exam Flashcards
“Near __________ somebody was once digging a pit when they came across a bone, deep down under the ground. It was a human bone. A lower jaw.”
Heidelberg, in Germany
How did the skull discovered in Germany differ from our human skulls?
“Instead of a forehead like ours, it just had two thick ridges above the eyebrows.”
What gives “prehistory” its name?
It comes before history.
Which examples of materials did scientists find that change slowly but regularly over a very long period of time?
woods, plants and volcanic rock
Why do historians call it the “Stone Age”?
“And because of these stone tools we call this time the Stone Age.”
About how long did the Neanderthal people inhabit the earth?
two hundred thousand years
About how long ago did the Neanderthal people appear in prehistory before our ancestors?
seventy-thousand years earlier
What was the climate like during The Stone Age?
Winters were longer and summers shorter.
“Do you know what __________ invented? … They invented talking.”
Cavemen
What was invented or developed by prehistoric people?
“…clothes, houses and tools, plows to plow with, grains to make bread with, cows for milking, sheep for shearing, dogs for hunting and for company, bows and arrows for shooting and helmets and shields for protection…”
How long did The Ice Age last?
Many tens of thousands of years!
What reasoning did the writer give for why cavemen drew and painted in caves?
To summon creatures like a magic spell
Because forests were dangerous places in those days, home to large numbers of wild animals, such as wolves and bears, prehistoric people built __________.
Pile dwellings
What were “pile dwellings”?
Huts on stilts rammed deep in the mud in the middle of lakes
What did prehistoric people invent and decorate with patterns and fire in ovens?
Clay pots
What did the cavemen learn to do in the warmth once the ice retreated to the high mountains?
To plant grasses and then grind the seeds to make a paste to bake in the fire: bread
Around 4000 BC, prehistoric people discovered a more convenient way of making tools: __________.
They discovered metals
Which metal did prehistoric people use that “has a nice shine” but is “soft and gets blunt more quickly than stone”?
Copper
Prehistoric people “discovered that if you add just a little of another, very rare, metal, it makes the copper stronger. That metal is __________.”
Tin
Prehistoric people mixed __________ and __________ together to make __________.
Tin, copper, bronze
“Near __________ somebody was once digging a pit when they came across a bone, deep down under the ground. It was a human bone. __________.”
Answer not listed
How did the skull discovered in Germany differ from our human skulls?
Instead of a forehead like ours, it just had two thick ridges above the eyebrows.
What gives “prehistory” its name?
It comes before history.
Mesopotamia resided between which two rivers?
The Tigris and the Euphrates
