The Paleolithic Era began nearly two hundred thousand years ago, and lasted for tens of thousands of years. The Neolithic Era followed, and was introduced with the rise of plant and animal domestications between twelve and six thousand years ago. The thought of the human species being around for so long is interesting to think about, especially given the fact that humans originated from ancestors in East Africa that date four to five million years back.1 Our ancestors must have been doing something right, considering the fact that the human species survived for such a long time without the technology, medicine, and overall knowledge that we have today. Once we realize that our ancestors from two hundred thousand years ago were so successful in their pattern of living during the Paleolithic Era, we must ask ourselves what changes occurred during the transitional period between the Paleolithic and Neolithic Eras, and whether or not those changes were good.
Humans living during the Paleolithic Era lived in egalitarian societies, that is, societies in which the inhabitants practiced political, economic, and social equality, where each individual in society held the same social status as all other members of society. This egalitarian society was made possible because of their way of life at the time. People lived in small communities of no more than a hundred, and they relied on hunting and gathering as their means of sustenance. They were necessarily migratory because of the limits of their environment, so there was not a real possibility of staying in one place for an extended period of time. Their migratory existence made the accumulate wealth impossible; in fact, wealth was an inconceivable concept for hunters and gatherers. As a result, everyone in society had the same economic standing; since there were no economic differences among individuals of society, there were no social classes. Nor was there the formation of political classes during this time either. Furthermore, everyone—men and women alike—played relatively equal roles in contributing to the survival and well-being of the community.2
This way of life and the egalitarian nature of society remained intact for centuries after the beginning of domestications. However, as hunter and gatherer societies transitioned to herding and farming, and hence to a sedentary lifestyle, a shift began that transformed those societies from egalitarian to stratified societies.3 This shift is one of the major distinctions between the Paleolithic and Neolithic Eras; again, this shift is a direct result of plant and animal domestication, or herding of animals and agriculture.
Agriculture gave the people of the Neolithic Era reassurance that their food supply would be constant; however, it also caused the rise of new issues that communities in the Paleolithic Era never dealt with. For example, the rise of agriculture prompted humans of the time to live in clustered societies, and therefore fostered the spread of parasites and several infectious diseases.4 Furthermore, since agriculture promoted a sedentary lifestyle, Neolithic societies were enabled to accumulate wealth in the form of surplus food supplies. This accumulation of wealth allowed for the social structure of the Neolithic Era to quickly become vastly different from that of the Paleolithic Era due to a focus on the “interests, behavior, and social role(s) of individuals versus a collective group of individuals.”5
Essentially, in the transition between the Paleolithic and Neolithic Eras, human society suffered a loss of social and economic equality and a general respect for all people, and replaced it with a system that required the separation of people based on superficial characteristics such as wealth, power, and gender. The interesting thing about the new class and gender distinctions that accompanied the beginning of the Neolithic Era is that for hundreds upon thousands of years, the human species had managed to exist without the use of class separations. Instead, it was the common practice of communities during the Paleolithic Era that there was no need to cause separation between persons because everyone made an equal contribution to the development and management of their small communities. Ironically, during the Neolithic Era, the rise of agriculture allowed the development of class divisions, as well as the establishment of governments that ruled harshly over society’s non-elites.6
These changes in social structure that arose during the Neolithic Era as a result of agriculture still persist in our societies today; there are still deep and widespread class divisions; there is still gender inequality, and there is still a sense of excessive elite control over the working class.7 Overall, social changes that occurred during the transition between the Paleolithic and Neolithic Eras exhibited a loss in important practices that we have only recently attempted to restore.
- Jerry H. Bentley, Herbert F. Ziegler, and Heather E. Streets-Salter, Traditions & Encounters: A Brief Global History From the Beginning to 1500, Fourth, vol. 1 (McGraw-Hill Education, 2016), 6-7. ↵
- Bentley, Ziegler, and Streets-Salter, Traditions & Encounters, 6-7. ↵
- Bentley, Ziegler, and Streets-Salter, Traditions & Encounters, 7-8. ↵
- Jared Diamond, “The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race,” Discover Magazine, May 1987, 65. ↵
- Ian Kuijt, Life in Neolithic Farming Communities: Social Organization, Identity, and Differentiation (New York: Springer Science & Business Media, 2002), 315-316. ↵
- Jared Diamond, “The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race”, 65. ↵
- Jared Diamond, “The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race.”, 65-66. ↵
59 comments
Cristian Medina-Lopez
I thought this article was very well written, keeping the reader entertained and hooked throughout the whole article. What I found very interesting was how when they changed from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic Era, there was separation of people from wealthy to gender. This showed me how something so small could have such a drastic effect on so many people.
Mariet Loredo
This was a very good article. I find it very interesting how in the past there wasn’t any social classes, everyone was seen as equal. But once agriculture was introduced social classes were created. It’s also crazy to think that populations were about 100 people compared to millions in today’s world. I couldn’t imagine living in a world where everyone is equal, but it would be something that would be interesting to do and hopefully it is something that will be done.
Emily Jimenez
This is a very informative article! I like how you convey the information but yet still find a way to keep it interesting. I did not feel like I reading out of a textbook, it was like a story. Even though the human race was developing and growing, we made a slight downgrade by conforming to social classes instead of sticking to an egalitarian society. Thank you for showing the butterfly effect in action.
Josemaria Soriano
In my personal opinion, this article possesses a literary richness in the sense in which it breaks the schemes. Instead of praising the process of civilization between the different human societies that preceded us, it criticize what was lost in this process. In fact, “primitive” societies enjoyed an egalitarian system, something that we have evidently totally lost today. What I think would be interesting to analyze in later articles is: Does the existence of specialized works lead irremediably to class stratification? The article argues that when primitive societies enjoyed equal work, the system was egalitarian. If this thesis is maintained for a current analysis in our actual world, the idea of an egalitarian system today is, pitifully, a mere utopia. If we take for granted the fact that the specialization of jobs leads to a non-egalitarian system, the result is demotivating. However, is this true? For this, I believe that we must analyze in depth how society works. What gave power and gives power to people are the material goods, today represented by money. The egalitarian system was broken by the inequality of goods that existed between people. Nowadays, we go to universities to specialize in a skill. Is it valid then to say that university education unconsciously fosters a non-egalitarian state? of course not. Unfortunately, in the salary scheme, each job has a very different value. A musician earns much less than an engineer, so his work is less valuable than the work of an engineer, and worse, his status as a person is less than that of an engineer. This is the world we have evolved, a world that has evolved to degrade some jobs without any reason. And this is because, unfortunately, we have learned to make value judgments based on money, not on the contribution to society.
Eduardo Foster
Its actually unbelievable what agriculture has done to our society. It has caused drastic changes that have been reflected on modern society. It also interesting how is reflected even though domestication and social classes began thousands and thousands of years ago, and after all we still are hanging around in the same lifestyle. In overall I’m amaze of societies improvements back in the days.
Erin Vento
Its pretty amazing to think about how different the world and social constructs were as a whole was towards the beginning of civilization. Humans have truly come a long way from where we used to be (although we did end up bringing with us and developing the idea of social classes and sexism). I liked this article because you made the transitions between time periods and social changes flow with the explanations you gave; overall really good.
Evelin Joseph
As we are learning about this topic in class currently, it was interesting to read this article and understand the diction and topics introduced. It is surprising to see that our ancestors were able to live in egalitarian societies where people were equal, as that is such a contrast to our modern day society. As we transitioned into a newer era though, we can see the rise of stratified societies and a general lack of equality, as we see it in our modern world. I can definitely see that even though there were developments in human society, such as agriculture, these developments have also led people to need leadership and distinct social classes.
Cherice Leach
It is interesting to know that our ancestors all lived in an equal society. It’s actually kind of hard to believe thanks to the type of society we live in today. However, those times were much easier times than they are now. Now we live in very complex societies where human beings depend on a lot more than just the means of survival so it wouldn’t be that easy to create an egalitarian society again.
Brianda Gomez
I find it so amusing that the world we live in today, has changed drastically throughout the years. Back then there was no social classes. All of the populations was in the same economic standing. It used to be an egalitarian community something we are not a part of today. As agriculture started playing a bigger role it led to increase in population but also increase in diseases. Now we have a lot of technology and we are not affected by many things that affected people back then. I really enjoyed reading this article because I like to learn about how our world used to be.
Rafael Azuaje
It is interesting that there were no social classes in the Paleolithic Era. No voting for a leader. I do wonder if this belief is from an absence of evidence or an evidence of absence. In my limited experience of the world so far, it seems to me that leaders naturally arise. We know that our genetic makeup can indicate a great deal about us. Some people are born with the genes to grow taller, stronger and more intelligent than their peers.
Leadership is difficult because the leader assumes responsibility and is held accountable for their actions. I have not met many people who would be willing to make important life or death choices on behalf of a group. Most people seem content to follow rather than lead. Perhaps this was different with our early ancestors.