Stone Age and Related Topics

Neolithic

An array of Neolithic artifacts, including bracelets, axe heads, chisels, and polishing tools.

The Urfa Man c.9000 BC. Şanlıurfa Archaeology and Mosaic Museum.

Female and male figurines; 9000–7000 BC; gypsum with bitumen and stone inlays; from Tell Fekheriye (Al-Hasakah Governorate of Syria); University of Chicago Oriental Institute (USA)

'Ain Ghazal Statues, found at 'Ain Ghazal in Jordan, are considered to be one of the earliest large-scale representations of the human form dating back to around 7250 BC.

Algerian cave paintings depicting hunting scenes

Female figure from Tumba Madžari, North Macedonia

Map showing distribution of some of the main culture complexes in Neolithic Europe, c. undefined 3500 BC

Skara Brae, Scotland. Evidence of home furnishings (shelves)

Stone cup, Neolithic period, Manchurian Culture

Stone Axe, Neolithic period, Manchurian Culture

Big Stone Axe, Early Neolithic period, Manchurian Culture

Round stone hoe, Early Neolithic period, Manchurian Culture

Anthropomorphic Neolithic ceramic figurine

Clay human figurine (Fertility goddess) Tappeh Sarab, Kermanshah ca. 7000-6100 BC, Neolithic period, National Museum of Iran

Reconstruction of Neolithic house in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina

earthenware pig, Xinglongwa Culture, Early Neolithic period

A Cucuteni-Trypillian culture deer antler plough

Food and cooking items retrieved at a European Neolithic site: millstones, charred bread, grains and small apples, a clay cooking pot, and containers made of antlers and wood

Red cup, Earthenware, Early Neolithic period, Xinglongwa Cultur

The Neolithic period is the final division of the Stone Age, with a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts of the world.

Iron Age

Final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity.

Europe in the year 700 BC, during the Iron Age

Maiden Castle, Dorset, England. More than 2,000 Iron Age hillforts are known in Britain.

Silla chest and neck armour from the National Museum of Korea in Seoul (3rd century CE)

Lingling-o earrings from Luzon, Philippines

Iron Age finds in East and Southern Africa, corresponding to the early 1st millennium Bantu expansion

It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Chalcolithic) and the Bronze Age.

Chalcolithic

Archaeological period that researchers now regard as part of the broader Neolithic.

Painting of a Copper Age walled settlement, Los Millares, Spain

Hongshan culture, Nine hole penannular ring, Chalcolithic period, Mongolia

The Chalcolithic was seen as a new -lithic age, a part of the Stone Age in which copper was used, which may appear paradoxical.

Hunting a glyptodon. Painting by Heinrich Harder c. 1920. Glyptodons were hunted to extinction within two millennia after humans' arrival in South America.

Paleolithic

Period in prehistory distinguished by the original development of stone tools that covers 99% of the period of human technological prehistory.

Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain

This skull, of early Homo neanderthalensis, Miguelón from the Lower Paleolithic dated to 430,000 bp.

Temperature rise marking the end of Paleolithic, as derived from ice core data.

An artist's rendering of a temporary wood house, based on evidence found at Terra Amata (in Nice, France) and dated to the Lower Paleolithic ( BP)

Lower Paleolithic biface viewed from both its superior and inferior surface

Stone ball from a set of Paleolithic bolas

Humans may have taken part in long-distance trade between bands for rare commodities and raw materials (such as stone needed for making tools) as early as 120,000 years ago in Middle Paleolithic.

The Venus of Willendorf is one of the most famous Venus figurines.

Gwion Gwion rock paintings found in the north-west Kimberley region of Western Australia.

Picture of a half-human, half-animal being in a Paleolithic cave painting in Dordogne. France. Some archaeologists believe that cave paintings of half-human, half-animal beings may be evidence for early shamanic practices during the Paleolithic.

People may have first fermented grapes in animal skin pouches to create wine during the Paleolithic age.

Large game animals such as deer were an important source of protein in Middle and Upper Paleolithic diets.

It derives from Greek: παλαιός, palaios, "old"; and λίθος, lithos, "stone", meaning "old age of the stone" or "Old Stone Age".

Smelting

Process of applying heat to ore in order to extract a base metal.

Casting bronze ding-tripods, from the Chinese Tiangong Kaiwu encyclopedia of Song Yingxing, published in 1637.

Cowles Syndicate of Ohio in Stoke-upon-Trent England, late 1880s. British Aluminium used the process of Paul Héroult about this time.

The impact was so pervasive that scholars traditionally divide ancient history into Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age.

Prehistory

Period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins c. undefined 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems.

Massive stone pillars at Göbekli Tepe, in southeast Turkey, erected for ritual use by early Neolithic people 11,000 years ago

An early sketch imagining an adult and a juvenile from prehistoric times making a stone tool

A nineteenth century concept of early humans in a wilderness

Proposed map of early human migrations, according to mitochondrial population genetics with numbers that are millennia before the present (its accuracy is disputed)

Entrance to the Ġgantija phase temple complex of Ħaġar Qim, Malta, 3900 BCE

An array of Neolithic artifacts, including bracelets, axe heads, chisels, and polishing tools - Neolithic stone artifacts are by definition polished and, except for specialty items, not chipped

The monumental building at Luni sul Mignone in Blera, Italy, 3500 BCE

Artist's impression of a Copper Age walled city, Los Millares, Iberia

An image of an ox-drawn plow is accompanied by script, Egypt, c. 1200 BCE

The three-age system of division of prehistory into the Stone Age, followed by the Bronze Age and Iron Age, remains in use for much of Eurasia and North Africa, but is not generally used in those parts of the world where the working of hard metals arrived abruptly from contact with Eurasian cultures, such as Oceania, Australasia, much of Sub-Saharan Africa, and parts of the Americas.

Stone tool

A stone tool is, in the most general sense, any tool made either partially or entirely out of stone.

A typical Oldowan simple chopping-tool. This example is from the Duero Valley, Valladolid.

A biface (trihedral) from Amar Merdeg, Zagros foothills, Lower Paleolithic, National Museum of Iran

A typical Acheulean handaxe; this example is from the Douro valley, Zamora, Spain. The small flakes on the edge are from reworking.

A tool made by the Levallois technique. This example is from La Parrilla (Valladolid, Spain).

Middle Paleolithic stone tool known as Mousterian point, Darai Rockshelter, Zagros

Polished Neolithic jadeitite axe from the Museum of Toulouse

Axe heads found at a 2700 BC Neolithic manufacture site in Switzerland, arranged in the various stages of production from left to right

Small lunates from Epipaleolithic site of Mar Dalan, Rawansar, Kermanshah, Zagros

Although stone tool-dependent societies and cultures still exist today, most stone tools are associated with prehistoric (particularly Stone Age) cultures that have become extinct.

Flint

Sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone.

A piece of flint, 9-10 cm long, weighing 171 grams

Silicified remains of algae and silica pseudomorph after halite in flint. Pebble of Loire near Marcigny, France. Image width: about 5 mm.

Pebble beach made up of flint nodules eroded from the nearby chalk cliffs, Cape Arkona, Rügen, northeast Germany.

A ferrocerium “flint” spark lighter in action

Assorted reproduction firesteels typical of Roman to Medieval period

A flint church – the Parish Church of Saint Thomas, in Cricket Saint Thomas, Somerset, England. The height of the very neatly knapped flints varies between {{convert|3|and|5|in|cm}}.

Close-up of the wall of the Roman shore fort at Burgh Castle, Norfolk, showing alternating courses of flint and brick

A typical medieval wall (with modern memorial) at Canterbury Cathedral – knapped and unknapped ("cobble") flints are mixed with pieces of brick and other stones

Ruins of Thetford Priory show flints and mortar through the whole depth of the wall

Flint is one of the primary materials used to define the Stone Age.

This is a drawing of a replica of an Acheulean hand-axe found during the Lower Paleolithic period. The tool in this drawing is made of black obsidian and is worked on both sides.

Middle Paleolithic

The Middle Paleolithic (or Middle Palaeolithic) is the second subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age as it is understood in Europe, Africa and Asia.

Lower Paleolithic

The Lower Paleolithic (or Lower Palaeolithic) is the earliest subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age.