The Neolithic Age

The Neolithic Age is a relatively short phase within the timeline of the development and evolution of our species over the course of some 300,000 years, which is about how long anatomically modern human beings have existed on this planet. However, the Neolithic spans only a small fraction of this 300,000 years beginning about 12,000 years ago (c.10,000 BCE) in the fertile crescent region of the Middle East.

The beginning of the Neolithic is marked by the transition of homo sapiens from hunter-gatherer tribes into the first stages of sedentary settlements. These settlements emerged after the invention of agricultural and pastoral practices, including both animal husbandry and herding.

Essentially the Neolithic began once humans discovered that it was possible for them to cultivate their own food. That they could take control of and direct their local environment, rather than being at its whim. They somehow learned that they could plant seeds and grow crops to support their relatively small tribes composed maybe of a few families united together into what was essentially a fairly small extended family.

They also found that it was possible for them to domesticate certain types of animals, breeding and raising them for consumption of both meat and milk, or for other practical uses. Perhaps this possibility occurred to them after the symbiotic relationship between certain individual wolves (whose ancestors became dogs) and hunter-gatherer tribes was established a few millennia before 10,000 BCE.

This transition marked the beginning of humanity moving towards more complex societies. Partially because the sedentary lifestyle enabled more people to live together, even requiring more people to live together to collectively perform the numerous tasks required in farming and herding to cultivate and maintain a greater surplus of food.

The term Neolithic comes from the Greek words νέος (neos) which means “new” and λίθος (lithos) which means “stone”. Literally the “Neolithic” means “New Stone” and refers to the New Stone Age division of the Stone Age, part of the Three-Age System of dividing human prehistory and history into three ages called the Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age.

Within the Stone Age the New Stone Age (Neolithic) is preceded by the Middle Stone Age (Mesolithic) and Old Stone Age (Paleolithic), with a few smaller subdivisions in that period.

The First Neolithic Settlements

The Neolithic Age began in the Near East, in northern Mesopotamia, the Levant, and southern Anatolia (Turkey). This is where farming was first invented roughly 10,000 BCE in the era of World Prehistory. The Middle East was the original source of this new level of knowledge, skill, and way of life, from whence it spread to nearly everywhere else in the world where farming was and is practiced. It is in this region that we see the first human settlements ahead of the majority of the world by several thousand of years.

The region of the Fertile Crescent spans the modern countries of Iraq, Syria, the Lebanon, Palestine, Israel, and Egypt. You can also see in the map to the right how the borders of these modern countries overlap with the more general and ancient designations of Mesopotamia, the Levant, and parts of Anatolia. Egypt essentially having always been Egypt.

The first ever large settlements fashioned by humanity are sites such as Tell Qaramel by as early as 10,700 BCE whose ruins show evidence of two structure which have been classified as temples by archaeologists. Tell Qaramel is very close to the famous temple / settlement site of Gobekli Tepe which might have been founded by 10,000 BCE.

The settlement of Jericho was founded by about 9000 BCE fashioned with notably high, thick walls in the Levant. We also have the site of Aşıklı Höyük in Turkey which was established by about 8,200 BCE. The site of Mehrgarh in Pakistan, just to the northwest of India, was established by 7000 BCE whose people cultivated fields of wheat and barley, and had domesticated goat, sheep, and cattle.

In northern China we have sites of the Nanzhuangtou culture, whose people had entered the Neolithic by perhaps 10,600 BCE. Though in Mesoamerica (Central America) they developed agricultural skills independently and seem to have entered the Neolithic at around the same time as cultures of the Near East, earliest estimates pointing toward some time in the 11th millennium BCE.

Neolithic Culture

During the Neolithic we generally see a tribal way of life. Several different lineages of people came together in a sedentary community, a small village if you will. We can also imagine that new families and bloodlines were added from time to time as certain nomadic tribes came across these small villages, some of whom might have been inclined to stay.

Within Neolithic communities there does not appear to have been distinct social stratification, where people are divided into classes by birth or by wealth. Two veins of evidence exist for this conclusion: the analysis of burial practices and the styles of homes themselves. In places where there is distinct social stratification (Sumer, Assyria, Liangzhu, Egypt, Minoan Crete, India at the time of the Mahabharata) we see a distinct difference in burial goods.

Some burials and entire cemeteries are clearly reserved for distinguished, wealthy, “elite” individuals as their grave goods are filled with gold, jewels, precious metals and stones, and ornate objects of high craftsmanship typical of the wealthy in nearly every phase of human civilization. “Commoners” on the other hand might only be buried with simple pottery, simple tools or weapons, plain clothes, or some small object with obvious personal value, rather than intrinsic.

Moreover, we also see a difference in their homes. The common folk lived in simple dwellings, maybe mud-brick huts with thatched roofs – small, humble dwellings. In later times these existed alongside what amount to extravagant ancient palaces, which were the domains of the nobility.

This clear distinction of wealth proves the existence of social stratification, a distinction of wealth and status between peoples forming social classes. Though this is generally not found within Neolithic communities. Based on such evidence as burial goods and architecture there does not appear to have been a leader or ruling elite who possessed greater wealth, authority, or status.

Nonetheless, this does not in any way preclude the existence of complex social hierarchy. There would have been an individual or group of individuals who the tribe looked to in times of need, if only because they had distinguished themselves in the eyes of the rest of the group for their cunning, hunting skill, calmness and reasonableness under pressure, wisdom, or skill in negotiation and mediation.

Yet this differs from true social stratification in that fundamentally, Neolithic societies appear to have been egalitarian. Food and resources were distributed evenly. None were superior to the other by birth or by wealth.

Generally speaking, it isn’t until the advent of the Bronze Age that we begin to see an intensification in social stratification. An elite class seems to emerge as wealth is accumulated through the advent of business and mercantile practice. Some scholars believe that this is how the whole concept of a ruling elite and kingship emerged. Certain families or clans accumulate great wealth through the control, production, and accumulation of resources which enables them to obtain more and more. Thus possession and wealth can be seen as morphing into social power and authority.

We might also conjecture the early existence of the equivalent of “tribal chiefs” within Neolithic communities, which might have been hereditary to some degree. Not with absolution in the sense of the Ancient Egyptian Pharaoh whose right to rule was believed to have been divinely ordained through their bloodline tracing them back to the gods, but in the sense that certain families and lineages were illustrious and noteworthy in that they had produced more powerful leaders, literally physically stronger and faster men, or more cunning, skilled individuals than other lineages within a clan.

As Neolithic settlements grew in population, the need for greater social order and highly defined social hierarchy would have become apparent. Simply for the sake of decision making, maintaining order, and the smooth operation of villages that had amassed thousands of inhabitants. Authority would have necessarily been placed in the hands of certain individuals or groups to maintain order among larger and larger groups of people.

The Neolithic Period By Region

The beginning of the Neolithic period is distinguished by a cultural transition from hunting and gathering to farming and raising animals. Though this transition occurred at different times in different places.

Furthermore, the end of the Neolithic Age is marked by a peoples entrance into the Bronze Age, once they invent or learn the skills of working with metals, or else obtain the metal through trade.

Thus the Neolithic in Europe begins and ends at different times than it does in India or China. There are even some cultures that never entered the Neolithic at all. Instead they transitioned directly from what we might call the Mesolithic almost into the Modern Age (technically the Age of Enlightenment) as is the case with the North American Indians and the Indigenous Australians.

Below is a list of the rough beginning and ending dates for the Neolithic in various regions of the world:

• The Near East :: As stated the Neolithic settlements began emerging in the Near East as early as 10,700 BCE where we find many of the largest, oldest, and most sophisticated examples of early human civilization. Regions in Central Asia such as Mehrgarh in Pakistan entered the Neolithic by 7000 BCE.
• Neolithic Europe :: Southern Europe entered the Neolithic as early as about 6500 BCE which lasted until the Bronze Age began maybe around 3200 BCE but possibly as early as 4500 BCE. Northern Europe didn’t enter the Neolithic until about 4500 BCE.
• South and East Asia :: China entered the Neolithic by as early as 10,500 BCE according to age estimates for one site in particular, but sees Neolithic settlements emerging for the next few thousand years. The earliest farm on the Korean Peninsula seems to date to 3600 BCE at the oldest.
  • India :: Entered the Neolithic by 6500 BCE.
• The Americas :: Regions in Mesoamerica (Central America) developed the skills of agriculture perhaps as early as 10,000 BCE. Though for some fascinating reason these skills never made it to the natives of North America who, like the indigenous Australians, entered directly in the Age of Enlightenment and Industrial Age through their contact with European settlers.
• Australia :: never entered the Neolithic and instead predominantly remained hunter-gatherers until the Europeans settle the island.