Reading 1/21 pg. 7-20

Paleolithic era - Old stone age

• 95% of the time that humans occupied the planet

• Foraging and hunter gatherers

• Very small bands of groups (~25 people)

• Not much gender inequality compared to larger agricultural societies

• Low life expectancy

Neolithic era - New stone age

• ~12,000 to 4,000 years ago

• Agricultural revolution

• Taming of animals

• Settled villages and growing populations

• Technological innovation

• Happened separately in Asia, Africa, and Americas

Pastoral societies

• Societies in Central Asia, Arabian Peninsula, Sahara who depended on animals for transport and food because farming was difficult or impossible

• Moved seasonally because their animals had to eat

• Often had conflict with farming societies because they wanted grazing land and wealth but also sometimes exchanged technologies

Agricultural village societies

• Agricultural societies without kings, chiefs, bureaucrats or aristocracies

• Doesn’t have the oppressive political power that large states would

• Organized politically by chiefdoms

Civilizations

• Mesopotamia, Egypt, Peru b/t 3500 to 3000 BCE

• Over the next 4000 years this way of living spread to India, China, Europe, Ethiopia, East African Coast, Mesoamerica, etc

• Civilization - societies based in cities and governed by states

• Cities served as administrative capitals while many people still lived in rural areas

• Occupational specialization

  • Scholars, artisans, soldiers, farmers, etc

• Wealth and gender inequality

• Environmental destruction due to heavy irrigation and chopping

• Organizational structures such as city states or bureaucracies (China and India)

• Slaves (debtors or prisoners of war) were at the bottom of the social hierarchy