, 46 ard, 150, 157, 160

f.

Akjoujit, Mauretania, 198

Arjeneh point, 52 Arka, Hungary, 68

Akkadians, ii7f., 211 Alaca Hiiyiik, Turkey, 109 Alacaluf Indians, 300

armour, 170 Amhem Land, N. Territory, 259 Arpachiya, Iraq, 102

Alaric, 176

Alaska, 64, 269, 278, 298 Aleuts, 298

ff.

Alexander the Great, 165, 218 Alexandrovka, U.S.S.R., 56 f. Algeria, 11, 15, 65, 198

Ali

Kosh

ff.,

arrowheads, 81, 90, 131, 144 f., 198, 225, 236 f., 241 f., 244 art, 50, 54 f., 58-62, 65, 81 f., 88, 98, iii,

f.

136

205

256

phase, Iran, 87, 92

Allerod oscillation, 22 alphabet, 116, 162

Aryan

f.

Asia, 2, 7

f.

62

amber, 81, 122, 133, 142, 146, 151 ff. America, North, i, 31, 64, 71, 91, 240, 243 f., 269-89, 292-302 See also under Alaska, Canada, United

122

America 2,

f.,

262, 272

f.,

275, 278-84,

154,

f.,

66, 72, 74

130,

f.,

172,

205, 254,

216

135,

ff.,

ff.,

35-48, 51-4,

78, 80, 83-118,

148

f.,

155,

157

f.,

167-70, 174, 179, 181, 186, 190-3, 197, 202 ff., 206-46, 250, 262, 270, 274 Asoka, 220

Asprochaliko, Greece, 68

Amratian culture, 188 ff. Amri, Pakistan, 209, 211

astronomy, 286

Assyrians, 108

ff.,

Atahuallpa, 292

319

168 f.,

161-5,

Asselar, Mali, 199

215

f.,

10-15, 19, 30

289-92, 299-302 amethysts, 213 f.,

f.,

259, 277, 283, 285,290,296,299

f.,

ff.,

165

188, 192, 198

f.,

speakers, 213

Altamira, Spain, 61, 66

America, South,

147,

f.,

176, 184

Syria, 46

States of

223,

231, 294

Ahrensburgian culture, 54, 73 Ahuitzotlo, 288 Ahu Tepeu, Easter I., 268

Al Ghab,

f.,

f.

112, 115, 195

INDEX Boian culture, 125, 127

Aterian industry, 65 f. Atlanthropus, see under atlatls, see

Homo

bones, utilization of 28

under spear-throwers

Aunjetitz culture, 151

Aurignacian culture, 52

66

f.,

Australia, 2, 15, 19, 31, 35,

Bonfire Shelter, Texas, 301

247-60

ff.

Austria, 68

170

134, 156

f.,

bora grounds, 257

Bomeck, Germany,

Australopithecus y 7—11, 27 f.,

f., 38 See also under antler and bone

155

f.,

ff.

Brazil, 301

150, 154, 157, 185

f.,

Brewster,

189

f.,

200

206, 216

ff.,

ff.,

223, 226,

121, 133, 140

274, 301

27,46,77,79 143, 153

f.,

Aztecs, 278, 284, 288

f.

Babylon, Iraq, 107 f., Badarian culture, 1 87

f.

Honduras, 284 Broion Cave, Italy, 46 Broken Hill, Zambia, 13 British

m,

115

f.

bronze, 109,

1

12-16, 136, 144, 150-4, 166,

170, 205, 228, 292

2H

Baikal, Lake, U.S.S.R., 63, 222, 229, 244

Buddhism, 220, 243 Buki Tengku Lembu, Malaya, 237

f.

Balearic islands, 139

Bulgaria, 53, 121, 124 Buret', Siberia, 63

Bali, 239,

burials, 45

Bainapalli, India, 219

247

Balkans, 122-8 ff.,

132

140

f.,

ff.

211

f.,

f.,

ff.,

f.,

Byzantium, 178

92

cremation,

f.

f.

Turkey, 91 Turkey, 87, 91 Belgium, 126, 134 Belt Cave, Iran, 92 Belbasi,

Caesar, 173

calendar, 61, 82, 286

f.

Canada, 244, 269, 275, 278, 298 Can Hassan, Turkey, 99

ff.

cannibalism, 39, 45 Cap Blanc, France, 61

Bible, 114 86, 249, 256, 266,

f.

Cambigne, N.S.W., 260

Benin, Nigeria, 205

f.,

123, 127,

Byblos, Syria, 96, 113, 115

150

150, 154, 198

Beldibi,

birds, 36, 79

f.,

Burma, 238 Burzahom, Kashmir, 216, 219 Bushmen, 184 f. Bus Mordeh phase, Iran, 86 f., 92

293 f., 297 f., 300 Bass Strait, 248, 250

Beidha, Jordan, 88

63, 88, 97, 106

137,

mastaba, pyramids

245

Baradostian culture, 52, 66, 69, 91 ff., 97, 185 ff., 201, 283,

f.,

ff.,

See also under cemeteries,

basketry, 81, 85

Battle-axe cultures, 143

137, 178

218, 230, 234, 236, 244, 278, 293, 295

bananas, 239 Ban-Kao, Thailand, 236

Beaker pottery, 143

ff.,

f.,

139-43, 147 ff-, 151 ff-, 158, 166, 168 ff., 185, 187-92, 201, 133

Baluchistan, 208

83, 116,

159, 173,

286

culture, 134

Baltic area, 79

ff.,

f.,

See also England, Scotland, Wales

Azilian culture, 82

Bahrain,

Wyoming,

Britain, 12, 15, 19,

234-9, 242, 244, 256 ff., 264, 266 ff., 283 Ayampitin, Argentine, 272

Baden

f.

Bramagiri, India, 217

axes, adzes, 80, 90, 96, 98, 123, 127, 131 f.,

56

Borneo, 233, 235, 239, 247 Bougras, Syria, 92

Avdeevo, U.S.S.R., 57 Avebury, England, 143, 286 135, 140, 145

f.

Bolivia, 291

erectus

300

Bimik

Capertee, N.S.W., 260

Black Sea, 163 f., 175 Blackwater Draw, New Mexico, 274, 301

Capsian culture, 183, 198 Carcassonne gap, France, 164 Carchemish, Syria, 99 Carlton River, Tasmania, 249, 260

culture, 299 Biskupin, Poland, 171

boats, 81, 102, 105, 138, 146, 163, 191, 202,

Camac, France, 286

226, 241, 259, 263 ff. Bodrogkeresztur culture, 134 Boghazkoy, Turkey, iii, 161, 214

Carthage, Tunisia, 116, 164, 201 Carthaginians, 166 f. 174

320

8

INDEX Claudius, 174 Cleopatra, 197

Castelluccio, Sicily, 138

no, 122

^atal Hiiyiik, 92, 96-99,

f.

caves, and rock-shelters, 43-7, 51

59-62, 86 221, 234

247

f.,

ff.,

climate, 14, 16

55,

91, 130, 139, 147, 200,

ff.,

253-8, 273, 276

ff.,

274

f.,

ff.,

clothing, 45, 62

121

Clovis, 177 Clovis,

224, 238 f.,

85-8, 90

122, 124

f.,

93, 95, 97,

131, 185

ff.,

ff.,

200,

287, 296

ff.,

f.,

74, 88, 98, 167

New Mexico, 273 Cnossos, Crete, 136, 149

301

ff.,

Cody, Wyoming, 275 coinage, 173

Constantine, 177

cooking, 38, 56, 94, 297 copper, 87, 94, 96 f., 102, 104, 109 ii6f., 122, 129, 134

f.,

144, 150

Chandragupta Maurya, 219 Chanhu Daro, Pakistan, 215

208, 213, 215, 217, 277

f.,

112,

156-9, 163, 189-91, 198, f.,

286, 290,

296

ff.,

Coromandel Peninsula, N.Z., 268

214, 228

Charlemagne, 177 Chassey pottery, 131

Corsica, 166

Corfu, Greece, 130

Chatelperronian culture, 52

62

f.,

f.,

66

Cortaillod pottery, 131

Cortes, Hernando, 289

culture, 289

Cheng Chou, China, 228

cosmetics, 98, 188

Cheops, 195

cotton, 283, 290

Chicama Valley, Peru, 282

cremation, 158

f.

Ch'i-chia-p'ing, China, 226

Crete, 119

Chichimecs, 288

Coomagnon,

Chile, 272, 291, 300

f.,

f.,

f.

295

135-9, 148

f-,

151, 174

13

'Cromerian' flints, 27 cross-bow, 231

ff.

Chillon Valley, Peru, 272

Chimu, Peru, 290 Ch'in dynasty, 232 China, 2, 10 f., 30,

f.,

138, 140, 142,

Chandoli, India, 216

Chavin

ff.,

Cook, Captain, 297

Chanchiawo, Shensi, China, 36

106, 113, 149, 171

187

Confucius, 231 Congo, 65, 182

Cerro dos Chivateros, Peru, 301 Ceylon, 207, 220, 250 Chad, 200 Chalan Piao, Saipan I., Marianas, 268 Chancelade, Dordogne, 14 Chan-chan, Peru, 290

chariots,

f.,

Colombia, 278 Columbus, Christopher, 180

208, 214, 223, 242

ceremonial centres, 283

61, 66, 74-8, 82,

192, 237, 277, 293, 300

cemeteries, 45, 88, 127, 129, 147, 170, 188,

f.,

f.,

f-

Celebes, 235, 237, 247, 250, 255, 257 Celtic, 159, 166-9, 172-5

100

22

See also glaciation, pluvial periods

282, 293, 300 ^ayonii Tepesi, Turkey, 90

cereals, 71, 75

ff.,

84, 120, 175, 186, 200, 244, 251, 263,

Crusades, 179 Cucuteni, Romania, 128

179, 204, 217, 221-33, 235-9, 242,

Cueva Cueva

245, 279

cults, 58, 98, 100, 103, 111, 126, 159, 195

31, 36-41, 45, 64, 120,

Pajitanian,

Soan, Tampanian f.,

nr, Pekin, 11, 36-9,

chronology, 16 See also potassium/argon,

Cyrus of

64

212

ff.,

228

no,

f.,

284

ff.,

165

Persia,

1 1

f.,

129,

protoacti-

113, 115-18, 166 f.,

151 f.,

Czechoslovakia, 47, 54, 56, 58, 68 134 f.

Dabban

nium/thorium, radiocarbon 102-5, 107,

78

Cyrenaica, see under Libya

238

Christianity, 116, 176-80, 203, 286

cities,

Cyclades, 137

Cyprus, 115, 161

dynasty, 168, 231

Choukaoutien,

dell toll, Spain,

Curracurrang, N.S.W., 260

chopper-tools, 31, 35 ff., 40 See also under Anyathian,

Chou

del Juyo, Spain, 66

f.,

288, 290

32]

culture, 51

f.,

69

daggers, 96, 98, 138, 141, 144, 154, 161 189 f., 192

f.,

INDEX dancing, 257

El Inga, Ecuador, 272

Danger Cave, Utah, 276, 301 Danubian culture, 126-34, 223

El Jobo, Venezuela, 272

Daojali Hading, Assam, 217

Ellice

el

Emiran culture, 52 Emporion, Spain, 164

David, 115 defences, 89, 109, iii, 113, 115, 128, 130, 171

England,

212, 226, 232, 267

f.,

Denbigh culture, 298 f. Denmark, 79 f., 132 f., 141,

144, 146, 151,

environment,

77

Dent, Colorado, 274, 301 desert, 184, 193, 196, 275

De

280, 282

diet,

32

ff.,

130

14-23, 30, 32

7,

82

f.,

f.,

282,

Ertebolle culture, 133

298

14, 56, 278,

Etruscans, 156, 164-7, 172

gathering, sea-food, shell-fish

Europe,

i

10-19,

f.,

21

f-

ff.,

31

f.,

35

ff.,

39-43, 47 f., 51-62, 66, 74, 76-83,88, 1 16-81, 251, 260, 266, 279, 295, 297,

digging-sticks, 184, 276, 290, 293 f.

300

f.

287 faience, 152

See also under leprosy, venereal disease divination, 226, 230

farming, 70-93, 120-33, '45, I57, i6o> 1^2, 181, 185

206,

Dolnf Vestonice, Czechoslovakia,

56, 69

13

fauna, 16, 20, 23, 37, 41

f.,

83, 86

f.,

f.,

174

f.

f-,

262-8

Fell's felt,

Fengate pottery, 143

174, 185-8, 205, 279

168

Fezzan, Libya, 198 figurines, 54, 58

Ehringsdorf, Germany, 12

123, 127

283, 299

f.,

3 1

ploughs,

rice,

44, 46, 54, 61,

f.

El Argar, Spain,

Elam, Iran, 107

229,

92, 185-8, 205

Ecuador, 272, 278 f., 291 Egypt, 40 f., 87, 92 f., 111-16, 120, 135-8,

1 5

ff.,

Cave, Chile, 272, 301

ecology, see under environment

f.,

225

shell-fish

Fayum, Egypt,

149, 155, 164

198, 200, 202,

90, 97, 247 See also under dog, dingo, fish, livestock, 63, 74, 79

f.

See also under wine

I.,

f.,

222,

and burn Fatyanovo culture, 144

f.

drink, drinking vessels, 170, 171

f.,

slash

Dorians, 160

Dorset culture, 298

213

pastoralism,

maize,

301

So'n, Indo-China, 238

Dordogne, France,

191, 193

ff.,

208,

279-83, 287, 289, 292-5 See also under cereals, horticulture,

See also dingo

Domebo, Oklahoma,

190, 201, 216

f.,

family, 33, 56

f.

Djeitun, Turkmenia, 95 Djetis beds, Sangiran, Java, 7 dogs, 80, 239, 241, 263 ff., 293

Easter

302

ff.,

Ethiopia, 203

fishing, horticulture, hunting, plant-

Dong

186,

£rd, Hungary, 46

Eskimo,

See also under birds, cereals, farming,

disease,

66,

f.,

ff.,

27

'eoliths',

78, 83, 91, 126,

234, 256, 263, 266, 276

Dimini, Greece, 124

61

savannah

tion, pluvial periods,

258

293. 297, 300

dingo, 254

ff.,

86, 120, 145, 181

ff.,

See also climate, desert, forest, glacia-

S. Australia, 255,

36-9, 41, 70

ff.,

ff.,

287

Soto, H., 295

Devon Downs,

116, 143, 159,

ff.,

193, 198, 203, 251, 269, 273-7, 280, f.,

293, 301

f.,

79

12, 15, 27,

286

173, 175

desert culture, 276

87

I.,

emery, 138

300

5,

Israel, 46,

263 El Mekta, Algeria, 205 El Omari, Egypt, 185, 205

Dar-es-Sultan, Morocco, 205 Darius, 165, 218 Darwin, Charles,

Kebarah,

17

f.

Fiji,

f.,

ff.,

f.

86, 88, 95, 98, 100, 105,

131, 138, 189, 242, 268,

268

Elba, 130

Finland, 144

El Garcel, Spain, 131

Finnmark, Norway, 83

322

ff.,

178

INDEX fire, II,

36-40, 45, 55

258, 270

f.,

156, 186, 202, 248,

276, 278, 287

f.,

fish-hooks, 81, 88, 145, 185, 201, 223, 236, 241, 245, 266

fishing, 36, 44, 71, 75, 81, 83, 86, 88, 102,

133, 145

ff.,

223, 240

f.,

163, 168, 185

244

ff.,

Goths, 175

200, 221,

f.,

249, 256, 258, 264,

and stone- working, 26-31,

35

42

f.,

ff.,

122-5, 130, 135-9, 144, 148 155, 160-8, 171-4, 197

grinding-stones, 234, 275 See also under queries

270-5, 298

Grotta La Punta,

ff.

22

forest, 14, 20,

200, 202

214, 223, 226, 249, 251,

275, 277, 293

Formosa,

Taiwan

see under

New

159

82

(i(>,

f.,

91,

164, 171, 173

f.,

Fromm's Landing,

45, 50-5,

ff.,

130

68

f.,

culture, 201

Gunderstrup, Denmark, 173 gunpowder, 292 Gymea Bay, N.S.W., 260

Caledonia, 268

16, 27, 39, 41

ff.,

57-61,

297

Gua Cha, Malaya, 234, 237 Gua Harimau, Malaya, 245 Gua Kechil, Malaya, 245

Gumban

Fragoas, Portugal, 121 France, 12

Italy,

ff.,

Guatemala, 284, 288 Guinea, 200

Fort-Harrouard, France, 131 Fort Rock Caves, Oregon, 276, 301 Fosna, Norway, 83

Foue Peninsula,

ff.,

151*

Grotte du Renne, France, 46, 66 Grotte de la Vache, France, 66

43, 65, 77-83, 145, 182,

f.,

f.,

f-,

Greenland, 298 f. Grimaldi Caves, nr. Mentone, 14

221, 233, 242, 244, 246, 249, 253-9,

Folsom, New Mexico, 273 ff., 301 Font de Gaume, France, 61

141

Gravettian culture, 53-6, 58 ff., 63, 66 Greece, Greeks, i, 51, 68, 116, 118

ff.,

48-54, 57, 62-6, 80 f., 83, 85, 87-92, 95-8, 100, 122 f., 127, 145 f., 182-7, 189 ff., 198, 200 f., 216,

39

Missouri, 277

Grand Pressigny, France,

282, 296, 300 flint-

f.

Graham Cave,

297

f.,

Goldberg, Germany, 130 Gorbunovo, Russia, 229

133

Gypsum

Cave, Nevada, 276, 301

f.,

Ha'atuatua Bay, Marquesa

f.

S. Australia, 255, 258,

260

I.,

263, 268

Hagilar, Turkey, 91, 99, 124 hair styles, 187

Halafian culture, see under Tell Halaf

Fucino, Italy, 68

Fukui, Japan, 240

f.,

Haldas, Peru, 289

245

Funnel-neck beakers, 132

f.

Hallstatt culture, 170

143, 150

ff.

Hal Tarxien, Malta, 138, 153 Gagarino, U.S.S.R., 55 Galapagos I., 262 f.

Hamburgian

Gaul, Gauls, 172

Hammurabi, 107

ff.

Han

Gebel el-Arak, Egypt, 192 Gebel el-Tarif, Egypt, 192

Germany, 126

11

f.,

I5G, 7-^,

89,

132, 134, 142, 144, 151

f.,

159, 172

f-,

f-,

177

Gerrzan culture, 190 f. Geulah Cave, Israel, 46 Ghana, 200 Ghar-i-Mar Cave, Afghanistan, 208

187

f.

dynasty, 170, 222, 232, 242

hand-axes, 31, 39-42, 206 hands, 7, 9, 24, 31

Harappan

civilization, 207-16, 219 f. Hargesian culture, 183 harpoon-heads, 54, 57, 82, 132, 147, 186,

200, 215

f.,

241, 300

Hastinapur, India, 215, 218 Haua Fteah, Cyrenaica, Libya, 46, 51, 69, 78, 92, 183, 185, 198, 205

Gibraltar, 46, 164

Gilgamesh

culture, 54, 73

Hammamuja, Egypt,

glass, 204,

Hawaii, 263, 268 Hayes, Dr and Mrs, 34 Hearne, Samuel, 278

gods, goddesses, 139 ff., 161, 195 gold, 105, 149, 163, 203 f., 211, 290, 292

Heluan, Egypt, 87 Henry the Fowler, 178

epic, 192

glaciation, 12, 16

ff.,

52, 77, 269,

273

ff.

259 See also under faience

Heliopolis, Egypt, 190, 195

323

INDEX Herodotus, 163, 165, 169

Iberia, 116, 144, 153, 159, 171

197

f.,

See also under Portugal, Spain

Heuneburg, Germany, 172

Nigeria, 205

Hierakonpolis, Egypt, 192, 194

Ife,

Hinduism, 220, 239

Ilskaya, Russia, 57

impressed wares, 130

Hissar, Iran, 117, 209

108-12,

Hittites,

118,

Incas, 278, 291

f.,

India, 15, 36,

214 Hoabinhian culture, 233 Hoggar, Algeria, 199 f.

Hohokam

i6i

155,

149,

f.,

f.

f.

40

179

f.,

203

f.,

Indo-China (Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam), 227, 233-6, 238

culture, 293

f.

Holland, 81, 126

Indo-European language, iii

home

Indonesia, 7, 10

base, 33

See also under caves, houses, tents

Homer, 162

279 Indus Valley,

i6

3,

Homo erect us, 10 ff., 32, 35 f. Homo hab'dis?, 9 f., 32, 35 f. Homo sapiens, 10—15 Homo sapiens sapiens, 10, 13-15,

ff-,

247

f-,

Intihausi, Argentine, 272, 301

300

culture,

Iran, 23, 42, 75

107

117

f.,

f.,

78, 84, 86

f.,

148, 208

horse-riding, 170

Ireland, 140

92

ff.

iron,

289

f.,

115,

ff.,

63

f.,

127

f.,

85

228, 239, 241, 263

under

Israel, Israelites, 44, 46, 74, 78,

Istallosko, Isturitz,

282, 293, 2