The Neolithic Age

The Neolithic Age, or New Stone Age is also widely known as the Polished Stone Era, while during the Paleolithic and Mesolithic Ages man secured his food by hunting and collecting. Neolithic man domesticated certain animals and cultivaled certain plants. In other words, hunting was replaced by animal husbandry and food gathering by farming. These great advances in agnculture mark the first revolution in history called the Neolithic Revolution.

Approximately 7000 or 10000 years ago, wheat and barley were the first plants to be cultivated and sheep, goats, and pigs the first animals to be domesticated. Again, during the Neolithic Age human settlements in the true sense of the word were established in the form of small villages. The dwellings were built of sun-dried bricks and had flat roofs. Pottery was made for the first time.

Parallel to these changes, tools were further developed. Long, thin, sharp blades were made from flint and obsidian; other characteristic implements of this period were polished axes, mace heads, pointed arrow and spear tips, rough handmade pottery, windmill and grinding stones and various tools made of bone. Among the important art documents of the time are Wall paintings and statues in stone and earthenware of the Steatopygous woman, portraying the Mother Goddess.