NEOLITHIC CULTURE

Neolithic, or "New Stone Age," cultures appeared in Anatolia around the upper Euphrates River of Mesopotamia about ten thousand years ago. Neolithic culture was marked by the domestication of plants and animals. These peoples were herder-cultivators rather than hunter-gatherers. The shift from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic was not instantaneous; for several thousand years proto-Neolithic cultures practiced a combination of the two lifestyles.

Older theory assumed that, once created, Neolithic culture was so superior to Paleolithic that it was adapted immediately. Now it is clear that at some times and places, the Paleolithic way of life persisted for millennia.

Neolithic settlements also occured in Southeast Asia about the same time as in Anatolia, so the shift apparently occurred more than once.

Paleolithic life was nomadic. With the domestication of plants and animals, permanent settlements came into existence for the first time. Over time settlements grew from villages to towns to large cities. Living in large, stable societies certainly would have required a major change in worldview. The Jungian scholar Joseph Campbell has argued that the stress of this change is expressed archetypally as a battle between chthonic beings representative of the Paleolithic and a complex "team" of gods representative of the Neolithic.

NEOLITHIC CULTURE Neolithic, or "New Stone Age," cultures appeared in Anatolia around the upper Euphrates River of Mesopotamia about ten thousand years ago. Neolithic culture was marked by the domestication of plants and animals. These peoples were herder-cultivators rather than hunter-gatherers. The shift from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic was not instantaneous; for several thousand years proto-Neolithic cultures practiced a combination of the two lifestyles. Older theory assumed that, once created, Neolithic culture was so superior to Paleolithic that it was adapted immediately. Now it is clear that at some times and places, the Paleolithic way of life persisted for millennia. Neolithic settlements also occured in Southeast Asia about the same time as in Anatolia, so the shift apparently occurred more than once. Paleolithic life was nomadic. With the domestication of plants and animals, permanent settlements came into existence for the first time. Over time settlements grew from villages to towns to large cities. Living in large, stable societies certainly would have required a major change in worldview. The Jungian scholar Joseph Campbell has argued that the stress of this change is expressed archetypally as a battle between chthonic beings representative of the Paleolithic and a complex "team" of gods representative of the Neolithic.