6th millennium BC

Last updated

Millennia:
Centuries:
  • 60th century BC
  • 59th century BC
  • 58th century BC
  • 57th century BC
  • 56th century BC
  • 55th century BC
  • 54th century BC
  • 53rd century BC
  • 52nd century BC
  • 51st century BC

The 6th millennium BC spanned the years 6000 BC to 5001 BC (c. 8 ka to c. 7 ka). It is impossible to precisely date events that happened around the time of this millennium and all dates mentioned here are estimates mostly based on geological and anthropological analysis. The only exceptions are the felling dates for some construction timbers from Neolithic wells in Central Europe.

Contents

This millennium is reckoned to mark the end of the global deglaciation which had followed the Last Glacial Maximum and caused sea levels to rise by some 60 m (200 ft) over a period of about 5,000 years.

Overview

Neolithic culture and technology had spread from the Near East and into Eastern Europe by 6000 BC. Its development in the Far East grew apace and there is increasing evidence through the millennium of its presence in prehistoric Egypt and the Far East. In much of the world, however, including Northern and Western Europe, people still lived in scattered Palaeolithic/Mesolithic hunter-gatherer communities. The world population is believed to have increased sharply, possibly quadrupling, as a result of the Neolithic Revolution. It has been estimated that there were perhaps forty million people worldwide at the end of this millennium, growing to 100 million by the Middle Bronze Age c. 1600 BC. [1]

Europe

It has been estimated that humans first settled in Malta c. 5900 BC, arriving across the Mediterranean from both Europe and North Africa. [2]

Use of pottery found near Tbilisi is evidence that grapes were being used for winemaking c. 5980 BC. [3]

Evidence of cheese-making in Poland is dated c. 5500 BC. [4]

Four identified cultures starting around 5300 BC were the Dnieper-Donets, the Narva (eastern Baltic), the Ertebølle (Denmark and northern Germany), and the Swifterbant (Low Countries). They were linked by a common pottery style that had spread westward from Asia and is sometimes called "ceramic Mesolithic", distinguishable by a point or knob base and flared rims. [5] [6] [7]

Africa

North Asia

- According to Vasily Radlov, among the Paleo-Siberian inhabitants of Central Siberia and Southern Siberia were the Yeniseians, of whom the Kets are considered the last remainder of these peoples. The Yeniseians were followed by the Uralic Samoyeds, who came from the northern Ural region. Proto-Uralic is the unattested reconstructed language ancestral to the modern Uralic language family. The hypothetical language is thought to have been originally spoken in a small area in about 7000–2000 BC, and expanded to give differentiated Proto-Languages. Some newer research has pushed the "Proto-Uralic homeland" east of the Ural Mountains into Western Siberia. [8]

- Polities harbouring the Uralic peoples thrive. The shores of all Siberian lakes, which filled the depressions during the Lacustrine period, abound in remains dating from the Neolithic age.[ citation needed ] Countless kurgans (tumuli), furnaces, and other archaeological artifacts bear witness to a dense population. Some of the earliest artifacts found in Central Asia derive from Siberia. [9] Large scale constructions occur as early as 6000 BC. Prehistoric settlements in remote Siberia, Russia have revealed that 8,000 years ago construction of complex defensive structures, such as the Amnya complex, occurred with political warfare. They are the oldest fortresses in the world. Finding such ancient fortifications challenges previous understanding of early human societies. It suggests that agriculture wasn’t the only driver for people to start building permanent settlements.

- Large scale backwards migrations occur with Native American populations migrating back into Asia, settling in areas such as the Altai Mountains several times over a span of thousands of years, earliest dated to 5500 BC. This is potentially linked to the environmental changes at the time (see Mount Mazama), which remained preserved in oral history of the North American cultures to this day. [10]

- Na-Dené-speaking peoples finally entered North America starting around 8000 BCE, reaching the Pacific Northwest by 5000 BCE, [11] and from there migrating along the Pacific Coast and into the interior. Linguists, anthropologists, and archeologists believe their ancestors constituted a separate migration into North America, later than the first Paleo-Indians. They migrated into Alaska and northern Canada, south along the Pacific Coast, into the interior of Canada, and south to the Great Plains and the American Southwest.

- Indo-European cultures descended from Ancient North Eurasians long ago, continue to expand Westwards from Central Russia. It provides linguistic evidence for the geographical location of these languages around that time, agreeing with archeological evidence that Indo-European speakers were present in the Pontic-Caspian steppes by around 4500 BCE (the Kurgan hypothesis) and that Uralic speakers may have been established in the Pit-Comb Ware culture to their north in the fifth millennium BCE (Carpelan & Parpola 2001:79).

Such words as those for "hundred", "pig", and "king" have something in common: they represent "cultural vocabulary" as opposed to "basic vocabulary". They are likely to have been acquired along with a novel number system and the domestic pig from Indo-Europeans in the south. Similarly, the Indo-Europeans themselves had acquired such words and cultural items from peoples and cultures to their south or west, including possibly their words for "ox", *gʷou- (compare English cow) and "grain", *bʰars- (compare English barley). In contrast, basic vocabulary – words such as "me", "hand", "water", and "be" – is much less readily borrowed between languages. If Indo-European and Uralic are genetically related, there should be agreements regarding basic vocabulary, with more agreements if they are closely related, fewer if they are less closely related.

- Indo-European cultures in Central Asia flourish, these cultures are the: Middle Volga culture (followed by the Samara culture at the turn of the millennium), the contemporary Dnieper–Donets culture. From around 5200 BC, the patriarchal Dnieper-Donets culture leaves the Mesolithic hunter-gatherer lifestyle and begins keeping cattle, sheep and goats. [12] Other domestic animals kept included pigs, horses and dogs. [13]

South Asia

Junglefowl were domesticated around c. 5500 BC in Southeast Asia. [14]

East Asia

- The Zhaobaogou culture in China began c. 5400 BC. It was in the north-eastern part of the country, primarily in the Luan River valley in Inner Mongolia and northern Hebei. [15]

- The 'Yangshao culture (仰韶文化, pinyin: Yǎngsháo wénhuà) was a Neolithic culture that existed extensively along the middle reaches of the Yellow River in China from around the end of this millennium, from 5000 BC to 3000 BC. Excavations found that children were buried in painted pottery jars. Pottery style emerging from the Yangshao culture spread westward to the Majiayao culture, and then further to Xinjiang and Central Asia along a proto-Silk Road. [16]


Banpo bowl.jpg
Banpo motif (B&W).png
Bowl of the Banpo culture (first stage of the Yangshao culture), with geometrial human face motif and fish, 4500–3500 BC, Shaanxi. [17] [18] [19]

Oceania

Indigenous Australians in what is now southwestern Victoria were farming and smoking eels as a food source and trade good using stone weirs, canals, and woven traps around 6000 BC. [20]

Environmental changes

The 6th Millennium features widespread dramatic climatic events: The early Holocene sea level rise (EHSLR), which began c.10,000 BC, tailed off during the 6th millennium. Global water levels had risen by about 60 metres due to deglaciation of ice masses since the end of the Last Ice Age. [21] Accelerated rises in sea level rise, called meltwater pulses, occurred three times during the EHSLR. The last one, Meltwater Pulse 1C, which peaked c. 6000 BC, produced a rise of 6.5 metres in only 140 years. It is believed that the cause was a major ice sheet collapse in Antarctica. [22]

Approximately 8,000 years ago (c. 6000 BC), a massive volcanic landslide off Mount Etna, Sicily, caused a megatsunami that devastated the eastern Mediterranean coastline on the continents of Asia, Africa and Europe. [23]

In South America, a large eruption occurred at Cueros de Purulla c. 5870 BC, forming a buoyant cloud and depositing the Cerro Paranilla Ash in the Calchaquí Valleys. [24] A cataclysmic volcanic eruption occurred c. 5700 BC in Oregon when 12,000-foot (3,700 m) high Mount Mazama created Crater Lake as the resulting caldera filled with water. [25] Another major eruption occurred c. 5550 BC on Mount Takahe, Antarctica, possibly creating an ozone hole in the region. [26]

The carbon-14 content in tree rings created c. 5480 BC indicates an abnormal level of solar activity. [27]

Astronomy and calendars

Mosaic of Creation of Adam from Monreale Cathedral - dated year 1 A.M. (September 5509 BC) in the Byzantine calendar. Monreale creation Adam.jpg
Mosaic of Creation of Adam from Monreale Cathedral - dated year 1 A.M. (September 5509 BC) in the Byzantine calendar.

The epoch of the Byzantine calendar, used in the Byzantine Empire and many Christian Orthodox countries, is equivalent to 1 September 5509 BC on the Julian proleptic calendar (see image right). [28]

The 6th millennium BC falls entirely within the Astrological Age of Gemini (c. 6450 BC to c. 4300 BC) according to some astrologers. [29]

According to Gregory of Tours God created the world 5597 years prior to the death of Martin of Tours, which would be 5200 BC. [30]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mesolithic</span> Prehistoric period, second part of the Stone Age

The Mesolithic or Middle Stone Age is the Old World archaeological period between the Upper Paleolithic and the Neolithic. The term Epipaleolithic is often used synonymously, especially for outside northern Europe, and for the corresponding period in the Levant and Caucasus. The Mesolithic has different time spans in different parts of Eurasia. It refers to the final period of hunter-gatherer cultures in Europe and the Middle East, between the end of the Last Glacial Maximum and the Neolithic Revolution. In Europe it spans roughly 15,000 to 5,000 BP; in the Middle East roughly 20,000 to 10,000 BP. The term is less used of areas farther east, and not at all beyond Eurasia and North Africa.

The 5th millennium BC spanned the years 5000 BC to 4001 BC. It is impossible to precisely date events that happened around the time of this millennium and all dates mentioned here are estimates mostly based on geological and anthropological analysis.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Neolithic Europe</span> Era of pre-history

The European Neolithic is the period from the arrival of Neolithic technology and the associated population of Early European Farmers in Europe, c. 7000 BC until c. 2000–1700 BC. The Neolithic overlaps the Mesolithic and Bronze Age periods in Europe as cultural changes moved from the southeast to northwest at about 1 km/year – this is called the Neolithic Expansion.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yangshao culture</span> 5000–3000 BC Chinese archaeological culture

The Yangshao culture was a Neolithic culture that existed extensively along the middle reaches of the Yellow River in China from around 5000 BC to 3000 BC. The culture is named after the Yangshao site, the first excavated site of this culture, which was discovered in 1921 in Yangshao town, Mianchi County, Sanmenxia, western Henan Province by the Swedish geologist Johan Gunnar Andersson (1874–1960). The culture flourished mainly in the provinces of Henan, Shaanxi and Shanxi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of Eurasia</span>

The history of Eurasia is the collective history of a continental area with several distinct peripheral coastal regions: Southwest Asia, South Asia, East Asia, Southeast Asia, and Western Europe, linked by the interior mass of the Eurasian steppe of Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Perhaps beginning with the Steppe Route trade, the early Silk Road, the Eurasian view of history seeks establishing genetic, cultural, and linguistic links between Eurasian cultures of antiquity. Much interest in this area lies with the presumed origin of the speakers of the Proto-Indo-European language and chariot warfare in Central Eurasia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andronovo culture</span> Group of Bronze Age cultures 2000–900 BC

The Andronovo culture is a collection of similar local Late Bronze Age cultures that flourished c. 2000–1150 BC, spanning from the southern Urals to the upper Yenisei River in central Siberia. Some researchers have preferred to term it an archaeological complex or archaeological horizon. The slightly older Sintashta culture, formerly included within the Andronovo culture, is now considered separately to Early Andronovo cultures. Andronovo culture's first stage could have begun at the end of the 3rd millennium BC, with cattle grazing, as natural fodder was by no means difficult to find in the pastures close to dwellings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Comb Ceramic culture</span> Ancient northeast European culture

The Comb Ceramic culture or Pit-Comb Ware culture, often abbreviated as CCC or PCW, was a northeast European culture characterised by its Pit–Comb Ware. It existed from around 4200 BCE to around 2000 BCE. The bearers of the Comb Ceramic culture are thought to have still mostly followed the Mesolithic hunter-gatherer lifestyle, with traces of early agriculture.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Prehistoric Europe</span> History of Europe before written records

Prehistoric Europe refers to Europe before the start of written records, beginning in the Lower Paleolithic. As history progresses, considerable regional unevenness in cultural development emerges and grows. The region of the eastern Mediterranean is, due to its geographic proximity, greatly influenced and inspired by the classical Middle Eastern civilizations, and adopts and develops the earliest systems of communal organization and writing. The Histories of Herodotus is the oldest known European text that seeks to systematically record traditions, public affairs and notable events.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sredny Stog culture</span> Archaeological culture in Eastern Europe

The Sredny Stog culture is a pre-Kurgan archaeological culture from the 5th–4th millennia BC. It is named after the Dnieper river islet of today's Serednii Stih, Ukraine, where it was first located.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dnieper–Donets culture</span> Prehistoric culture north of the Black Sea c. 5000–4200 BCE

The Dnieper–Donets culture complex (DDCC) was a Mesolithic and later Neolithic culture which flourished north of the Black Sea ca. 5000-4200 BC. It has many parallels with the Samara culture, and was succeeded by the Sredny Stog culture.

The Afanasievo culture, or Afanasevo culture, is an early archaeological culture of south Siberia, occupying the Minusinsk Basin and the Altai Mountains during the eneolithic era, c. 3300 to 2500 BCE. It is named after a nearby mountain, Gora Afanasieva in what is now Bogradsky District, Khakassia, Russia, first excavated by archaeologist Sergei Teploukhov in 1920-1929. Afanasievo burials have been found as far as Shatar Chuluu in central Mongolia, confirming a further expansion about 1,500 km beyond the Altai mountains. The Afanasievo culture is now considered as an integral part of the Prehistory of Western and Central Mongolia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Armenian hypothesis</span> Hypothesis in Indo-European historical linguistics

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bug–Dniester culture</span> Archaeological culture

The Bug–Dniester culture was an archaeological culture that developed in and around the Central Black Earth Region of Moldavia and Ukraine, around the Dniester and Southern Bug rivers, during the Neolithic era.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Proto-Indo-European homeland</span> Prehistoric "Urheimat" of the Indo-European languages

The Proto-Indo-European homeland was the prehistoric linguistic homeland of the Proto-Indo-European language (PIE). From this region, its speakers migrated east and west, and went on to form the proto-communities of the different branches of the Indo-European language family.

Okunev culture, sometimes also Okunevo culture, was a south Siberian archaeological culture of pastoralists of the early Bronze Age dated from the end of the 3rd millennium BC to the early of the 2nd millennium BC in the Minusinsk Basin on the middle and upper Yenisei. It was formed from the local Neolithic Siberian forest cultures, who also show evidence of admixture from Western Steppe Herders and pre-existing Ancient North Eurasians.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Proto-Uralic homeland</span> Hypothesized location where the Proto-Uralic language originated

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The Kama culture is an Eastern European Subneolithic archaeological culture from the 6th-4th millennium BC. The area covers the Kama, Vyatka and the Ik-Belaya watershed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indo-European migrations</span> Migrations out of the Proto-Indo-European homeland

The Indo-European migrations are hypothesized migrations of Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) speakers, and subsequent migrations of people speaking derived Indo-European languages, which took place approx. 4000 to 1000 BCE, potentially explaining how these languages came to be spoken across a large area of Eurasia, spanning from the Indian subcontinent and Iranian plateau to Atlantic Europe, in a process of cultural diffusion.

The farming/language dispersal hypothesis proposes that many of the largest language families in the world dispersed along with the expansion of agriculture. This hypothesis was proposed by archaeologists Peter Bellwood and Colin Renfrew. It has been widely debated and archaeologists, linguists, and geneticists often disagree with all or only parts of the hypothesis.

The Elshanka culture was a Subneolithic or very early Neolithic culture that flourished in the middle Volga region in the 7th millennium BC. The sites are mostly individual graves scattered along the Samara and Sok rivers. They revealed Europe's oldest pottery.

References

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  2. ↑ "700 years added to Malta's history". Times of Malta . 16 March 2018. Retrieved 1 June 2019.
  3. ↑ "'World's oldest wine' found in 8,000-year-old jars in Georgia". BBC News. 13 November 2017. Retrieved 1 June 2019.
  4. ↑ Subbaraman, Nidhi (12 December 2012). "Art of cheese-making is 7,500 years old". Nature. Macmillan. doi:10.1038/nature.2012.12020. S2CID   180646880 . Retrieved 1 June 2019.
  5. ↑ Gronenborn, Detlef (2007). "Beyond the models: Neolithisation in Central Europe". Proceedings of the British Academy. 144: 73–98.
  6. ↑ Anthony, D. W. (2007). "Pontic-Caspian Mesolithic and Early Neolithic societies at the time of the Black Sea Flood: a small audience and small effects". In Yanko-Hombach, V.; Gilbert, A. A.; Panin, N.; Dolukhanov, P. M. (eds.). The Black Sea Flood Question: changes in coastline, climate and human settlement. pp. 245–370. ISBN   978-9402404654.
  7. ↑ Anthony, David W. (2010). The horse, the wheel, and language: how Bronze-Age riders from the Eurasian steppes shaped the modern world. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. ISBN   9780691148182.
  8. ↑ Grünthal, Riho; Heyd, Volker; Holopainen, Sampsa; Janhunen, Juha; Khanina, Olga; Miestamo, Matti; Nichols, Johanna; Saarikivi, Janne; Sinnemäki, Kaius (29 August 2022). "Drastic demographic events triggered the Uralic spread". Diachronica. 39 (4): 490–524. doi:10.1075/dia.20038.gru. hdl: 10138/347633 . ISSN   0176-4225. S2CID   248059749.
  9. ↑ The New Encyclopædia Britannica, Page 724, by Philip W. Goetz, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc, 1991
  10. ↑ Nunn, Patrick (28 August 2018). "Eye-witnesses call from millennia past". Cosmos . Royal Institution of Australia. Retrieved 26 February 2024.
  11. ↑ D.E. Drummond, "Toward a Pre-History of the Na-Dene, with a General Comment on Population Movements among Nomadic Hunters", American Anthropological Association, 1969. Retrieved 2010-03-30.
  12. ↑ Anthony 2010, pp. 174–182.
  13. ↑
  14. ↑ Concise History of Science & Invention: An Illustrated Time Line. National Geographic Books. 2010. p. 24. ISBN   978-1-4262-0544-6.
  15. ↑ Stark, Miriam T. (26 August 2005). Archaeology of Asia. Blackwell. p. 129. ISBN   1-4051-0213-6.
  16. ↑ Zhang, Kai (4 February 2021). "The Spread and Integration of Painted pottery Art along the Silk Road". Region - Educational Research and Reviews. 3 (1): 18. doi: 10.32629/RERR.V3I1.242 . S2CID   234007445. The early cultural exchanges between the East and the West are mainly reflected in several aspects: first, in the late Neolithic period of painted pottery culture, the Yangshao culture (5000-3000 BC) from the Central Plains spreadwestward, which had a great impact on Majiayao culture (3000-2000 BC), and then continued to spread to Xinjiang and Central Asia through the transition of Hexi corridor
  17. ↑ "Painted Pottery Basin with Fish and Human Face Design, National Museum of China". en.chnmuseum.cn. National Museum of China.
  18. ↑ Valenstein, Suzanne G.; N.Y.), Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York (1989). A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics. Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN   978-0-8109-1170-3.
  19. ↑ Major, John S.; Cook, Constance A. (22 September 2016). Ancient China: A History. Routledge. p. 60. ISBN   978-1-317-50365-1.
  20. ↑ Flood, Josephine (2004). Archaeology of the dreamtime: the story of prehistoric Australia and its people (revised ed.). Marleston, South Australia: J. B. Publishing. ISBN   1-876622-50-4. OCLC   61479845.
  21. ↑ Smith, D. E.; Harrison, S.; Firth, C. R.; Jordan, J. T. (July 2011). "The early Holocene sea level rise". Quaternary Science Reviews . 30 (15–16). Elsevier: 1846–1860. Bibcode:2011QSRv...30.1846S. doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.04.019..
  22. ↑ Blanchon, P. (2011a) Meltwater Pulses. In: Hopley, D. (Ed), Encyclopedia of Modern Coral Reefs: Structure, form and process. Springer-Verlag Earth Science Series, p. 683-690. ISBN   978-90-481-2638-5
  23. ↑ Pareschi, M. T.; Boschi, E.; Favalli, M. (2006). "Lost tsunami". Geophysical Research Letters. 33 (22): L22608. Bibcode:2006GeoRL..3322608P. doi: 10.1029/2006GL027790 .
  24. ↑ Fernandez-Turiel, J. L.; Perez-Torrado, F. J.; Rodriguez-Gonzalez, A.; Saavedra, J.; Carracedo, J. C.; Rejas, M.; Lobo, A.; Osterrieth, M.; Carrizo, J. I.; Esteban, G.; Gallardo, J.; Ratto, N. (8 May 2019). "La gran erupción de hace 4.2 ka cal en Cerro Blanco, Zona Volcánica Central, Andes: nuevos datos sobre los depósitos eruptivos holocenos en la Puna sur y regiones adyacentes". Estudios Geológicos. 75 (1): 21. doi: 10.3989/egeol.43438.515 . hdl: 10553/69940 . ISSN   1988-3250.
  25. ↑ "Geology and History Summary for Mount Mazama and Crater Lake". Volcano Hazards Program. United States Geological Survey. 3 November 2017. Retrieved 1 June 2019.
  26. ↑ "Takahe". Global Volcanism Program . Smithsonian Institution.
  27. ↑ Miyake, Fusa; Others (31 January 2017). "Large 14C excursion in 5480 BC indicates an abnormal sun in the mid-Holocene". PNAS. 114 (5). National Academy of Sciences: 881–884. Bibcode:2017PNAS..114..881M. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1613144114 . PMC   5293056 . PMID   28100493.
  28. ↑ Stephenson, Paul. "Translations from Byzantine Sources: The Imperial Centuries, c.700–1204: John Skylitzes, "Synopsis Historion": The Year 6508, in the 13th Indiction: the Byzantine dating system". November 2006.
  29. ↑ Mann, Neil (24 May 2007). "The Astrological Great Year" . Retrieved 1 June 2019.
  30. ↑ A history of the Franks, Gregory of Tours, Pantianos Classics, 1916
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