Mesolithic

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Stone Age
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↑ before Homo (Pliocene)

Paleolithic

Lower Paleolithic
Homo
control of fire, stone tools
Middle Paleolithic
Homo neanderthalensis
Homo sapiens
out of Africa
Upper Paleolithic
behavioral modernity, atlatl, dog

Mesolithic

microliths, bow, canoes

Neolithic

Pre-Pottery Neolithic
farming, animal husbandry, polished stone tools
Pottery Neolithic
pottery
Chalcolithic
metallurgy, horse, wheel
↓ Bronze Age

The Mesolithic period or Middle Stone Age[1] was a period in the development of human technology in between the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age and the Neolithic or New Stone Age.

The word "Mesolithic" is derived from the Greek words mesos, meaning "middle", and lithos, meaning "stone".

The term "Mesolithic" was introduced by John Lubbock in his work Pre-historic Times, published in 1865. The term was, however, not much used until V. Gordon Childe popularized it in his book The Dawn of Europe (1947).[2]

Recently, Ray Mears and paleoethnobotanist Gordon Hillman have brought the term 'Mesolithic' back into the public arena, prompting individuals to learn more about it and the diets of Mesolithic people through the popular BBC 2 broadcast 'Ray Mears' Wild Food'.

Contents

[edit] A question of terminology: "Mesolithic" or "Epipaleolithic"?

The term "Mesolithic" is in competition with another term, "Epipaleolithic", which means "the peripheral Old Stone Age".[3]

In the archaeology of northern Europe - for example for archaeological sites in Great Britain, Scandinavia, Ukraine, and Russia - the term "Mesolithic" is almost always used.

In the archaeology of other areas, the term "Epipaleolithic" may be preferred by most authors, or there may be divergences between authors over which term to use or what meaning to assign to each.

  • Some authors use the term "Epipaleolithic" for those cultures that are late developments of hunter-gatherer traditions but not in transition toward agriculture, reserving the term "Mesolithic" for those cultures, like the Natufian culture, that are transitional between hunter-gatherer and agricultural practices.
  • Other authors use the term Mesolithic for a variety of Late Paleolithic cultures subsequent to the end of the last glacial period whether they are transitional towards agriculture or not.

A Spanish scholar, Alfonso Moure, says in this regard:

In the terminology of prehistoric archeology, the most widespread trend is to use the term "Epipaleolithic" for the industrial complexes of post-glacial hunter-gatherer groups. Conversely, those that are in course of transition toward artificial food production are assigned to the "Mesolithic".[4]

Some authors prefer the opposite convention, using the term "Epipaleolithic" for cultures that are in transition toward agriculture and "Mesolithic" for those that are not. This is not really as confusing as it seems. The important thing is to take note of how each author uses the term.

[edit] Use of "Mesolithic" by Steven Mithen

British archaeologist Steven Mithen, in his award-winning book After the Ice, identifies the term "Mesolithic" with a subset of European hunter-gatherer cultures that were directly descended from the European Paleolithic. He rejects the Mesolithic label for the Levant and Anatolia, where the contemporary cultures were Neolithic and had evolved directly out of the Paleolithic cultures of West Asia.[5]

Mesolithic cultures, as designated in this way, are distinct from Paleolithic cultures in their tendency toward more partially sedentary settlements, their emphasis on fishing, reliance on bow-hunting over spear-hunting, and far more advanced social and ritual structure. They are distinct from Neolithic cultures in their absence of farming and pastoralism.[6]

[edit] In Europe

It began at the end of the Pleistocene epoch around 11,000 BC and ended with the introduction of farming, the date of which varied in each geographical region. In some areas, such as the Near East, farming was already in use by the end of the Pleistocene, and there the Mesolithic is short and poorly defined. In areas with limited glacial impact, the term "Epipaleolithic" is sometimes preferred. Regions that experienced greater environmental effects as the last glacial period ended have a much more apparent Mesolithic era, lasting millennia. In northern Europe, for example, societies were able to live well on rich food supplies from the marshlands created by the warmer climate. Such conditions produced distinctive human behaviors which are preserved in the material record, such as the Maglemosian and Azilian cultures. Such conditions also delayed the coming of the Neolithic until as late as 5000 BC in northern Europe.

As what Mithen terms the "Neolithic package" (including farming, herding, polished stone axes, timber longhouses and pottery) spread into Europe by routes that remain controversial among scholars, the Mesolithic way of life was marginalized and eventually disappeared. Some late Mesolithic groups, such as Denmark's Ertebølle culture, did make some pottery and did engage in significant trade with Neolithic groups directly to their south.[7]

Mithen notes that Mesolithic cultures were a historical dead end, unlike the somewhat earlier cultures of the late Paleolithic period in West Asia, which were evolving steadily toward the Neolithic. At the same time, genetic studies strongly suggest that modern Europeans' ancestry, especially their matrilineal mitochondrial DNA, is descended directly from these Mesolithic peoples, who must have eventually adopted the Neolithic way of life that had come to them from West Asia.[8]

[edit] In the Levant

There are two designated periods:

Mesolithic 1 (Kebara culture; 20-18,000 BC to 12,150 BC) followed the Aurignacian or Levantine Upper Paleolithic throughout the Levant. By the end of the Aurignacian, gradual changes took place in stone industries. Microliths and retouched bladelets can be found for the first time. The microliths of this culture period differ greatly from the Aurignacian artifacts. This period is more properly called Epipaleolithic.

By 20,000 to 18,000 BC the climate and environment had changed, starting a period of transition. The Levant became more arid and the forest vegetation retreated, to be replaced by steppe. The cool and dry period ended at the beginning of Mesolithic 1. The hunter-gatherers of the Aurignacian would have had to modify their way of living and their pattern of settlement to adapt to the changing conditions. The crystallization of these new patterns resulted in Mesolithic 1. New types of settlements and new stone industries developed.

The inhabitants of a small Mesolithic 1 site in the Levant left little more than their chipped stone tools behind. The industry was of small tools made of bladelets struck off single-platform cores. Besides bladelets, burins and end-scrapers were found. A few bone tools and some ground stone have also been found.

These so-called Mesolithic sites of Asia are far less numerous than those of the Neolithic and the archeological remains are very poor.

Mesolithic 1 started somewhere around 18,000 BC in Israel. The change from Mesolithic 1 to Mesolithic 2 can be dated more closely. The latest date from a Mesolithic 1 site in the Levant is 12,150 BC. The earliest date from a Mesolithic 2 site is 11,140 BC. The 10th millennium BC seems to correspond with three other sites at Kebara (9200 BC), Mugharet el Wad (9970 and 9525 BC), and Jericho (9216 BC). However, other sites suggest an even later start via dates of 8930 and 8540 BC. It would thus appear that Mesolithic 2 (Natufian) culture emerges around 11,000–9000 BC in Israel and Lebanon. Mesolithic 2 is characterized by the beginnings of agriculture, which would emerge fully in the Neolithic period.

The earliest known battle occurred during the Mesolithic period at a site in Egypt known as Cemetery 117.

[edit] See also

[edit] Mesolithic sites

Some notable Mesolithic sites:

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ This translation can be ambiguous since Middle Stone Age is an older African prehistoric period.
  2. ^ Linder, F., 1997. Social differentiering i mesolitiska jägar-samlarsamhällen. Institutionen för arkeologi och antik historia, Uppsala universitet. Uppsala.
  3. ^ Archaeology Wordsmith: Definitions of Epiplaeolithic and Mesolithic
  4. ^ A. Moure El Origen del Hombre, 1999. ISBN 84-7679-127-5
  5. ^ Mithen, Steven. "After the Ice: A Global History 20,000 - 5,000 B.C." 2004. Harvard Univ. Press
  6. ^ Mithen, 2004
  7. ^ Mithen, 2004
  8. ^ Mithen, 2004