First Civilizations

Since 3500 B.C.E., Civilizations started forming.  Again like the start of agriculture, the beginning of these civilizations started around the same time but in different parts of the world. Civilizations started in three different places Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Norte Chico. From the start of these three civilizations it became greater and greater into the civilizations we have now. It is fascinating to know that the civilization we know now came from the ideas of many agricultural civilizations. Throughout thousands of years, civilizations developed everywhere in the world. The Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilization went from being separate civilizations to becoming part of the Persian Empire thousands of years later. The fight and change of different civilizations not only happened to the Egyptians and Mesopotamians but the rest of the world. These takeovers are how most of the world came to be.

It isn’t hard to believe that with the civilizations beginning there wasn’t inequality and hierarchy within the civilization. Naturally, those who had power were the ones that had more crops and more food. When you are in power, or upper class, you received many fortunes and could escape the need for physical labor. All the Civilizations had a small amount of those in the upper class and the majority as free commoners, very much like today’s society. Even lower than free commoners were people who were enslaved. Although it isn’t ok to enslave people as we know now through history, people thousands of years ago didn’t have the same rules as those decades ago. Slaves in the past weren’t always used just for hard labor and children that were born into slavery could become “free”. It isn’t the greatest idea to own people but it seems they had better rules for slave-owning thousands of years ago than decades ago.

Agriculture, Horiculture, Pastural.

                About 12,000 years ago the early humans went into what we now call the Neolithic or Agricultural revolution. The "new stone" age is when many of these people started a form of farming and manipulation of nature for our advantage. The start of this era changed how things were to develop for us now. Because of the onset of husbandry in this time period, we have many animals that can be companions instead of a threat. These changes also got us the corn we know now instead of the 1-inch cob they knew then. Although we saw "domestication" as an advantage for us, it was a slight disadvantage for the animals that now depend on people to keep them alive because they can no longer survive in the wild alone. The most shocking among these facts is while all these people were thousands of miles away from each other, they all partook in the domestication of nature as a whole. It is great how around the world different crops and animals were being grown and domesticated to become part of the human ecosystem.

                Even though many of these early homos had an agricultural revolution, there were some areas that strived more than others. The  Southwestern European space that is now known as a dry area where not much grows was once a highly vegetated land. Many archeologists believe that a dry spell happened in the Fertile Crescent which is why we have a desert-like area among other places that were also highly vegetated. These extraordinary facts explain why this less than likely climate condition has been populated by people. Another reason people could live in these harsh conditions is that they adapted to be co-dependent on animals that could be herded like cattle. They found it easy to have these animals eat things that people couldn't eat and make a product that was beneficial to the human anatomy. The pastoral people were mostly in Eurasian and African regions which are where most of the dry spells thousands of years ago happened. An interesting relationship started forming between the pastoral people and those who lived in a high vegetative area. Although some fought because of the two methods of survival, others created a cohabiting living arrangement. Overall I wish the Yahi people were treated better than the massacre that happened to them.

The Hadzas and others

                The prologue was an excellent refresher course on things like The Big Bang theory and in time how it relates to how we have developed into Homo Sapiens. I found that inserting what happened once the big bang occurred into a yearlong event, helps many understand that many human advances have happened in a short period of time in relation to the development of Earth. It's outstanding that while the galaxy happened 13 billion years ago life on Earth wasn't around until many years after the galaxy forming, 600 million years ago. Many years after the first life form appeared (250,000 years ago) the first humans existed on Earth. After the first humans came to be we rapidly advanced, in comparison to how the galaxy developed, to the modern people we are now. It is fascinating to think of world history with the 3 C's; Change, Comparison, and Connection.

                It is quite upsetting that the Hadza people of northern Tanzania are nearing extinction just because they are different in how they survive in the world. Many establishments like missionaries and governments don't accept this "primitive" way of living because it isn't like most of those people do it. The Hadza still keep the nomadic process of our older ancestors, which they did for thousands of years. I find nothing wrong with this way of living yet many people are forcing their ways on these peaceful people. The nomadic tendencies started in Africa, but many early humans decided to leave the African continent and travel to Eurasia and Australia. In these regions, you see many cave paintings and the use of better tools than just a rock. The farther the humans, at the time, went the better the skills they developed. Although most of these people depended on gatherers in their groupings, many  started hunting different kinds of animals. I find it surprising that many of the gatherers were women and that there was more equality between men and women than there is now. Throughout this equality, there were rules and regulation if you wanted to live into an age of approximately 35. Another thing I found interesting is the spirituality that happened later in which most of those religions were based on a female entity that was worshipped, unlike most current religions.