biological, cultural, and sociopolitical

processes in human evolution (week 6-7)

(Part 1)
 Table 1.1 HUMAN EVOLUTION

The Oldowan Industry Homo habilis A stone tool industry

The Archeulian
Homo erectus Develop a more complex industry, created hand axes
Industry
The tools from the industry combined achelian industry techniques with
The Monasterian Homo
vallosinian technique which involved the use of premadle, and core tool for
Industry neathertalensis
extraction of a flake tool that has sharpened edges.

The Aurignacian The development in this industry is projected through cave painting and the
Industry fabrication of accessories such as figurines, bracelets and beads.

This industry which is also a proto-culture used by the early human was
The Magdalenian
defined by several revolutionary advancement in technology such as the
Industry
creation of micoliths from flint, bone, antler, and ivory.

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 Tools industry Evolution

Oldowan Industry Acheulean Industry The Monasterian Industry

The Aurignacian Industry 3 The Magdalenian Industry

 The human evolution

✣
Modern humans evolved over the past seven million years from ape-like ancestors who were the earliest members of our lineage.
The hominid fossils discovered by archeologists are carefully studied by paleoanthropologists who try to determine how the fossils
fit in the evolutionary tree of modern humans. Evolution involves the gradual changes from simple to more complex
forms. Humans are believed to have developed from simpler forms.
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The fossil record seems to indicate that australopithecus is the ancestral of homo and
modern humans. It was once assumed that large brain size had been a precursor to
bipedalism, but the discovery of australopithecus with a small brain upset this theory.

The first human ancestors appeared between five million and seven million years ago,
probably when some ape-like creatures in Africa began to walk habitually on two legs.
They were flaking crude stone tools by 2.5 million years ago. Then some of them spread
from Africa into Asia and Europe after two million years ago. (Feb 26, 2002).

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 Hominid Species

Ardipithecus ramidus Australopithecus anamensis

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 Hominid Species

Australopithecus Afarensis Australopithecus africanus

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 Hominid Species

Australopithecus aethiopicus Australopithecus robustus

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 Hominid Species

Australopithecus boisei Homo habilis

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Early Hominids
Homo habilis

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✣
Homo habilis
(Latin: “able man” or “handy man”) are extinct species of humans, the most ancient
representative of the human genus, Homo. Homo habilis inhabited parts of sub-
Saharan Africa from roughly 2.4 to 1.5 million years ago (mya).
✣ It had lightly built brain-case, projecting face and jaws relatively large front teeth, but
small narrow cheek teeth.
✣ Body size was 25-40 kg.
✣ With long powerful – muscled arms and hands suggesting climbing ability and short hind
limbs, Homo habilis developed tools primarily for their use in scavenging and they are
considered by most experts as more intelligent and organized than the hominids.

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Homo erectus

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 Homo erectus
Homo Erectus, (Latin: “upright man”) are extinct species of the archaic human genus (Homo) from Pleistocene,
perhaps an ancestor of modern humans (Homo sapiens) and is one of the recognizable members of the Homo.

Homo erectus: A primate believed to have been an extinct ancestor of modern humans being (Homo sapiens).
Known to have been tall (average 1.78 m or 5 feet, 10 inches), erect stature, smaller brain (about 75% the size of
Homo sapiens), and a lower forehead than modern humans.

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the Homo Sapiens

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 the Homo Sapiens
✣ Homo sapiens, (Latin: “wise man”) the species to which all modern human beings belong.

✣ Characterized by Bipedalism.

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Prehistoric Ages
(Paleolithic, Neolithic and
Mesolithic Ages)

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 Table 1.2 CHARACTERISTICS OF
PALEOLITHIC AND NEOLITHIC
REVOLUTION

Characteristics Paleolithic Neolithic

Include a wider array of small and bigger tools

Tools Stone and handy for mobile lifestyle
due to sedentary lifestyle

Small and limited to personal ornaments , Included the certain artworks that required a
Personal properties bigger artworks were done but not within a longer length of time and a greater number of
long time frame (e.g cave paintings) people (e.g stonehenge)

Subsistence Foraging Agriculture

Leadership Semi rigid; based on legitimacy (religious

Not rigid, based on age and knowledge
belief, social status)

Social division None; communal lifestyle Elite vs. working class

Population size Small (30-50) people Large (in thousands)
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 Paleolithic or Old Stone Age

In the Paleolithic period (roughly 2.5 million years ago to 10,000 B.C.), early
humans lived in caves or simple huts or tepees and were hunters and gatherers.
They used basic stone and bone tools, as well as crude stone axes, for hunting
birds and wild animals.

Paleolithic or Old Stone Age: from the first production of stone artifacts, about
2.5 million years ago, to the end of the last Ice Age, about 9,600 BCE. This is
the longest Stone Age period.

During the Paleolithic, hominins grouped together in small societies such as

bands, and subsisted by gathering plants and fishing, hunting or scavenging
wild animals.

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 The Mesolithic
(or Middle Stone Age)
✣ During the Mesolithic period (about 10,000 B.C. to 8,000
B.C.), humans used small stone tools, now also polished and
sometimes crafted with points and attached to antlers, bone
or wood to serve as spears and arrows. They often lived
nomadically in camps near rivers and other bodies of water.

✣ Agriculture was introduced during this time, which led to

more permanent settlements in villages.

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 The Neolithic Period
✣ The Paleolithic Period ended when the Neolithic Period began.
However, this transition point is much debated, as different parts of
the world achieved the Neolithic stage at different times.

✣ During that time, humans learned to raise crops and keep domestic
livestock and were thus no longer dependent on hunting, fishing,
and gathering of wild plants. These cultures made more useful stone
tools by grinding and polishing harder rocks rather than merely
chipping softer ones down to the desired shape.
✣ The cultivation of cereal grains enabled people to settle in one
location, build permanent dwellings, and develop villages, and the
release from nomadism and a hunting-and-gathering economy gave
them the time to pursue specialized crafts.
✣

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Thank you

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