Historical sources on the Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages
Early human history is divided into three eras, known as the Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages, which are named after gradual series of changes in tools, technology, and ways of life that can be traced through archaeological evidence and later historical writing.
The sources collected here present both nineteenth- and early twentieth-century interpretations of this past, from the classifications of Herbert George Wells and John Lubbock to encyclopaedia entries and school textbooks that explain how early societies used stone, then bronze, and later iron to make tools and weapons.
Through these extracts, you can examine how historians and scholars described the shift from hunting societies with simple chipped tools to settled communities that farmed, built, and developed writing systems, and they can also evaluate how knowledge of prehistory depended on limited physical remains and changing scholarly methods over time
Source 1
Extract A
“Geologists talk of these wintry phases as the First, Second, Third and Fourth [Ice Ages], and of the [breaks between them] as [warmer periods]. We live to-day in a world that is still [damaged] and scarred by that terrible winter. The First [Ice Age] was coming on 600,000 years ago; the Fourth [Ice Age] reached its bitterest some fifty thousand years ago. And it was amidst the snows of this long universal winter that the first man-like beings lived upon our planet.”
Extract B
“These are the latest of the men that we call [Palaeolithic] (Old Stone Age) because they had only chipped [tools]. By ten or twelve thousand years a new sort of life has dawned in Europe, men have learnt not only to chip but to polish and grind stone [tools], and they have begun cultivation. The Neolithic Age (New Stone Age) was beginning.”
Extract C
“We are still very ignorant about the beginnings of cultivation and settlement in the world although a vast amount of research and [thought] has been given to these matters in the last fifty years. All that we can say with any confidence at present is that [sometime] about 15,000 and 12,000 B.C. while the Azilian [Mesolithic] people were in the south of Spain and while the remnants of the earlier hunters were drifting northward and eastward, somewhere in North Africa or Western Asia or in that great Mediterranean valley that is now [sunk] under the waters of the Mediterranean sea, there were people who, age by age, were working out two [extremely] important things; they were beginning cultivation and they were [taming] animals. They were also beginning to make, in addition to the chipped [tools] of their [ancestors], [tools] of polished stone. They had discovered the possibility of basketwork and roughly woven [fabrics] of plant fibre, and they were beginning to make a [roughly made] pottery.”
Contextual information:
Herbert George Wells (1866–1946) was an English novelist and public intellectual who wrote A Short History of the World in 1922 as a shortened version of his longer Outline of History (1920). He drew on advice from leading scientists and scholars, including Sir Ray Lankester and Gilbert Murray. The book was written for general and school readers, which makes it accessible for younger audiences.
Bibliographical reference:
Adapted from Wells, H. G. (1922). A short history of the world (pp. 44, 59, 65). The Macmillan Company.
Copyright: Public domain.
Source 2
“From the careful study of the remains which have come down to us, it would appear that Pre-historic Archaeology may be divided into four great [periods]. Firstly, that of the Drift; when man shared the possession of Europe with the Mammoth, the Cave bear, the Woolly-haired rhinoceros and other extinct animals. This we may call the ‘Palaeolithic’ Period. Secondly, the later or polished Stone age; a period characterised by beautiful weapons and [tools] made of flint and other kinds of stone; in which, however, we find no trace of the knowledge of any metal, [except for] gold, which seems to have been sometimes used for ornaments. This we may call the ‘Neolithic’ Period. Thirdly, the Bronze age, in which bronze was used for arms and cutting [tools] of all kinds. Fourthly, the Iron age, in which that metal had [replaced] bronze for arms, axes, knives, [and so on]; bronze, however, still being in common use for ornaments, and frequently also for the handles of swords and other weapons, but never for the blades.”
Contextual information:
Sir John Lubbock (1834–1913), later Lord Avebury, was an English polymath and archaeologist who was a close neighbour and student of Charles Darwin. In his 1865 book Pre-Historic Times, he coined the terms “Palaeolithic” and “Neolithic” which are still used today. The seventh and final edition (1913) was the standard English-language textbook of prehistoric archaeology for decades.
Bibliographical reference:
Adapted from Lubbock, J. [Lord Avebury]. (1913). Pre-historic times, as illustrated by ancient remains, and the manners and customs of modern savages (7th ed., pp. 2–3). Williams and Norgate.
Copyright: Public domain.
Source 3
Extract A
“PALAEOLITHIC (Gr. παλαιός, ancient, λίθος, stone), in [the study of human cultures], the [term used for] the Drift or early Stone Age when Man shared the possession of Europe with the mammoth, the cave-bear, the woolly-haired rhinoceros and other extinct animals. The [period] is characterised by flint [tools] of the [most basic] type and never polished. The fully [proven] remains of palaeolithic man are few, and discoveries are [limited] to certain areas, e.g. France and north Italy. The reason is that [burial] appears not to have been practised by the river-drift hunters, and the only bones likely to be found would be those accidentally preserved in caves or rock-shelters.”
Extract B
“NEOLITHIC, or Later Stone Age (Gr. νέος, new, and λίθος, stone), a term employed first by Lord Avebury and since generally accepted, for the period of highly finished and polished stone [tools], in contrast with the [rough craftsmanship] of those of the earlier Stone Age (Palaeolithic). Knowledge of Neolithic times is [collected] mainly from four sources: [burial mounds], the Lake-dwellings of Switzerland, the Kitchen-middens [ancient rubbish dumps] of Denmark and the Bone-Caves. No trace of metal is found, except gold, which seems to have been sometimes used for ornaments. Agriculture, pottery, weaving, the [taming] of animals, the burying of the dead in [stone tombs], and the [building] of [large stone] monuments are the typical developments of man during this stage.”
Contextual information:
The Encyclopaedia Britannica 11th edition (1910–1911) was a 29-volume reference work produced under the editorship of Hugh Chisholm and published by Cambridge University Press. Its articles were written by leading scholars of the early twentieth century and it is still widely cited as a primary reference for Edwardian-era scholarship.
Bibliographical reference:
Adapted from Chisholm, H. (Ed.). (1911). Palaeolithic. In The Encyclopaedia Britannica (11th ed., Vol. 20, p. 374, 593). Cambridge University Press.
Copyright: Public domain.
Source 4
Extract A
“This remarkable [mixture of metals], which we call bronze, is made by melting together nine parts of copper and one part of tin. It is harder than either of the two metals of which it is made; indeed, it is one of the hardest [materials] known to man, before he learned to make steel. Copper tools and weapons were in use in Egypt as early as 3400 B.C., and probably earlier. Bronze gradually came into use in the eastern Mediterranean world between 3000 and 2500 B.C.”
Extract B
“The Sumerians of the Two Rivers were the first people to pass from the use of pictures to that of signs which stood for [parts of words]; and in this way they were the first people to make a really [workable] system of writing. Because the soft clay into which they pressed these signs with a stick shaped the strokes of each sign into little wedges, we call their system of writing cuneiform, which means ‘wedge-form.’”
Extract C
“The lower end of the plain of the Two Rivers, stretching inland from the head of the Persian Gulf, was the home of the earliest [civilisation] of Western Asia. This region was called Babylonia. Here the marshes were first drained, the rivers were led into great canals for irrigation, and agriculture was carried on upon a large scale. The people who did this were called Sumerians.”
Extract D
“The Assyrian soldier was the first in the ancient world to carry weapons of iron. His spear-point, his sword, and even the [pieces] of his [armour] were of this metal, which was much stronger and kept a better edge than the bronze which his enemies still used. It was with these iron weapons that the armies of Nineveh conquered the whole of Western Asia.”
Contextual information:
James Henry Breasted (1865–1935) was the first American professor of Egyptology and the founder of the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago. His 1916 textbook Ancient Times was written by Ginn and Company specifically for high school students, and it became the standard American school text on the ancient Near East for a generation. Breasted is also credited with coining the term “Fertile Crescent.”
Bibliographical reference:
Adapted from Breasted, J. H. (1916). Ancient times: A history of the early world (pp. 56, 108, 116, 179). Ginn and Company.
Copyright: Public domain.