Cultural evolution of man

Cultural evolution of man

In close connection with biological evolution, human cultural evolution was initially very slow, but has been accelerating for some 80,000 years. These are the emergence of traditions and their transmission from generation to generation.

Biological and cultural evolution should be seen as a single entity, since man's achievements are possible only because of his genetic makeup.

Testimonies of cultural evolution

During excavations, together with the fossil bone finds, a variety of tools have been discovered, which can draw quite accurate conclusions about the way of life of these people. As new achievements in cultural-technical terms apply

 - Ranged weapons such as bows and arrows,
 - Javelins, harpoons and sling stones,
 - Dwellings of wood and stones, often covered with animal skins,
 - Jewelery made of teeth, shell shells and snail shells.

Impressive are also testimonies of his artistic activity, which were handed down to us as engravings and cave paintings as well as sculptures.

The variety of equipment suggests a division of labor within the Horde. Until 15 000 years ago, people only lived from what nature offered them or what they could directly wrest from nature. They were still collectors and hunters, but their prey was certainly much larger than Neanderthals because of the more modern equipment.

About 10,000 years ago, people started not only to hunt animals, but also to capture and tame them alive, to hold them for a while, and later to multiply them. So they created food reserves for times when the hunt was less successful or no fruits could be collected.

A little later, they also started to cultivate soil and cultivate plants in some parts of the world. From the glacial (fossil) Nowmenschen developed the today living (present) present man. There was a stormy cultural development of man.

Traditions have been developed and handed down from generation to generation,

 - Manufacture and use of tools and equipment,
 - Keeping and breeding of animals,
 - Cultivation and breeding of plants,
 - Manufacture of jewelery and works of art,
 - Development of a font and
 - Inventions in science and technology.

Man became the creator of his environment and his life.