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Prehistory
and Ancient History.
1. HOMINIZACION'S PROCESS AND MATERIAL
CULTURE. THE CONTRIBUTION OF THE HISTORICAL ANTHROPOLOGY.
1.1 SCIENCES AND TECHNIQUES FOR THE STUDY OF
THE PREHISTORY.
1.1.1.1 Prehistoric traditional archaeology.
1.1.1.3 Structural archaeology.
1.1.2.1 Historical anthropology.
1.2 THEORIES ON THE ORIGIN OF THE MAN
1.2.1 Chronological division of the prehistoric
period.
1.3 BIOLOGICAL TRANSFORMATIONS OF THE
HOMINIDS.
1.3.1 The Australopithecus genre.
1.3.1.2 African. (Child of Taung).
1.3.2.3.2 Sapiens-sapiens = Man of the Cro-Magnon.
2. EVOLUTION OF THE MATERIAL CULTURE OF THE
PALEOLITHIC.
2.4 THE CHARACTERS OF THE ENGRAVING.
2.4.1 THE CHARACTERS OF THE MODELLING
2.5.1 Beginning of the Superior Palaeolithic.
2.5.2 The complex auriñaciense.
2.5.3 Reduced edge and retouch.
2.5.4 The end of the Superior Paleolithic.
3. THE URBANISM AND THE ORIGIN OF THE STATE
IN THE NEAR EAST.
3.2 The meaning of the Neolithic.
3.2.3 The beginning of the agriculture.
3.2.4 The invention of ceramic.
3.2.5 The first Mediterranean navigations.
3.3 The varied chronological and geographical
diffusion of the Neolithic one.
3.3.1 The Neolithic development in the Near
East and Egypt.
3.3.1.1.1 Pre-ceramic Neolithic (VIII-VII
millennium before. Christ).
3.3.1.1.2 Neolithic ceramic (6500-5500 to. C).
3.3.1.2.1 The Fayum (The First half of V millennium
before Christ).
3.3.1.2.2 Merindense (4200-3600 to. C).
3.3.1.2.3 Tasiense. (V millenium to. C).
3.3.1.2.4 Omariense. (The second half of the IV
millennium to. C).
3.3.2 Neolithic in the sea The Aegean Sea and
the Balkans.
3.3.2.1 Continental Greece. Macedonia and
Tesalia.
3.3.3 Diffusion of the Neolithic in the
Mediterranean basin.
3.3.3.1 Neolithic ancient (VI-V millennium).
3.3.3.2 Full Neolithic session. (Final V
millennium- end III millennium).
3.3.4 Neolithic in the Central and western
Europe.
3.3.4.2
Central Europe. The second half of the IV millennium.
3.3.5
The last phases of the Neolithic and the beginnings of the metallurgy.
3.3.5.2
The expansion of the bell-shaped glass.
4.The bases of the urban society.
4.1.1 The transformations
in the agriculture.
4.1.2 Transformations
in cattle.
4.1.3 Changes in the
handcrafted activities.
4.1.4 Transformations
in the culture and the science.
4.1.5 Transformations
in the political structure.
5. The complex
Mesopotamic world.
5.1.1 The first Sumerians
cities. (The second half IV millennium 2350)
5.1.2 The acadio empire.
(2350-2150 to. C).
5.1.3 The height of the
Sumerians. (2060-1950 to. C).
5.1.4 The I dynasty of Babylonia.
(1850-1530 to. C).
5.1.6 The
empire Assyrian (The First half of I millenium to. C).
5.1.7 Empire
neobabilónico (the first half of I millennium).
5.2
The socio-economic structure.
PREHISTORY
Unlike other sciences, the prehistory suffers the consequences of religious prejudices, in the topic relating to the origin of the man.
The prehistory, nevertheless, is a science that uses scientific procedures. Today in day the prehistory makes a multidisciplinary sense and is helped by several sciences: archaeology, anthropology, and biology...
An identification exists between archaeology and prehistory, which is not completely correct. The archaeology is the skill that serves to extract information that is used by the prehistory. The archaeology supposes a fieldwork, whereas the prehistory is based in an analysis that gives coherence to the information extracted by the archaeology.
Born in France at the beginning of century. ABATE BREUIL. His studies still have certain importance.
He speaks on the assimilation of archaeological knowledge and systematisation of archaeological types.
It is originated from MARX and Engel’s ideas. The society is composed of one all. On the one hand the structure is and for other one the infrastructure (technical means), which can be read across the archaeological remains. GORDON CHILDE, and his studies on the step Palaeolithic -Neolithic- urban societies.
Synthesis of the previous one and of new
studies as for anthropology. LEROI-GOURHAN.
About 1960 in North American universities. Relation (among) the economic and environmental factors that would explain the changes. There is criticised from Europe the omission of the social and ideological factor. CLARK.
It is defined as the science of the human being (ambiguous and widespread definition). It has split into two branches:
a)
Biological.
It studies the biological development of the human being.
b) Cultural.
It is devoted to the study of the culture that the human being has produced. Two schools. The American deals with the fossil peoples, whereas that the European centres on the current cultures.
It mixes the knowledge of the archaeology with those of the cultural anthropology. The cultural processes are independent from the time and from the space. It is possible to apply the situation of current primitive peoples to the prehistoric peoples. It is necessary to tint the application of this theory, because the conditions of primitive current peoples (they have had contacts with the white man) cannot be the same that those of the prehistory.
The anthropology came to its majority of age in the century XIX. The evolutionism appears. The anthropologists had to explain the difference between the cultures, and according to the evolutionary theory, all the peoples cross for the same stadiums. Nowadays not all the peoples we would be in the same stadium, that is the difference between some and others. For this reason the evolutionists say: to study the past it is necessary to notice the present.
Its more important representatives: Morgan and Tyler.
During the first forty years of the 20th, there was an anti-evolutionary trend: the difusionism and the cultural North American historicism.
On the part of the historicism, it is necessary to stand out to:
Boas. He wanted to introduce inside the cultures on having seen failures and exceptions in the theories of the evolutionists.
He dedicated to study the Indians of Canada. His conclusion was that these Indians had his origin in an inferior stratum of the same tribe.
The diffusionists based their theories on cultural circles, on similar zones of culture that they were evolving on having be influenced mutually.
These theories have triumphed in the century XX and continue in force in the present time.
Because of the studies and the investigations, the anthropology had been converted into a descriptive science.
From the 50 there was a return to the evolutionism, a neo-evolutionism, a flight of the excessive descriptivism previous and a search of laws on the anthropology.
In the 60’s arises, under the protection of the neo evolutionism, an American trend: " The New archaeology ", or " System archaeology ".
The most famous of its followers was Binford.
The principal characteristic of this archaeology is the flight of the difusionism and of the historicism in the cultural changes. These changes were produced by a few internal contradictions of every people that lead them to the change.
It has a hypothetical deductive character. It consists of doing the hypothesis based on trying to refute them.
It has a interdisciplinary character. Persons foreign to the anthropology and to the archaeology study the remains.
It possesses a statistical and quantitative character. The measurements of the remains are done with numbers, that they are quantified and interpreted by means of the statistics.
In the last years does not exist an unanimity on the prevailing theory, though it looks like that exists archaeologists of Cambridge who have imposed their ideas. This is the post-procesual archaeology, a return to the historicism.
It is the study of the ancient beings (fauna and flora principally). It studies the remains of fauna that are in the excavations. With this the age is studied, the condition of the (wild or domestic) animal. They do a statistical study by means of percentages.
It reaches, likewise, climatic information (Medium and inferior Palaeolithic) and chronological. The climatic information is given by the micro-fauna. The rodents, for example they are very sensitive and 14 types of mouse are known in the last glaciation, which helps to the chronology of the found remains.
With regard to the botanical part, the study is more complicated, on having eliminated the majority of the plants. Nevertheless, the pollen stays, become fossilised, with the intact form. The result of the study, with which there is obtained the climate of the studied period, is called polinic profile.
It is very important in the investigation and archaeological interpretation, moreover, is a great help to associate objects chronologically.
It is ruled by a basic principle, the oldest thing is in the inferior caps and the more modern thing in the top one. They are originated by passing the time, because of natural agents who were covering what there was; for rivers, precipices of caverns etc.
For the strata’s colour is possible know the origin of the remains that possesses, the darkest reflect the existence of organic components, which indicate the step of the man and those of a clearer colour those that did not know this step.
The levels are not all uniform, that is to say, not all of them have the same measurement and duration. They present themselves in thin sheets or in bulky caps of several meters of thickness, and represent in a few cases a minimal duration, one day for example, and in others a long period of time (1.000 years).
Sometimes they can be deposits without stratification, for what to obtain the chronology it is necessary to have detailed and meticulously study of the objects and utensils there opposing. Then it is possible to speak about a cultural stratification. The more common thing is to establish the "arbitrary strata", that is to say, to divide the deposit in imaginary levels.
There are two types of theories:
A) Creationists. They consider the appearance of a supernatural element. They explain the origin of the man by means of the intervention of a supernatural element. They go from the autochthonous legends up to the religions (Christianity).
Inside the Christianity three clearly differentiated currents are observed:
[ Monobrooms. Only origin from Adam and Eve. The moment of the creation is the moment of maximum perfection. From then, a degeneracy took place: appearance of the races. COUVIER.
[ Polybrooms. They defend the existence of several creations, one from which, was the creation of Adam and Eve and the with race. It was used to defend racist expositions.
[ Doom-mongers or. The man was created along several cataclysms, the last one of which it was Noé's deluge. Later place took the definitive creation. They coined the antediluvian term.
B) Evolutionists. They deny the presence of supernatural elements. They apply scientific methods. They believe in the evolutionary process. These theories have its precedents in the first illustrated scientists (LINNEO). It includes the man inside the animal world. The fundamental step is given when wants to be explained the presence of fossil remains.
LAMMARCK exposes that the evolution consists in the transmission of a generation to other one of the genetic improvements (he will be converted into a predecessor of DARWIN).
DARWIN. The evolution of the species (1859). The engine of the evolution is the natural selection. The best-adapted ones are those who manage to survive.
Not any selection leads to the perpetuation of the species.
WALLACE. The natural selection explains everything. At the moment of reasoning the appearance of the human brain the God's figure appear.
Current neo-Darwinist. (Century XX). It is a synthesis of Mendel’s theory (genetic) and DARWIN (natural selection). They defend the appearance of fortuitous mutations, improvement of the genes and they consider very important can transmit these improvements to the following generations, a transmission of other inferior species.
A wide debate exists around these ideas.
a. Macro evolutionists. They do not deny the existence of the natural selection. They resort to sudden and radical changes to explain the evolution. They do not accept a slow process.
b. Neutralists. The changes, besides for natural selection, take place for random. This is something that can be not refuse, does not have scientific proof either.
I. Age of stone:
· Palaeolithic. Hunters collectors.
· Neolithic.
II .Age of the metals:
· Age of Bronze.
· Age of iron.
From the Neolithic, we enter in the food producers epoch.
The Palaeolithic appears with the first objects, very coarse, does two millions of years in Sudan, Kenya and Angola. The objects were struck to give them a certain form. Hunt and collection appears. It is thought, basing us on the anthropology, that the men were hunters and the women collectors.
They formed very small groups, without settlements. They did not have scarcely mobility.
His final does not coincide with all the places.
The Palaeolithic is still divisible in three periods:
1) Inferior Palaeolithic. It is the most ancient and longer period. It ended 100.000 years ago.
2) Medium Palaeolithic. It lasts 40.000 years. The man of the Neardhental appears.
3) Top Palaeolithic. It is the most modern. It lasts 25.000 years. The man of the Cro-Magnon appears, the art: Altamira, South Africa. The dead men are buried to.
These names have taken with the present geology; so the inferior caps are the most ancient and Superior, the inferior Palaeolithic is the most ancient and the top most near to the present.
The epipaleolithic, a stage of transition towards the Neolithic one, begins in 9000 Bp. and ends in 6000 Bp. (Information recounted to the Iberian Peninsula), in Mesopotamia, for example it had a duration of approximately 1000 years 8000-7000 Bp.
In the epipaleolithic, an increase of population exists, especially on the coasts. It is believed that in this period America filled.
Towards 8000 and 7000 Bp., several areas appear of Neolithic: Mesopotamia, Near East, China (this area is later towards 4000 B.p) Thailand, Cambodia, Eastern Africa, America (south of Mexico, Yucatan).
The Neolithic supposes the appearance of the agriculture and the domestic animals, though in every area the animals and the plants are different. In agreement with the place, with the climate and the form of life of each one of the civilizations. Likewise the ceramics appear.
The Neolithic one never ends really. All these changes are done more complex up to coming to the metals.
The Age of the bronze appears in Mesopotamia towards 3000 Bp., whereas in Europe its birth was delayed until the year 2000 Bp.. and its ends when appears the iron (1100). In Europe, also it ended later.
The appearance of the metals made more complex and improved the conditions of life, especially from the practical and technological point of view: utensils of tillage, swords, etc... The iron was in this respect the whole revolution.
During these ages a stratification of the society was made, which had the metal was more powerful and had more influence than the one that did not have it. There appears the State, in which a priestly or military advice leaned by the army; they were controlling the whole tribe.
It is not possible to say when the Age of the Iron finishes, because there are civilizations in which the iron is the most used object, for example Rome, and they do not belong to the prehistory.
This chronological division is not equal in all the parts. In the south of Africa one was late in the bronze to be known more than in other places, the bosquimanas tribes have gone out of their Palaeolithic a few years ago.
In Asia the Palaeolithic lasted up to the XVII, when began the European imperialism.
In America, there were civilizations that had a great state and military organization, they knew the agriculture and the cattle, but they were not using the metals. How can be called this?
Africa has been the continent that has facilitated most of the remains found, thanks to which the evolution of the man can be studied.
They are studied often at the same time as the cultural changes. Scientific this is incorrect, since not always they go equal.
The process of hominización is the process for which the first hominids transformed in men.
The hominids are characterized by two features:
a) Bipedism.
b) Wide cerebral development.
A) The bipedism is fundamental. It is the engine of all the changes. It took place 1.000.000 of years before any cultural development. It has three advantages:
- Easier displacement.
- Better vision.
- They liberate the hands.
It supposed the change of the completely physical structure and a better union between the specimens, which for some American authors would give place to the language.
B) It is very important the liberation of the hands and the amplification of the sight. The Homo appears what to do with what he can see and with his hands. This will make possible the appearance of the industry. In addition, it is linked to the birth of the language. The generational transmissions already do not get lost. The size of the cranium will be used to study the evolution of the different species.
EVOLUTION OF THE GENRE HOMO (D. JOHANSON).
AUSTRALOPITECUS AFARENSIS
AUSTRALOPITECUS HOMO
Africanus Habililis
Robustus Erectus
Sapiens
Sapiens sapiens
LEAKY'S CLASSIFICATION
THE FIRST (UNKNOWN) HOMINID
AUSTRALOPITECUS GENRE HOMO
In Africa were found the most ancient remains, of the most ancient men forbears: The genre Australopithecus.
It has been described to the australopithecines (BROWN, ROBINSON) as monkeys of small cranium, big millstones and the face thrown towards ahead (in these characteristics they are similar to the monkeys). They differ from them in the absence of canine distinction, besides the existence of a cavity in the cranium in order that penetrates the spinal marrow. They walked erect. For these reasons, the australopithecines have been included inside the family of the hominids. Returning to the previous characteristics it is necessary to fix in a detail of considerable importance: the Australopithecus, and the man, since a differentiation must be done, they were the only primates that lacked of canine distinction. These canine ones took as a principal use the defence (we can verify that very small monkeys as the baboons have very long fangs).
Also it is necessary to heel walk erect of these beings, which is due to an evolutionary compensation in relation to other animal to make them free the hands and they can use them in other aspects, as defence, since they were lacking of her(it) previously mentioned dental defence.
It appeared more or less 3-4 millions of years ago. It has primitive characters. It only has a tuber in the first one molar, though the second one is appearing. It possesses a very small cranium possesses about 400 cc. It’s 1' 20 height. It lives in the trees, but they were travelling erect. Biped, it was omnivorous; it had the small molars that the Africanus and the robustus, to man's similarity. Robust bodies, but not of great speed.
3-2 millions of years. 1' 25 height and a brain of 550-550 cc. The denture much similar to the man. Nourishment more varied than the robustus.
1 ' 55. Vegetarian. Very robust. It) had approximately 600 cc. 7.00. It lives in the trees, but they were walking erects with molars very big prepared to chew vegetables. It was omnivorous. The teeth, for example look like those of the man more than to no other animal known. That is what happens with the bones of the inferior extremities and with those of the hips. The Australopithecus was using the bones of the members of the antelopes as utensils.
Biped. 650-775 cc. 1 ' 70 of stature. East and South of Africa. 2.100.000 of years. Its first remains were found by the Professor Leaky in 1960. Very long arms, like the Australopithecus, and as them, it supports the arboreal suspension. It has very small molars. The front more straight than the Australopithecus.
1.800.000-300.000. Cranial capacity between 775-940 cc Remains out of Africa.
a) China (Sinatropus or Man of China).
b) Java.
DUBOIS called him Pithecanthropus erectus, because he thought it was the lost link. This name proceeds of pitecus (monkey) and anatropous (man) and erectus (it was walking erect), though it is known that the afarensis, approximately 3 millions of years ago were walking erects.
The Homo erectus is an interval among the habilis and the sapiens. The thickness of the bones of the cranium is very bulky. They had the minor brain that the current man, his craniums were bulkier, his jaws heavier. His entire skeleton was heavier. There is an increase of the carnivorous diet, which bore a decrease of the size of the molars.
It is believed that there was a species between both. A Homo sapiens arcaicos. Very robust. 1625 of cranial capacity. Europe and Middle East.
Between his physical characteristics, it is necessary to mention the fugitive forehead, the very marked superciliares arch. Likewise, the posterior part of the head (occipital) was projected backward. The inferior jaw was ending in a heavy chin. His craniums continued being dolichocephalous (narrow craniums). The denture is equal to the current one, but broader.
In the scapula, a rut existed for the muscle that was moving the arm.
The skeleton is adapted to a great fortress.
The first ones reconstructions of this specimen gave place to a being with neck of bull, which was walking bent. Those reconstructions were demonstrated erroneous thanks to modern excavations and advances in the matter. They revealed that the man of the Neanderthal was travelling so erect as the modern man, didn’t had the double knees nor had the neck of bull. As for the question of his intelligence, the rough appearance that could have had is not an obstacle in order that the specialists think that this type of man was almost so intelligent as the modern man. A proof of this are the samples of tools of type musteriense, as well as opposing remains that show the existence of religious rites inside the beliefs of this type of men.
It is not known when it appears (approximately 200.000 years), and disappear 35.000 years ago. His disappearance has originated controversy, so in Europe it could depend of the lack adjustment to the sapiens sapiens, in Middle East they coexisted with them.
There are three possible causes for Europe:
[ Lack of adjustment.
[ Miscegenation with the sapiens-sapiens.
[ Lack of fertility.
Culture. It is the psychic adjustments to the environment. Appearance of the technology. Relations between the individuals (ideology, relations of kinship); they do not leave material remains. It is impossible to speak about man without culture.
Homo habilis. Industry of boulders, stone chips. There is discussed the existence of industry associated with the Australopithecus. Culture achelense belonging to the Homo erectus. Extension of the two faces’ hand axes. Appearance of the osseous industry. Levallois's industry. The raw material is not worked as is found. They looked for concrete things. Cannibalism. Hunters of elephants, tortoises, wild boars.
Man of the Neanderthal. Baptized by the industry of Moustier's deposit (Dordogne), the musteriense grouped in a beginning the triangular tops and the spockshaves proceeding from the caverns. Later the name was applied to the whole set that endures the same objects and that they are the typical part of the “musteriense” industry. In this epoch stands out the presence of the technology Levalloisian. The levalloisense was characterized for being a certain type of stone chip, obtained of a nucleus specially prepared for the effect. The first copies were obtained between the industries of alluviums of the northwest of France, which contents in spockshaves and triangular tops have been converted progressively in "levalloisense".
Reduced to its fundamental lines, the “levalloisense” rests on a certain technology of engraving of stone chips, worked from ready nuclei. The current knowledge is not enough to explain the moment of appearance of this technology because the levalloisense includes the Mediterranean in any more than thousand kilometres, and comes to Africa (Kenya).
Two reasons prevent that the date and the point of appearance they can decide accurately. The first one is that this technology needs millenniums for its development, and its diffusion has been, necessarily, very slow. The second reason makes more hypothetical the determination of the place of appearance: the technology levalloisense combines the features of manufacture achelense in the preparation of the nucleus, and more widespread, those of the obtaining from elongated stone chips. Consequently, there are wide precedents in the inferior Palaeolithic, and the "pseudolevalloisense" or "protolevalloisense" gets lost in a distant past where the problem of the chronological determination appears of darker way. In a more general plane, it is not necessary to forget that of the inferior Palaeolithic to the most top the technologies evolve in progression of logarithmic march, whereas the human generations happen in constant digression. In the Medium Palaeolithic, the pace of the technical progress is still excessively slow, whereas the possibilities of diffusion are situated (as, in all the times, except in the present time) to scale of the human step and of the duration of the generations.
The levalloisense fact is not the only one in the development of the industries of the Medium Palaeolithic. The stone chips Levalloisian are the support of tools whose form can be found in some objects of the Superior Palaeolithic, carved on stone chips of ordinary type. The spockshaves. The cut away tops exist the in the achelense and in the tayaciense. This one might cross for a kind of musteriense. Accordingly, the mustero-levalloisense is constituted in the coincidence of a technology of preparation of origin bifacial and of forms of instruments in stone chips already used.
In this time, there exists a complete control of the fire. Burials with offerings and manipulation of the cranium post-mortem. Cannibalism. Cabins of bones (leather roof) transportable.
The limits of the Superior Palaeolithic are so bad defined as those of the Medium Palaeolithic, due to two fundamental reasons: the coincidence between chronological information and the cultures.
As it happened in the Medium Palaeolithic the traditions of this period did not know important transformations along duration of 10.000 years, what they passed between 40.000 and 30.000 years.
The origin of these transformations is difficult to discover: the traditions that mark the forms and engraving of the stone industry are strongly established in the Medium Palaeolithic and the sets typical of the auriñaciense and of the gravetiense are far from offering an original suitable unit in the time and the space.
One of the characteristics that define to the Superior Palaeolithic is the important development of the structures of the habitat, the importance of the osseous material elaborated in the shape of weapon, tools, of objects of adornment, the employment of matters colourings, the appearance of the first figurative works of art.
As we could have estimated in the Medium Palaeolithic, the engraving of the raw material stamps on the objects the aspect typical of the phase on which they correspond: the Medium Palaeolithic is such because his tools was done on the products and by-products of the engraving of a nucleus bifacial with form of caparison of tortoise. The most important characteristic of the Superior Palaeolithic is that its industry derives from the industry of leaves obtained of a suitable nucleus.
The leaves engraving does not appear in the Superior Palaeolithic and comes preceded from the ancient Palaeolithic for elongated pieces (stone chips / leaves) indicating that, parallel to the stone chips of fracture musteriense, the elements come from a technology that was perfected and systematized only from the moment in which the leaves were converted into the principal object of the engraving. It is evident that the alleviation can have influenced in a very different cultural bases, and that provides an apparent kinship without that supposes that China and in South Africa only they have supported a movement of general drift of a mainly techno-economic character.
Independently of the retouches destined to re-intensify the edge of a tranchant, certain retouches of shaped give to the useful ones or to the whole industry a style that has used often as sign of differentiation. Such it is the retouch of emptying of the products characterized in our latitudes as solutrense, or the retouch reduced of gravetiense or of the romanelliense, or the retouch of leaves on bulky pieces of the auriñaciense. The value of such characters is very important, but it is not necessary to forget that the number of technical solutions for the sílex engraving is limited. The retouch to laminate does not even imply necessarily a presence of the culture auriñaciense and two industries can present close characters without that exist links among them. Nevertheless, the particular tone of technical sets is widely valid and the statistics realizes of his affinities, though these turns out to be sometimes purely technical.
The knifes on leaves have inherited directly the function of the spockshaves and of the tops, which had of the bifacial or of the stone chips not shaped. In effect, the study of the characters of each one of the edges of the edge shows in the bifacial, the spockshave, the top mustero-levalloiense, Chatelperron's top, the leaves auriñacienses or magdalanienses, a dissymmetry of retouches or of vestiges of utilization and a zone reserved in the base that corresponds to an identical use. The different types have simultaneously characters of the form of the products in brute obtained the nucleus and of the retouch.
The development of the osseous industry is directly tied to the multiplication of scrapers and burins. One and others they exist, though rare, from the ancient Palaeolithic, and the innovation only rests on its density and its more frequent application to the leaves. In the Medium Palaeolithic, the function of the scraper was testified by the innumerable spockshaves and denticulate instruments on stone chips of different forms, but it seems to correspond to the shaped of throwing woods and of lances. The spockshaves persists in the Superior Palaeolithic parallel to the above-mentioned scrapers.
The osseous matters are destroyed in most of the cases and it is not possible to warn the evolution and the nature of the osseous industry, with exception of the European zone and some Siberian deposits. The small thing that is known in the rest of Europe and of Africa allows considering its existence.
The most ancient and widely testified useful it is the punch, which appears at the end of the musteriense. Often it is a splinter of bone which top has been obtained by grazing. Its presence is testified in all the parts where the bone has been worked, but it is not frequent that its decoration serves to establish a date.
The tops of arrow, heads of javelins, of harpoons continue then in order of numerical importance. Other objects are narrowly tied to every cultural way and draw real provinces on the former continent. Tool as perforated canes, the spatulas, and objects adorned as the hangers.
The study of the deposits of France, Belgium, and Spain they have given to a division of the Superior Palaeolithic in several periods:
In Atlantic Europe, the period of contact among of Medium Palaeolithic and Superior seems to centre on the 40.000-35.000 years; though there are of scanty means to be able to compare it with the rest of the Western Europe.
From the cultural point of view, the units of step are uniform on the geographical set: the whole part is not distinguished of the evolved mustero-levalloiense: the tops and spockshaves carved and denticulate on stone chips of levalloiense engraving are abundant. Together to the laminate engraving is accentuated, especially in the Atlantic sector where the nuclei of leaves coexist with the nuclei prepared by means of the extraction of stone chips.
Judging by the stoned documents we are in front of the last episode of the Medium Palaeolithic, while other testimonies show already its direct march about the Superior Palaeolithic. One of more important deposit of the epoch is Arcy-sur-Cure.
It offers the contrast of an industry of stone for the half musteriense and a considerable development in other authorities: circular huts of paved soil, abundant employment of the ochre; osseous industry in the shape of javelins, punches, height of bone and of the ivory by means of parallel grooves done with burin.
The Atlantic auriñaciense is characterized by the disappearance of the reduced one of the edges and a retouch that detaches leaves and thin scales, for leaves of thin inverse retouch, and for the flat javelin. This set reigns from Belgium to Spain. The term auriñaciense covers a period among the 30.000 and the 25.000 years before our age. Its diffusion is vast, but of fact it is necessary to consider that only it is a question of some cutting useful, whose acceptance is based on the efficiency or the comfort and that they could have covered with the same cap still cultural multiple unknown units. In West the auriñaciense indicates the presence of the first testimonies known of Homo sapiens and the first appearance of the figurative art, in it other depart only is possessed the industry of the sílex.
The ten thousand years from 25.000 to 15.000 are a period of still enough confused. They are characterized by the presence of industry of stone, by the development of the abrupt retouch of the recess, which was allowing cutting away the edges of the leaves of sílex, (gravetiense) and for the flat retouch in scales (solutrense).
The technology of the recess is applied from this moment equally to small leaves that to the leaves, but this suffer fluctuations, whereas the little leaves can supported throughout the whole period up to the mesolítico. Also the truncated of leaves appears, and the geometric cut away one of small, triangular elements, who towards the end of the most top Paleolithic will adopt different figures.
The Atlantic sector comes from the gravetiense, followed of the protosolutrense and from the solutrense. This apparent complicity owes to the presence, of one only pertinent element. For the gravetiense the top of straight back, for the protosolutrense, the top of invading retouch on flat face; for the solutrense the bifacial leaf.
Between the 13.000 and 8.000, in the Atlantic sector was developed the magdaleniense sequence. To analyse the characteristics of the common features to the industries magdalenienses is necessary to mention the fundamental characters of the laminate retouch auriñaciense, the reduced and the engraving of leaves… Hunters and fishermen. Spain and France.
Art. The first objective expressions. The “artist” shape the ideology of the group. It has given place to several theories:
- The represented figures are isolated figures. Magic or propitiatory practices (hunting). BREUIL
LEROI-GOURHAN. The figures are not isolated. Their placement is depending on the personality whom paints them. The art of the Palaeolithic can be explained as a coupling between masculine and feminine elements. Very open to criticism. It would connect with the rites of fecundity.
ANCIENT HISTORY
- It includes from the ninth millennium to the first half of the first millennium before Christ.
- It is a decisive epoch, since supposes a transformation by means of which the man establishes a producing economy and later creates cities.
- Its characteristics are: sedentary nature, agriculture, cattle and the ceramics.
- When it came to its maturity the formation of urban societies was initiated.
- For the study of this period they are indispensable the archaeological sources.
- Definition of Neolithic comes from the XIX (polishing stone).
- It was distinguishing from the no-polished stone or Palaeolithic.
- Gordon Childe coined the term " Neolithic revolution " or change from a predator economy to a producing one.
- It was based on the agriculture and the cattle that continued being the economic bases up to the industrial revolution.
- During many years has been accepted that it was a consequence of the transformations that led of the compilation to the production.
- The last investigations have demonstrated that it was something habitually before the practice of the agriculture and cattle.
- The sedentary nature is not an economic, but a social and cultural fact.
- The sedentary life propitiated the cattle and the selection of vegetables.
- First houses, circulars, with a wood superstructure (in Tell Mureybet).
- This process was initiated in the ninth millennium before Christ in the Near East.
- The domestication of certain animals was the first manifestation of the Neolithic one.
- The dog was the first domesticated animal. It came from the wolf or from the jackal.
- The first animal domesticated for the nourishment was the wild sheep (Iran).
- The pork appears domesticated towards 7000 on the Lebanese coasts, the bovines are not up to the sixth millennium. They were used in agricultural tasks.
- The horse and the jackass were domesticated to the end of the Neolithic.
- With the exception of the central Sahara it appeared later to the cattle.
- From the eighth millennium before Christ.
- The agriculture was preceded of the election of natural products (wheat in Jericho).
- The culture of wheat spread later to Europe (white type).
- The leguminous should been had cultivated from very ancient epoch. Lentil in East and chickpea in West.
- In some deposits, silex sheets were used as sickles.
- Primitive hoes ( stakes with a ball of stone perforated in an end).
- Clayey shaped paste cooked by the man.
- The most ancient found was a few cylindrical glasses with scrappy decoration (Tell Mureybet, 8000-7700 to. C.
- From 6000 is generalized in the Mediterranean area.
- Some authors think that appeared after the nourishing changes derived from the agriculture (soups and cooked plates).
- Other authors do not accept this hypothesis because they admit the existence of peoples that were cooking the food in leather.
- Maybe the mud was more useful than the leather because it resist better the heat.
- It is not also possible to relate her to the storage because other materials already were expiring with this mission.
- The first ceramics were moulded to hand with paste formed by clay and degreases materials (quartz, limy, crushed bones, sands)
- The innovations were transmitted by diffusion.
- It was a phenomenon of acculturation that affected in first place to the Mediterranean.
- It is possible that the interchanges were made by maritime route and a navigation was existing, possibly coastal trade.
- The navigation began in the oriental Mediterranean (beginning of the VIII millennium to. Before Christ). In the next, Corsica had been reached already.
3.2.6 The Neolithic technology.
- There took place the diffusion of instruments of polishing stone.
- The most typical material is the polishing axe, related to the agriculture.
- Fewer characteristics are the tops of arrow that do not appear in Europe up to the end of the Neolithic Way.
- The handcrafted activities gave place to the division of the work and to the appearance of a hierarchical society.
- It is an almost universal phenomenon.
- It had a diffusion that answered to chronological varied phases and different paces.
- There are three theories that try to explain this transformation.
1) Climatic changes and ecological alterations (Gordon Childe).
2) Adequacy to the environment and symbiosis between the group and the environment (Braidwood). It is most accepted.
3) Demographic imbalance and expansion to new lands (Binford).
- Deposits of Jericho, Tell Mureybet, Jarmo...
- Agriculture and ranching live together with hunt and fishing up to his imposition.
- circular houses had changed to rectangular (Flannery believes that they suppose a growth of the economic activity and modification of the social structure).
- Trade of salt, bitumen, obsidian. Appearance of jars of stone.
- No-polished industry. Picture cards of animals and of the Goddess Mother.
- Çatal Hüyük, Hacilar.
- Ceramics of great quality and decorated.
- Lentils, peas, wheat, barley.
- Sheep, goats, oxen and dogs. Importance of the hunt.
- Rectangular houses with access for the roof. Burials under the housings.
- Obsidian and marine molluscs trade.
- Feminine divinity and feminine statues.
- No polished stone industry..
- The introduction of the Neolithic was later.
- Agriculture of wheat and barley.
- Cattle of ox, pork and lamb. Elephant’s and crocodile’s hunt.
- Rudimentary silos.
- Stone and osseous industry: sickles, harpoons, palettes.
- Ceramics of simple forms and without decorating.
- Cabins ovals.
- Cereal preserved in baskets re-dressed with clay.
- Living together of hunt and cattle.
- Red or black ceramics: glasses, almost spherical glasses. Animals of clay.
- Burials ovals. Corpses shy and wrapped in skins.
- Wheat and barley. Gathered of bones of ostrich. Fishing with fishhook of bone or ivory.
- Huts constructed with branches.
- Polished axe and palettes for the makeup.
- Grey dark and black ceramics, flared form. Geometric smooth decoration.
- Ovals tombs and bodies shy and wrapped in skins.
- Great density of population.
- Rude ceramics without decoration. Tops of arrow and sickles.
- Cemetery under the huts. Shy corpses and orientation southwest.
- Wheat and barley. Cattle without pork. Ovens to cook the bread.
- Ceramics pulimentada.
Lobar cavities.
- Scrapers and sickles of sílex. Tops of arrows and throwing canes.
- Hooks, combs and spoons of bone. Feminine figures of ivory or mud.
- Burials out of the village. Individual oval tombs, shy bodies.
- Introduction of the copper in the final phase (calcolitic). Trade with the Sinai.
- Long duration (VII-IV millennium before Christ.). Regional differences.
- Nea Nikomedia's deposit.
- Rectangular houses in apse around a central building.
- Sanctuary with feminine figures as symbol of fertility.
- Cattle economy, polished stone industry. Smooth and identical ceramics.
- Burials in wells.
- 4300-3300 before Christ. Dímini's culture.
- Housings types megarón.
- Ceramics with black and red spirals on straw bottom.
- Burials in wells and cremations in jars.
- Cnossos's deposit.
- Early Neolithic I (6000-5000). Agriculture. Polished Axes.
- Early Neolithic II (5000-4000 to. C). Planning of the urban space. Smooth ceramics or with printed points. Coarse feminine figures.
- Medium Neolithic (4000-3300). Rectangular houses of stone and adobe wall. Ceramics of great quality. Textile activity.
- The transition of the Neolithic late one to the calcolitic coincides with the minoico period.
- Starevo and
Kuranovo's cultures, very related to Greece.
- Hunters and anglers with absence of ceramics.
- Introduction of the Neolithic towards 5500 with ceramics, agriculture and trade.
- In the IV millennium, pass to the calcolitic period with the copper’s metallurgy.
- The information that exists had comes from the objects, but does not exist studies of habitat or the economic utilizations.
- Deposits in Dalmacia, Italy, The Iberian Peninsula, S of France and N of Africa.
- Habitat in caves and natural coats. Exceptionally outdoors.
- Hunting and fishing close to the cattle. Slow introduction of the agriculture.
- Printed cardial Ceramics. Carved and non-polished stone industry.
- Development of cattle and agriculture. Fishing and hunt like complementary.
- Development of the ceramics. Scrappy decoration and painting.
- Cultural interchanges Mediterranean-Egeo-Central Central.
- Industry of polished stone.
- Carved Sílex and slightly decorated ceramics.
- From the IV millennium printed Mediterranean ceramics appear.
- Deposits in the French Midday, Rin, British Isles.
- The first phase. Cerealist Agriculture and individual tombs. Danube’s zone.
- The second phase. Cattle and collective burials in megaliths.
- In the III millennium in the Near East and Egypt the urban societies had appeared, in Europe the consolidation of the Neolithic.
- Constructive current related to religious structures. In Europe IV-III millennium.
- Collective graves (dolmens, hypogeum). Also elongated blocks (megaliths), which meaning is a mystery.
- The most ancient examples in the French Brittany and the Portuguese Alentejo. IV millennium
- Rectangular plant with a corridor covered by a tomb.
- The coverage could be done with a false dome or with slabs on vertical stones.
- It spread over the Iberian Peninsula, France, British Isles.
- In many places, it coincides with the introduction of the metallurgy.
- The second phase of the calcolitic coincides with the bell-shaped ceramics. III-II millennium C.
- Origin in the Portuguese zone or north of the Iberian peninsula. Influences of " ceramics of strings".
- Its principal characteristic is not as much its form of bell as a decoration marked by the return to the technology of impression.
- The ceramics are decorated with combs and motives in horizontal records.
- Regional variants exist in the decoration (impression and incision) and morphologic (cavities, bowls, glasses).
- The expansion of these ceramics coincides with the last phase of the calcolitic and precedes the Age of the Bronze.
- Between 3500 and 500 before Christ
Near East was placed as forefront of the progress and of the social
organization.
- These regions will be center of
the urban revolution, the social stratification, the appearance of the writing,
the appearance of the states.
- The urbanization and the writing
were the distinctive features of this development.
- " Urban revolution " is
a term that was coined by Gordon Childe.
- It refers to the set of
transformations concerning the consolidation of urban societies.
- These transformations were not
static but they spread during 3 millenniums.
- Although remained the same
cultures, were introduced advances in the infrastructure, in the dryness and in
the irrigation.
- Was the time of the introduction of the horse, the jackass and the
camel, what will revolutionize the technologies of transport and of the war.
- In the metallurgy was passed of
the bronze to the iron. More effective
tools were elaborated.
- In construction, the use of stone
and brick.
- In ceramic appearance of the rapid
wheel and improvement of the ovens.
- Advances in the writin.
Calculation, astronomy...
- Theocratic monarchy in Egypt.
- In Near East cities-states and big
empires.
- Urban societies directed by small groups
of employees and priests
- The maintenance of the structure
was resting on farmers and shepherds.
- Hard life conditions, diseases, bad nourishment.
- From the IV millennium it knew a
great diversity of peoples and cultures.
- There was diverse hypotheses about
the origin of the Sumerians (Iranian, of maritime origin).
- Several cities stand out: Eridú,
Ur, Umma, Uruk and Lagash.
- Later they constituted cities been
governed by the patesi or lugal.
- These cities evolve towards
dynasties as that of Urukaguina,
king of Lagash and Uruk who established the first juridical code.
- Culture of origin Semitic,
proceeding from Arabia, The Sinai or the High Syria.
- Sargón manages to defeat the Sumerians. They had a lighter arch.
- They established an empire from
Armenia up to the Persian Gulf and from the Zagros to the Mediterranean.
- The existence of different peoples
in the empire provoked frequent revolts.
- This internal weakness facilitated
the invasion of the Guti, proceeding from the Zagros.
- After the invasion of the Guti a
renaissance takes place. Sumerian led by the patesi Gudea de Lagash.
- This height continued under III
Ur's dynasty.
- There is established a religious
monarchy that obtains military victories and compiles a code that will use as
reference to Hammurabi.
- This civilization was destroyed by
the amorreos. At the same time nomadic Assyrians establish to the north of
Mesopotamia.
- After the rivalry among several cities
been there was imposed the hegemony of Isín's amorritas, which there was be
movement to Babylonia.
- Hammurabi managed to unify the whole Mesopotamia. He made a
juridical code and political, religious and juridical texts.
- After the decadence of the I dynasty of Babylonia takes place a
coexistence between Babylonia, Assyria and the kingdom hurrita of Mitanni on
the north.
- Epoch waved with alternations in
the hegemony.
- From the century XIV appears the Hittite
Empire that turns into vassal Mitanni and threatens Assyria.
- The Assyrians consolidate a state around
Nínive and Assur, the Medium kingdom Assyrian.
- When the previous balance was broken the Assyrians established a
great empire based on their powerful army.
- The first phase of the expansion
was realized by means of the collection of taxes without suppressing the
autonomy of the states (centuries IX and 1 ª half of the VIII)
- The second phase was realized
turning into provinces asirias the conquered territories. From the middle of
the century VIII
- The employees Assyrians were
controlling the productive surpluses towards Nínive, the capital, of
approximately 200.000 inhabitants.
- They managed to unify Mesopotamia
and Egypt in the middle of the VII to. C.
- At the end of the VII the caldeos
of Babylonia and the Medes destroyed the empire Assyrian.
- The kingdom remained inaugurated
neobabilónico, which came its brilliance with Nabucodonosor II (604-562).
- The opposition between the western
provinces and the Babylonian made possible his destruction.
- The Persian king Ciro, who had replaced the Medes in
Iran, invaded Babylonia (539 before Christ).
- Babylonia and Mesopotamia were
converted into provinces of the Persian Empire.
- The Mesopotamic economy is based
on the irrigated agriculture.
- The land is exploited by grant of
the condition(state) or by lessees. Wheat, vegetables...
- Ranching. Sheep, goats, bovine
cattle for labours, horses for transport and the war, birds of corral.
- The hunt was the sport of the
royalty, of the fishing had benefit the temple principally.
- Certain handcrafted development,
though it had the problem of shortage of prime matters. Production of
agricultural products, metallurgy, painting.
- Early development of the trade, it
was necessary to import prime matters.
- The gods represent the forces of
the nature. Every city possesses his(its) god-Lord with his temple.
- They are dwelt of the gods, and
the people cannot penetrate inside them.
-
Their relations with the god only can be realized across the priests.
