Bowmen and Deer, Cliff PaintingLos Caballos, Spain,10,000-9000 BC

MESOLITHIC PERIOD

MESOLITHIC PERIODbegan 12,000 BP

Mesolithic tool kits were based on chipped stone and often include microliths, very small stone tools intended for mounting together on a shaft

Hunter-gatherers began to store food in containers Less reliance on large mammals for food -- more on

fish and small game Domestication of animals began with domestication

of dogs Rock art paintings and carvings increasingly depict

human communal activities as well as animals

Tassili N’AjjerAlgeria

8000 years ago , the Sahara Desert spreading , today, from West to East in Africa , used to be a fertile land with rivers abounding with fish , rich grassy hills abounding with game .

Cultures followed one another leaving their own records Era of Hunters : 6000 to 4000 B.C. Era of Stockbreeders: 4000 to 1500 B.C. Era of Horse : 1500 B.C. to 1st century A.D. Era of Camel : from 1st century on

They left , painted or engraved in caverns or on cliffs , testimonies making one of the most complete catalogs ever found about prehistoric life .

GobustanAzerbijan

Situated between the south-eastern slope -of the Greater Caucasian Range and the Caspian Sea, lies the plain broken with ravines, called Gobustan (the territory of Gobu).

In the mountains of Gobustan, the witnesses to the past of Azerbaijan people of the Stone Age and subsequent periods are concentrated: these are over 6000 rock carvings, settlements, and tombstones, the oldest from 12,000 bce

BhimabetakaIndia

Bhimabetaka, is located 45 km to the south-east of Bhopal near a hill village called 'Bhiyanpur'.

“Bhima's sitting place” (character in Mahabharata) is the literal meaning of Bhimabetaka which probably it got due to its mysterious huge rock caves.

Atop the hill a large number of rock-shelters have been discovered containing more than 130 paintings.

Mesolithic WebsitesSahara: The Tassili FrescoesTassili Najjer: World Heritage site descriptionArchaic Art of N. Africa

Gobustan website from Azerbijan Ministryof Culture -- server connection not always reliableGobustan: text description of the area

Prehistoric Rock Art of IndiaPrehistoric Rock Paintings of Bhimabetaka

Rock Art Index from the Ancient World Web

As the nomadic hunter-gatherers domesticated more

animals and began to cultivate crops -- wheat, rice and corn -- around the world, Mesolithic

cultures entered into the Neolithic Revolution

NEOLITHIC PERIODClick here to continue