The10th millennium BC spanned the years 10,000 BC to 9001 BC (c. 12 ka to c. 11 ka). It marks the beginning of the transition from thePalaeolithic to theNeolithic via the interimMesolithic (Northern Europe andWestern Europe) andEpipaleolithic (Levant andNear East) periods, which together form the first part of theHolocene epoch that is generally believed to have begun c. 9700 BC (c. 11.7 ka) and is the current geological epoch. 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 analysis, anthropological analysis, and radiometric dating.
The main characteristic of the Holocene has been the worldwide abundance ofHomo sapiens sapiens (humankind). The epoch began in the wake of theWürm glaciation, generally known as theLast Ice Age, which began 109 ka and ended 14 ka whenHomo sapiens sapiens was in thePalaeolithic (Old Stone) Age.[1] Following theLate Glacial Interstadial from 14 ka to 12.9 ka, during which global temperatures rose significantly, theYounger Dryas began. This was a temporary reversal of climatic warming to glacial conditions in the Northern Hemisphere and coincided with the end of the Upper Palaeolithic. The Younger Dryas ceased c. 9700 BC, marking the cutover fromPleistocene to Holocene.[2][3]
In the Holocene's first millennium, the Palaeolithic began to be superseded by theNeolithic (New Stone) Age which lasted about 6,000 years, depending on location. The gradual transition period is sometimes termedMesolithic (northern and western Europe) orEpipalaeolithic (Levant and Near East). The glaciers retreated as the world climate became warmer and that inspiredan agricultural revolution,[5] though at first, the dog was probably the only domesticated animal. This was accompanied by a social revolution in that humans gained from agriculture the impetus to settle. Settlement is the key precursor to civilisation, which cannot be achieved by a nomadic lifestyle.[6]
Theworld population, c. 10,000 BC, is believed to have been more or less stable. It has been estimated that there were some five million people at the time of theLast Glacial Maximum, growing to forty million by 5000 BC and 100 million by 1600 BC, which is an average growth rate of 0.027% p.a. from the Neolithic to the Middle Bronze Age.[7] Around 10,000 BC, most people lived inhunter-gatherer communities scattered across all continents exceptAntarctica andZealandia. As the Würm/Wisconsin ended, settlement of northern regions was again possible.[7]
Agriculture developed in different parts of the world at different times. In many places, people learned how to cultivate without outside help; elsewhere, as in western Europe, the skills were imported.[8] A decrease in human height accompanied the rise of agriculture near the start of the Holocene period (10,000 BC) and was later correlated with urban population density.[9]
TheNatufian culture prevailed in theLevant through the 10th millennium and was unusual in that it supported a sedentary or semi-sedentary population even before the introduction of agriculture. An early example is'Ain Mallaha, which may have been the first village in which people were wholly sedentary.[10] The Natufian people are believed to have founded another early settlement on the site ofJericho (Tell es-Sultan) where there is evidence of building between 9600 BC and 8200 BC.[11] Dates for the Natufian are indeterminate and range broadly from c. 13,050 BC to c. 7550 BC.[12][13][14] It is possible that the early cultivation offigs began in theJordan River valley sometime after the middle of the 10th millennium.[15] Besides the fig trees, the people may have begun cultivation of wild plants such as barley and pistachio; and they possibly began herding goats, pigs and cattle.[16][17]
Agriculture began to be developed by the various communities of theFertile Crescent, which included the Levant, but it would not be widely practised for another 2,000 years by which time Neolithic culture was becoming well established in many parts of the Near East.[18] Among the earliest cultivated plants were forms ofmillet andrice grown in the Middle East, possibly in this millennium but more likely after 9000 BC.[8] By about 9500 BC, people in south-eastern Anatolia were harvesting wild grasses and grains.[16] The earliest evidence of sheep herding has been found in northern Iraq, dated before 9000 BC.[16]
Prehistoric chronology is almost entirely reliant upon the dating of material objects of whichpottery is by far the most widespread and the most resistant to decay. All locations and generations developed their own shapes, sizes and styles of pottery, including methods and styles of decoration, but there was consistency among stratified deposits and even shards can be classified by time and place.[19] Pottery is believed to have been discovered independently in various places, beginning with China c. 18,000 BC, and was probably created accidentally by fires lit onclay soil.[20][21][22][23] The main discovery of pottery dated to the 10th millennium has been atBosumpra Cave (early tenth-millennium cal. BC) on the Kwahu Plateau in southeastern Ghana andOunjougou (c.9400 BC) in Central Mali, providing evidence of an independent invention of pottery in Sub-Saharan Africa in different climatic zones.[24][25]
The first chronological pottery system was the Early, Middle and Late Minoan framework devised in the early 20th century by SirArthur Evans for his findings atKnossos. This covered theBronze Age in twelve phases from c. 2800 BC to c. 1050 BC and the principle was later extended to mainland Greece (Helladic) and the Aegean islands (Cycladic).[19] DameKathleen Kenyon was the principal archaeologist atTell es-Sultan (ancient Jericho) and she discovered that there was no pottery there.[26] Thepotter's wheel had not yet been invented and, where pottery as such was made, it was still hand-built, often by means ofcoiling, andpit fired.[27]
Kenyon discovered vessels such as bowls, cups, and plates at Jericho which were made from stone. She reasonably surmised that others made from wood or vegetable fibres would have long since decayed.[26] Using Evans' system as a benchmark, Kenyon divided the Near East Neolithic into phases calledPre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA), from c. 10,000 BC to c. 8800 BC;Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB), from c. 8800 BC to c. 6500 BC; and thenPottery Neolithic (PN), which had varied start-points from c. 6500 BC until the beginnings of theBronze Age towards the end of the4th millennium. In the 10th millennium, the Natufian culture co-existed with the PPNA which prevailed in the Levantine and upper Mesopotamian areas of the Fertile Crescent.[27][26]
In North Africa,Saharan rock art engravings in what is known as theBubalus (Large Wild Fauna) period have been dated to between 10,000 BC and 7000 BC.[28] Wall paintings found inEthiopia andEritrea depict human activity; some of the older paintings are thought to date back to around 10,000 BC.[29] InPrehistoric Egypt, a culture of hunter-gatherers replaced a grain grinding culture in 10,000 BC.[30] TheAbu Maditel mounds in theSinai Peninsula have been dated c. 9660 to c. 9180 BC.[31]
TheClovis culture was widely distributed throughout North America. The people were hunter-gatherers and the culture's duration is believed to have been from c.9050 BC to c.8800 BC.[32] There is evidence of increasing use ofClovis point tool technology for hunting.[33]
Elsewhere in North America, thePetroglyphs at Winnemucca Lake, in what is today northwestNevada, were carved by this time, possibly as early as 12.8 ka or as late as 10 ka.[34]
The sites atGöbekli Tepe, which is home to megalithic structures,Hallan Çemi Tepesi, both in south-easternAnatolia, and atTell Qaramel, in north-westSyria, may have been occupied during this millennium.[35][36][37][38][39] It was found out thatgastronomy first emerged inGöbekli Tepe in this millennium.[40] This most important discovery shedding light on the beginning ofgastronomy inAnatolia consists of religious places in which feasts were held in this millennium that were found in the archaeological excavations conducted inGöbekli Tepe inUrfa province which is called the zero point of time.[40] As a result of the investigations carried out inGöbekli Tepe which is dated to this millennium, it was determined that the people created cult structures and had a culture for religious purposes during the earlyNeolithic period and that they held feasts in which they offered foods while performing these cultures.[40] TheSassi di Matera in southernItaly is believed to have been the site of human settlement since thePaleolithic period in this millennium, making it one of the oldest continuously inhabited settlements in history.[41] At theHasankeyf Mound inTurkey,Europe, almost all archaeological data date to this millennium.[42] InGreat Britain, which was not then an island, theStar Carr site inNorth Yorkshire is believed to have been inhabited byMaglemosian peoples for about 800 years from c. 9335 BC to c. 8525 BC.[43]
The Bhimbetka rock shelters, which feature prehistoriccave paintings, earliest being dated to 10,000 BCE, corresponds to the IndianMesolithic.[44][45][46][47][48][49] These sites would have been home to a nomadic/hunting society existing in this region.
Subdivision of the Quaternary Period according to theICS, as of January 2020.[2]
For the Holocene, dates are relative to the year 2000 (e.g. Greenlandian began 11,700 years before 2000). For the beginning of the Northgrippian a date of 8,236 years before 2000 has been set.[3] The Meghalayan has been set to begin 4,250 years before 2000.[2]
'Tarantian' is an informal, unofficial name proposed for a stage/age to replace the equally informal, unofficial 'Upper Pleistocene' subseries/subepoch.
In the southern hemisphere, rising sea levels had gradually formedBass Strait, separatingTasmania from mainlandAustralia. This process is believed to have been complete by about the beginning of the 10th millennium. Bass Strait had been a plain populated by indigenous people who are thought to have first arrived around 40,000 years ago.[50]
The ongoingQuaternary System/Period represents the last 2.58 million years since the end of theNeogene and is officially divided into thePleistocene andHolocene Series/Epochs. The Holocene has been assigned an age of 11,700 calendar years before 2000 CE which means it began c. 9700 BC in the 10th millennium. It is preceded in thegeological time scale by theLate Pleistocene sub-epoch, also known as the Tarantian Stage/Age, which awaits formal ratification by theInternational Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS) and tentatively spans the time from c. 126,000 BC to c. 9700 BC. Preceding the Late Pleistocene is theMiddle Pleistocene sub-epoch, or Chibanian Stage/Age, which also awaits ratification and tentatively spans the time from c. 773,000 BC to c. 126,000 BC. TheEarly Pleistocene from c. 2,580,000 BC until c. 773,000 is sub-divided into two Stages/Ages which have been officially defined: theGelasian (until c. 1,800,000 BC) and theCalabrian.[53]
TheHolocene calendar, devised byCesare Emiliani in 1993, places itsepoch at 10,000 BC (with the year 2025 being rendered as 12025 HE). The Human Era calendar attempts to simplify the calculation of time spans acrossthe BC-CE divide by designating a more universally relevant epoch date: the start of human settlements (instead of the birth ofJesus Christ). CE dates can be converted by adding 10,000 years; converting BC dates requires subtraction from 10,001 (since theGregorian calendar lacks ayear zero).[54]
^abcdeCohen, K. M.; Finney, S. C.; Gibbard, P. L.; Fan, J.-X. (January 2020)."International Chronostratigraphic Chart"(PDF). International Commission on Stratigraphy. Retrieved23 February 2020.
^abBiraben, Jean-Noël (1979). "Essai sur l'évolution du nombre des hommes" [Essay on the evolution of the number of men].Population (in French).34 (1):13–25.doi:10.2307/1531855.JSTOR1531855.
^Özer, Başak Koca; Sağır, Mehmet; Özer, İsmail (March 2011). "Secular changes in the height of the inhabitants of Anatolia (Turkey) from the 10th millennium B.C. to the 20th century A.D.".Economics & Human Biology.9 (2):211–219.doi:10.1016/j.ehb.2010.12.003.PMID21316315.
^Watson, Derek J. (2 October 2017). "Bosumpra revisited: 12,500 years on the Kwahu Plateau, Ghana, as viewed from 'On top of the hill'".Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa.52 (4):437–517.doi:10.1080/0067270X.2017.1393925.
^Magli, Giulio (July 2016). "Sirius and the project of the megalithic enclosures at Gobekli Tepe".Nexus Network Journal.18 (2):337–346.arXiv:1307.8397.doi:10.1007/s00004-015-0277-1.
^Mathpal, Yashodhar (1984).Prehistoric Painting Of Bhimbetka. Abhinav Publications. pp. 220–227.ISBN9788170171935.The paintings of the earlier five phases ( A - E ) belong to the prehistoric or Mesolithic stage. The oldest of them may be dated to 10,000 BC
^Alok Kumar Kanungo.Gurudakshina: Facets of Indian Archaeology.British Archaeological Reports. p. 32.The oldest of them may be dated to 10,000 B.C. or even earlier.
Kuijt, Ian (2000).Life in Neolithic farming communities: social organization, identity, and differentiation. New York City: Springer.ISBN978-03-06461-22-4.
Milner, Nicky; Conneller, Chantal; Taylor, Barry, eds. (2018).Star Carr, Volume 1: A Persistent Place in a Changing World. York: White Rose University Press.ISBN978-19-12482-04-7.
Kislev, M. E.; Hartmann, A.; Bar-Yosef, O. (2006b). "Response to Comment on "Early Domesticated Fig in the Jordan Valley"".Science.314 (5806). Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science: 1683b.Bibcode:2006Sci...314.1683K.doi:10.1126/science.1133748.PMID17170278.
Lev-Yadun, S.; Ne'Eman, G.; Abbo, S.; Flaishman, M. A. (2006). "Comment on "Early Domesticated Fig in the Jordan Valley"".Science.314 (5806). Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science: 1683a.Bibcode:2006Sci...314.1683L.doi:10.1126/science.1132636.PMID17170278.
