THE ORIGINS OF OUR TIME Pre-History and the Ancient World
312 AD Constantine Converts to Christianity
30,000–15,000 BC Humans Reach the Americas
250–900 AD Maya Classic Period in Central America
Archaeologists, anthropologists, and geneticists tell us that, originating in Africa roughly 200,000 years ago, our species (homo sapiens) began migrations into the Eurasian continents about 70,000 years ago, reaching China and Australia 45,000 years ago, and southern Europe 40,000 years ago. The Clovis First Model stated that human arrival in the Americas occurred around 13,000 years ago with migration over the Beringia land bridge from Asia to North America. More recent research has challenged the Clovis First model, indicating multiple migrations over a longer period of time rather than a single movement. Researchers have uncovered evidence of human occupations predating the Clovis cultures, such as fossilized footprints in White Sands National Park dating back to 23,000 years ago and stone artifacts in Chiquihuite Cave in northern Mexico from around 25,000 to 30,000 years ago. Scholars continue to debate the precise arrival of humans to the Americas. Traditional knowledge and oral history from many Indigenous peoples state that they originated here and describe their ancestors living in the Americas from time immemorial. SEE FIGURE 1
CA 6 to 4 BC–CA 26 to 36 AD Jesus of Nazareth
Figure 1. Stone flints provided the ability to produce cooking fires on demand and this was essential to the welfare of the first human inhabitants of the Americas. Image courtesy of Matson Photo Service.
206 BC–220 AD Han Dynasty in China
490–404 BC Classic Greece at its Peak
509 BC–476 AD Roman Republic and Empire
563–483 BC 551–479 BC The Buddha in India Confucius in China
1400 BC Moses
Figure 2. The three great pyramids of Giza. Image courtesy of Library of Congress.
9000–5000 BC Agricultural Revolution
Following the last ice age, domestication of plants and animals evolved independently in various parts of the world and transformed migratory groups of hunter-gatherers into societies of agriculture and settlement. These in turn provided the organizational basis for storage of surplus food, population growth, trade, art, architecture, and centralized political structures. Cereals were common staples of early agriculture. By 9000 BC wheat and barley were domesticated in the Tigris-Euphrates valley and spread as crops into North Africa, Europe, and central and south Asia. In succeeding millennia broomcorn, millet, and rice were raised in China. Areas of Africa were known for millets and rice. In the Americas corn, beans, and squash were grown beginning about 7500 BC, but sedentary life based on farming did not develop until the second millennium BC.
2500 BC Pyramids Constructed in Egypt
2500 BC Pyramids constructed in Egypt
By 3000 BC, as the world’s first urban culture appeared in southern Mesopotamia, an equally complex civilization was forming along the Nile River. The world’s first pictographic writing had appeared in Sumer after 3300 BC and within 400 years evolved into a script called cuneiform. In Egypt, the early years of the third millennium BC were characterized by hieroglyphic writing, a sophisticated religion, and mummification of the dead. Egyptian society became strongly hierarchical, with kings believed to have been chosen by the gods as mediators between two worlds. Symbolic of this special status were 138 pyramids constructed as royal tombs in the middle centuries of the third millennia BC. The first of these, the step pyramid at Saqqara, dates
9000–5000 BC Agricultural Revolution
30,000–15,000 BC Humans reach the Americas
PRE-HISTORY AND THE ANCIENT WORLD
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