Pre-Civilization Period

Agriculture and animal domestication

A transcendent step in our development occurred when we discovered the ability to control plant and animal life – i.e. the beginning of agriculture in 10,000 to 9,000 BCE. (Please note that we now shift from “years ago” to “BCE”. 12,000 years ago is nearly the same as 10,000 BCE).  The invention of agriculture seems an appropriate milestone to make this change.   Archaeological evidence indicates that agriculture and animal domestication revolutions occurred independently in at least seven different locations. This revolution occurred very shortly after we had conquered the planet.  Perhaps these revolutions were a Darwinian solution for the growing populations of people and the finite and limited sources of naturally growing food. Even though agriculture may have been an obvious solution to the growing populations and limited food resources, it is interesting that it occurred independently in several locations.  This indicates a strong commonality of abilities and reactions across different human groups. However, it must also be pointed out that strong human grouping behavior, mixed with our inter-group competitive behavior, would have caused agriculture to spread to neighboring groups very quickly.

“And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the Lord.

And she again bare his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.” Genesis 4: 1-2.

How interesting, and insightful, that the 2 sons of Adam and Eve separately domesticated plants and animals.

No longer were we dependent upon gathering food that grew naturally – as do other foraging animals.  We domesticated animals and could use them for food and clothing.  We learned to control plants.  We selected seeds and planted them in locations where we knew they would grow. We harvested the plants and stored the harvest for upcoming months when we knew food would be scarcer.  However, when we planted, we also needed to be in the same area when the harvest was ready.  We began to develop permanent living places and no longer were nomadic.  Our left-brain “group-think” was serving us well.

The spread of agriculture - 10,000 BCE to 5,000 BCE

The inventions of agriculture and animal domestication catapulted us from hunter-gatherers who were living among the animals to town and city dwellers.  We became freed from the constant demands of foraging for food.  We could establish permanent living communities where we felt collective safety from predators.  We now had placed another level of separation between ourselves and the animal world around us.

Although agriculture appeared independently in several areas of the world, it first appeared in the Fertile Crescent, apparently nurtured by the Mediterranean climate.  Larger numbers of humans began to live with one another.  The first communities or small towns formed around 6,000 to 5,000 BCE.  Approximately 10,000 people lived in the Tigris, Euphrates, and Nile communities by 5,000 BCE.  The region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, in current day Iraq, has been referred to as Mesopotamia, the Greek for “between rivers”.

Early cities

The earliest settlements of people begin about 7,000 BCE and grow into villages. The earliest cities appear in Mesopotamia around 4000 BCE. Uruk, in current Iraq, is often considered the world’s first city.  Cities, of course, were enabled because we had discovered agriculture. All of this time, we are growing in our group-think abilities while our populations are also growing.  Without any more predators around, our rate of reproduction climbed quickly. 

By the late 4th millennium BC, the Mesopotamian area was divided by about a dozen independent city-states.  Each city had a temple at its center that was dedicated to and celebrated the particular patron god or goddess of that city.  Each city also had a king or ruler who was closely associated with the god or goddess.  The temples were the most dominant and important building of each city. They were built to be visible from long distances. 

These cities were the largest groups of people at the time.  The group organization was largely a dominance hierarchy with the god or goddess at the center of the group.  This group organization was nearly the same as campfire group organization around the image of a god.  The larger group simply required a larger physical symbol around which to congregate.

Each early city had its own god or goddess, which occupied the center of the city.  Our group organization was centered on a god as the leader.

Status – 3250 BCE

Our group-think had enabled us to bond together in larger, agriculturally-based communities.  Each community was likely organized as a dominance hierarchy and based on a theocracy.  God was leading, and we were organized on this planet like a bunch of ant hills.  We also had just discovered writing for broader communication with one another, and had discovered the group-think ability of conceiving a universal God.  The stage was now set for our group-think to expand to the next level: civilizations.