INTRODUCTION
This is the beginning of an occasion series in which I intend to write a history of man. I first attempted this many years ago, and have periodically gone back to re-write, push forward, etc. I’ve decided to begin publishing so I have no excuse to leave it.
My reasons for the work are simple. Whilst I do not attempt to rubbish historians, their works do tend to be too long for the layman. Hence, this very short history is mainly for them. But it is also something more.
Normal history deals with specific events, periods, etc. What I want to do is show the more general patterns of history, placing why we did this, and how it led to that. It is an area many historians miss.
Due to this, it will not be in a definite chronological order. I will bring a particular shred of history into the story when it fits the pattern to do so. This may, at times, seem awkward, but I’ve found it is the best way to show patterns in operation.
I’m not a historian and I admit there may be errors in this on-going work. It is simply an exercise to see if I have the ability to do it, and whether it would have worth. Please feel free to correct me as I go along.
BEGINNING
It begins with the origin of man. Creation myths survive from around the world which claim man was seeded on the Earth through supernatural intervention, best expressed in the west through the Creation Account in Genesis. This was popularly believed until recent times. But now evolution has replaced the supernatural.
Fundamental to modern man is our close genetic relationship to the great apes. We shared a common ancestor about ten million years ago, with man entering a separate lineage 5 to 8 million years ago. This was Austrolopithecus, or southern man, bipedalism beginning to show (i.e. walking on two legs), allowing us to evolve dextrous forelimbs for manipulation of our environment.
Evidence of Austrolopithecus came from Ethiopia, including the female skeleton, Lucy, from 3.5 million years ago. He disappears about 1.7 million years ago, replaced by homo habilis, meaning ‘man the toolmaker.’ The first clearly human ancestor, fossil evidence has been found in the Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania. With a rounded skull with enlarged brain, he has a human face. Rudimentary stone tools have been found close to his remains.
About the same time, a progression – homo erectus – appeared in Asia, but this may have been an off-shoot of the evolutionary line, wiped out by competition from modern man or catastrophe such as a meteor collision. But the remains of a 12 year old boy found at Nariokotome, dated to 1.7 million years ago, is only slightly different from a modern boy.
This is the first appearance of homo sapien, or ‘man the thinker.’ He had a great advantage in his technology. Austrolopithecus could only survive in warm climates, as in Africa. Home sapien went on to fashion clothing, fire and shelter, allowing him to move out of Africa, to colder climes. Hence, by 700,000 years ago, this almost modern man appears in Europe.
He has definite features by 250,000BC. He is Neanderthal Man, named after the discovery of his skeleton in the Neander Valley near Dusseldorf in 1856. He could think, he ritually buried his dead, suggesting religious forms. But being short and stocky, he wasn’t fully modern. But 35,000 years ago another migration began. This was Cro-Magnon Man, a skeleton found in the Cro-Magnon cave of Les Eyzies in the Dordogne in 1868.
First appearing in Africa 100,000 years ago, he was fully modern, and with his appearance, Neanderthal Man disappears. In the next post we will narrate how early man developed his technology, culture and agriculture.
(c) Anthony North, May 2007
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As the work progresses, you can access all posts, in order, by clicking History of Man in Blogroll
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