Developing agriculture and technology/Agricultural, pastoral, and foraging societies, and their demographic characteristics

Foundations: c. 8000 B.C.E.–600 C.E.

Major Developments

1. Developing agriculture and technology Agricultural, pastoral, and foraging societies, and their demographic characteristics (Include Africa, the Americas, and Southeast Asia.)
   1.  
      1. Foraging societies – small groups of people traveled – climate/food availability
         1. Bad - climate, disease, famine, natural disasters
         2. No permanent shelters
         3. Limit to how much land can feed
         4. Mammals, fished, gathered
         5. Organization
            1. Some had chiefs, leaders, religious figures
            2. Coordination needed for hunting large game – later used for warfare
         6. Worshipped deities – buried dead 100,000 years ago – burial sites
            1. Sacrifices, ceremonies
         7. Expression through art – art 32,000 years old, flutes 30,000 years old
         8. Gender division of labor
            1. Physical differences – men hunted, made war, heavy labor
            2. Women gathered, prepared food, maintained home, children
            3. Roles not seen as superior, just different - debatable
      2. Pastoral societies – domestication of animals
         1. Mountain regions, insufficient rainfall
         2. Small scale agriculture to add to milking
         3. Extended family important
         4. Women w/ few rights, men controlled food production
         5. Power based on size of herd
         6. Couldn’t settle needed to look for food for herd
            1. Seasonal migration
            2. Difficult to become “civilized”
         7. * Began to experiment w/ plants/seeds
            1. Mix animal husbandry w/ plant domestication
            2. By accident – latrines sprout veggies, yummy
            3. Women key role
      3. Key points – one didn’t disappear
         1. In one area, could have shifting cultivation + migratory farmers + forage + hunt/fish + nomadic pastoralism
      4. Polytheism –
         1. afterlife – matter – neither created or destroyed
         2. energy > energy
         3. from animism – spirits in anything
         4. anthropologists – need control over fate – petition gods
   2. Emergence of agriculture and technological change
      1. Neolithic Revolution/Agricultural Revolution – 8000-3000 BCE
         1. Nomadic > agricultural > town > city
         2. W/ good soil, water source + cultivate plants – could build homes
            1. Domesticated animals/simple tools
         3. Was it a revolution?
            1. Long period of time
            2. At different times
            3. but…no one can argue immense changes
      2. Psychological Issues
         1. Shared land vs. ownership, people come on your land - intruders
      3. Food Surplus
         1. Time to make tools, dig an irrigation ditch, philosopher, religious leader
         2. One farms for 100, you can individualize labor
            1. Armies, towns, writing, art, experiment, technologies – specialization
         3. Government and religion emerge to keep life orderly
            1. Organize irrigation efforts which increases scope
      4. Calendars, pottery containers, baskets, storehouses
      5. Domestication – dog first – companionship, security hunting
         1. Later goat – both during Paleolithic – milk/meat
         2. Advantages of some societies on domestic options
      6. Regional food
         1. Central Africa - plantains, bananas, yams
         2. Americas – maize, beans, squash
         3. India – millet, barley
      7. Migratory vs. Slash and burn
         1. Ashes kept soil fertile
         2. Replaced with shifting – planting, fallow
      8. Changes – irrigation, mixing crop types
      9. Fermentation of alcoholic beverages – end of Neolithic
   3. Nature of village settlements
      1. Must be near water – commerce, barter
      2. Stay in same place
         1. Sense of unity, create cultural traditions
         2. People tied to land – property as ownership
      3. Role of women pre-farming – food gatherers – first to plant/harvest crops
         1. Men were hunters
         2. Gender-related differences – women lost status
            1. Political, economic lives controlled by men
               1. Community leaders, warriors, priests, traders, crafts
               2. Patrilineal/patrilocal – tracing decent based on male line/husband’s home more important
      4. Needed to work together –formation of communities
         1. Defense against invaders
         2. A family alone can’t create complex irrigation systems
      5. Self-sufficient, but some trade occurred
      6. Religious rituals become more complex – greater variety of gods and goddesses
         1. Forces of nature + spirits of departed ancestors
         2. Built permanent sites of worship – shrines, temples, megaliths
      7. Creation of cities
         1. Offer protection for defense
         2. Centers for trading
         3. Different skills/talents live together
         4. Major cities
            1. Jericho – Jordan River
            2. Catal Huyuk – Turkey
            3. Danpo – China
      8. No longer can rely on oral communication – need writing
         1. Keep records
         2. Pass on information
         3. Transfer information
         4. Sumerians first 3500-3000 BCE, Incas civilized without
   4. Impact of agriculture on the environment
      1. Land – land reconfigured to fit needs of humans
         1. Diverts water
         2. Clears land for farming
         3. Roads built
         4. Stones unearthed for buildings/monuments
      2. Animal kingdom
         1. Animals as food, clothing, beast of burden – oxen
            1. Increase food production
      3. Overfarmed – depleted land of fertility
         1. Move on to new land – sometimes called slash and burn
   5. Introduction of key stages of metal use
      1. Hard granite stones – farming tools – hoes, plows – farm tools priority
         1. Plow key prerequisite of society?
            1. Allowed for food surplus
      2. Pottery for cooking
      3. Weaving for baskets/nets
      4. Complex/comfortable clothing
      5. Wheels for carts sails for boats
      6. Combine copper with tin to make bronze
         1. Weapons, tools – Bronze Age
         2. Iron follows
      7. Neolithic Age – New Stone Age – ends with metalworking
         1. 6600 BCE – Copper used in Europe, Asia
         2. Metalurghy – extracting from raw ore and metalwork – crafting – quite difficult
            1. Jewelry predates 6400 BCE, but tools not efficient until later
      8. 3500-3000 BCE – Bronze from copper/tin discovered in Middle East, Balkans, Southeast Asia – later part Neolithic Age – Bronze Age
         1. Americas and Asia never had a bronze age – tin scarce
         2. Scarcity of tin pushed need for international trade
      9. 1500-1200 BCE – Iron Age – Hittites
         1. Spread to Europe in 1000 BCE, Africa in 500 BCE
         2. Possible to cultivate hard packed soil/more land
         3. Wave of invasions from outside Mesopotamia