Climate Change in Prehistory : The End of the Reign of Chaos

Climate Change in Prehistory explores the challenges that faced humankind in aglacial climate and the opportunities that arose when the climate improveddramatically around 10,000 years ago. Drawing on recent advances in geneticmapping, it presents the latest thinking on how the fluctuations during the ice agedefined the development and spread of modern humans across the Earth. It reviewsthe aspects of our physiology, intellectual development and social behaviourthat have been influenced by climatic factors, and how features of our lives – diet,health and the relationshipwith nature – are also the product of the climate inwhichwe evolved. This analysis is based on the proposition that essential features ofmodern societies – agriculture and urban life – only became possible when theclimate settled down after the chaos of the last ice age. In short: climate change inprehistory has in so many ways made us what we are today. How did humankind deal with the extreme challenges of the last Ice Age? How have the relatively benign post-Ice Age conditions affected the evolution and spread of humanity across the globe? By setting our genetic history in the context of climate change during prehistory, the origin of many features of our modern world are identified and presented in this illuminating book. It reviews the aspects of our physiology and intellectual development that have been influenced by climatic factors, and how features of our lives - diet, language and the domestication of animals - are also the product of the climate in which we evolved. In short: climate change in prehistory has in many ways made us what we are today. Climate Change in Prehistory weaves together studies of the climate with anthropological, archaeological and historical studies, and will fascinate all those interested in the effects of climate on human development and history. Cover......Page 1 Climate Change in Prehistory......Page 2 Climate Change inPrehistory - The End of the Reign of Chaos......Page 4 Contents......Page 6 Preface......Page 10 Acknowledgements......Page 12 1 Introduction......Page 14 2 The climate of the past 100 000 years......Page 31 3 Life in the ice age......Page 87 4 The evolutionary implications of living with the ice age......Page 148 5 Emerging from the ice age......Page 182 6 Recorded history......Page 249 7 Our climatic inheritance......Page 274 8 The future......Page 298 Glossary......Page 325 References......Page 335 Bibliography......Page 353 Index......Page 359 This book explores the challenges that faced humankind in a glacial climate and the opportunities that arose when the climate improved dramatically after the Ice Age. It weaves together studies of the climate with anthropological, archaeological and historical studies, and will fascinate all those interested in climate and human development