Mankind's past is divided into two great periods: prehistory and history.
The period that begins with the appearance of the human being (about 5 million years ago) and finishes with the invention of writing (about 6 000 years ago) is called Prehistory. The prefix "pre" means before and "historic" relates to something from the past. The main difference with history is the existence of records. For history, we have written records but for prehistory, we don’t. The events in prehistory happened before there was a record of events. An example of prehistory is when dinosaurs lived on Earth.
Prehistory is the longest period in humankind. In that long time, the oldest ancestors of today's people have emerged.
The study of the past before the historical record began is called prehistoric archeology.
Prehistory is important because it provides a sense from the past and we can have a better understanding of what happened before written times.
Somewhere we can meet the word protohistory. That word refers to the period when a culture has not developed its own writing but is written about it by others (for example other cultures), and it refers to a period between prehistory and history.
The end of prehistory in different places came at very different dates, and the term is less often used in discussing societies where prehistory ended relatively recently.
Early human history can be divided into three ages, but the dating of these ages is very approximate. The three ages are:
The stone was the most important tool and weapon in prehistory. That's why the oldest period is called the Stone Age. Тhe Stone Age was a prehistoric period during which stone was widely used as a primitive stone tool. The humans first used the stone as they would find it in nature or roughly shaped. Later, they worked out the stone and gave it various shapes depending on what they needed. They made axes, knives, and many more objects. In Stone Age are also used animal bones. This period lasted roughly 3.4 million years.
The Stone Age is divided into three different ages:
Paleolithic Age- which means Old Stone Age. It refers to the early period of the Stone Age when humans lived in caves and were hunters and gatherers. During this period are marked first uses of stone as a primitive tool and weapon.
Mesolithic Age- or Middle Stone Age. This period is a transitional phase between the Paleolithic Age and the Neolithic age. It has the characteristics of both: the Paleolithic Age and the Neolithic Age. The people lived on hunting, fishing, and food gathering.
Neolithic Age -or New Stone Age. This is the period when primitive agriculture emerged, and this way of farming by historians is called the Agricultural Revolution. It was also the time when pottery was first used. In many regions, people began to live in permanent settlements.
While searching for the stone for processing, the man encountered the ores and learned how to obtain metals. Ores are natural rocks (or sediment), found in the earth, from which desirable minerals, typically metals, can be extracted. Thus begins the epoch of the metal age. Copper was first found. Thus stone tools and weapons began to be replaced with metal ones.
When the man found the tin, he began mixing it with copper and obtained a new metal called bronze. Bronze weapons and tools were firmer because bronze itself is harder and more durable than other metals available at the time. The overall period is characterized by the widespread use of bronze.
The final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity is called Iron age. It follows the Bronze Age. In the iron age, there is mass production of tools and weapons that are made from steel and alloys. These tools and weapons were much cheaper, stronger, and lighter than the bronze materials used previously. That is why their use became more predominant. Artifacts made of smelted iron have been found dating from about 3000 BC in Egypt and Mesopotamia, which were two of the earliest known civilizations.
Many scholars place the end of the Iron Age at around 550 BC when Herodotus ( “The Father of History” ) began writing “The Histories”.
