Social Structure
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As people began to farm the land and domesticate animals, they
started living in one place instead of moving around all the time. This
farming and agriculture allowed groups of people to grow extra food.
Because there was extra food, people began to have specialized jobs.
Small settlements grew into larger communities, and then into great
cities.
As cities developed and grew, the food and water supply needed to
be maintained, and there had to be rules that people followed.
Governments began to oversee the business and existence of the cities.
As civilizations became more complex, so did jobs. The farmers
were able to produce enough food for everyone, and that freed up some
people to have different jobs. Skilled artisans and craftsmen made the
tools and goods people needed, and traded them for food. Other workers
concentrated on teaching, writing, or stone carving.
As jobs became more specialized so did the status of the people who
did those jobs. Farming was hard work, but it was easy to learn how to do
it. If you were a scribe, you didn’t have to work hard in the sun, but you
had to learn how to read and write a difficult language.
There began to be social classes in societies. Slaves were always the
bottom social class. They worked hard and were not free to make many
decisions about their lives. Farmers were next. They worked hard and
people needed their food, but farming was not a skilled profession. Stone
workers and craftsmen were next. Their jobs required a lot of skill. On
top of the social class system were religious leaders and government
leaders. They made all of the important decisions.
Sometimes governments would order public works projects. They
were expensive, but helped the community be safe and prosper. Examples
of public works projects are building walls around the city, building a
canal to help water crops, or building roads.
Communication
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Different groups of people developed different languages. All
languages in the Prehistory Era were oral languages, or languages that
were only spoken. About 3500 BC, some groups of people developed a
way to write their languages down.
One of the earliest examples of writing we have is from the
Sumerians. They would use the reed of a plant to press shapes into wet
pieces of clay, and then let the clay dry into tablets. Today, we call their
writing “cuneiform.” Cuneiform was used in Mesopotamia for about 2200 years.
Archaeologists have found thousands and thousands of clay tablets full of
cuneiform. Sumerians loved to write things down. These clay tablets are
lists of household goods, receipts for sales and purchases, government
records, stories, and some tablets with jokes have even been found.
After the Sumerians, other cultures also invented written languages
to write things down. Every successful civilization that came along had
their own language and writing system. Scientists estimate that there are
over 6,000 languages spoken in the world today, but that only about half
of these have a writing system.
Culture
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Culture is any learned behavior that can be shared with others.
There are many aspects of culture. Some examples include:
food
clothing
language, spoken & written
religion
holidays & festivals
art, like painting and sculpture
music
architecture (the way they designed and constructed buildings),
entertainment, like theater or sports
See how many examples of each you can think of...
science and technology
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Science is the process where people discover truths about nature.
It’s the process of figuring out how things work, and why they work the
way they do. When people use these truths they’ve discovered to make
tools, it is called technology.
Each different civilizations has contributed scientific discoveries and
added new technology to the world. Mesopotamian civilizations
developed systems of writing and built complex waterways. They also
figured out how to melt copper metal out of ore and make metal tools
instead of stone ones. They later learned how to make a stronger metal
called bronze. Later cultures discovered how to get or make even
stronger metals like iron, and eventually steel.
Ancient Babylonians were interested in astronomy, and kept records
of the movements of the stars and planets that spanned 800 years. They
could even predict eclipses.
Many ancient civilizations developed complex mathematics, which
they then used to help them construct large buildings and monuments.
Designing and building things is called engineering.
Economics
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When most people hear the word economics, they think of money.
But there is much more to economics than just money! Economics also
involves resources, production, buying, selling, and lots more. Most
people in societies buy or sell goods and services every day. Trade has
also shaped the course of history in major ways.
In order to prosper, countries and civilizations have to manage their
resources. There are four main types of resources: land, labor, money,
and entrepreneurship. Land is all the natural resources a nation has, such
as water, wood from trees, or ore to make metals. Labor is the ability of
people to do work. If a nation has many strong workers, they have good
labor resources. In today’s economies, most nations use printed paper
money. Ancient civilizations used gold and silver coins. Entrepreneurship
is a big word that means people running businesses.
Trade between nations has been important throughout history.
Exports are goods shipped out of a country and sold somewhere else.
Imports are goods brought in from other countries. Countries export
goods that they have a large supply of, and import things that are hard to
find.
A nation can only prosper with a strong economy. If the economy
weakens, people in that nation may not have work, money, or even food.