What kind of people lived in the era of the great glaciation? and got the best answer
Answer from Vladimir STEN [guru]
Europe was under the ice. So there are only ESCIMOS chocks - as I expected !!! ! this is 30 million years ago. ... then there were no people yet voschem get on your own 6. PRIMARY HUMAN IN THE ICE PERIOD An outstanding event of this ice age was the evolution of primitive man. A little west of India, in an area currently under water, among the descendants of the ancient North American type of lemur that migrated to Asia, mammals suddenly appeared, which became the early predecessors of man. These small animals walked mainly on their hind legs and had larger brains in relation to their height and in comparison with the brains of other animals. In the seventieth generation of this type of living creatures, a new, more developed group suddenly emerged. These new mammals - the intermediate precursors of man, whose height was almost double that of their ancestors and who possessed a proportionally larger brain - had barely established themselves when a third major mutation suddenly occurred: the primates appeared. (At the same time, as a result of the reverse development of the intermediate predecessors of man, the great apes appeared; from that day to the present day, the human branch progresses through gradual evolution, while the great apes remained unchanged and even somewhat regressed.) 1.000 .000 years ago Urantia was registered as an inhabited world. A mutation that occurred in a tribe of progressive primates suddenly gave rise to two primitive people - the real progenitors of humanity. This event roughly coincided in time with the third glacial advance; therefore, it is obvious that your ancient ancestors were born and raised in a challenging, tempering and challenging environment. And the only surviving descendants of these Urantian aborigines - the Eskimos - still prefer to live in the harsh northern regions. In the western hemisphere, people appeared only shortly before the end of the ice age. However, during the interglacial eras, they moved westward around the Mediterranean Sea and soon spread throughout Europe. In the caves of western Europe, human bones can be found mixed with the remains of both tropical and arctic animals. This proves that man lived in these regions during the last epochs of the onset and retreat of glaciers.
Answer from Prince of Wales[guru]
harsh
Answer from Fedorovich[guru]
Snowmen.
Answer from Milena Strashevskaya[guru]
Why are we mammoths to live in the era of glaciation ??
Answer from Protivostoyanie yunge[guru]
crucian carp
The fourth book in the series "The Emergence of Man" is dedicated to the immediate predecessor of modern man - the Neanderthal. The author acquaints the reader with the history of the discovery of the Neanderthal man who lived in the Ice Age - a skilled hunter, contemporary of the cave bear, cave lion, mammoth and other extinct animals.
The book examines the latest hypotheses explaining the almost sudden disappearance of the Neanderthal and the appearance of his successor, the Cro-Magnon, and also tells about the latest discoveries in this area.
The book is richly illustrated; designed for people interested in the past of our Earth.
Book:
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Although the outlines and area of the continents in the Ice Age approximately coincided with the present ones (in the figure are highlighted in black lines), they differed from them in climate and, consequently, in vegetation. At the beginning of the Wurm glaciation, during the time of the Neanderthals, the glaciers (blue) began to increase and the tundra spread far to the south. Temperate forests and savannah have invaded former warm climates, including areas of the Mediterranean now flooded with sea, and tropical areas have become deserts interspersed with rainforest
The Neanderthal was the last ancient man, not the first. He stood on shoulders even stronger than his own. Behind him stretched five million years of slow evolution, during which Australopithecus Australopithecus), the offspring of monkeys and still not quite a man, became the first species of true man - upright man ( Homo erect us), and Homo erectus gave birth to the following species - Homo sapiens ( Homo sapiens). This last species still exists. Its early representatives laid the foundation for a long line of species and subspecies, culminating first in Neanderthal and then in modern man. Thus, the Neanderthal concludes one of the most important stages in the development of the species Homo sapiens - later only modern man comes, who belongs to the same species.
The Neanderthal appears about 100 thousand years ago, but by that time other species of Homo sapiens were already about 200 thousand years old. From the pre-Neanderthals, only a few fossils have survived, united by paleoanthropologists under the general name "early Homo sapiens", but their stone tools have been found in large quantities, and therefore the life of these ancient people can be recreated with a fair degree of probability. We need to understand their achievements and development, because the history of the Neanderthal, like any complete biography, should begin with a story about his closest ancestors.
Imagine a moment of full joy of being 250 thousand years ago. Travel back to where England is now. A man stands motionless on a grassy plateau, breathing in the smell of fresh meat with obvious pleasure - his comrades, with heavy stone tools with sharp edges, chop the carcass of a newborn fawn that they managed to get. His duty is to see if this pleasant smell will attract some predator dangerous to them or just someone who loves to profit at someone else's expense. Although the plateau seems deserted, the sentinel never relaxes his vigilance: what if a lion is lurking somewhere in the grass, or is a bear watching them from a nearby fishing line? But the awareness of possible danger only helps him to perceive more sharply what he sees and hears in this corner of the fertile land where his group dwells.
The gentle hills stretching to the horizon are overgrown with oaks and elms, clad in young foliage. Spring, which has recently replaced a mild winter, has brought such warmth to England that the sentinel does not chill even without clothes. He can hear the roar of hippos celebrating their mating season in the river - its willow-covered banks can be seen one and a half kilometers from the hunting ground. He hears the crackle of a dry branch. Bear? Or maybe a rhino or a heavy elephant grazes among the trees?
This man, who is standing, illuminated by the sun, holding a thin wooden spear in his hand, does not seem so strong, although his height is 165 centimeters, his muscles are well developed and it is immediately noticeable that he should run well. When you look at his head, one might think that he is not distinguished by special intelligence: a forward-looking face, a sloping forehead, a low, like a skull flattened from the sides. However, it has a larger brain than its predecessor, Homo erectus, who carried the torch of human evolution through more than a million years. As a matter of fact, in terms of the volume of the brain, this person is already approaching the modern one, and therefore it can be considered that he is a very early representative of the modern species, Homo sapiens.
This hunter belongs to a group of thirty people. Their territory is so large that it takes several days to pass it from end to end, but such a huge area is just enough so that they can safely get meat all year round, without causing irreparable damage to the populations of herbivores living here. Other small groups of people wander around the borders of their territory, whose speech is similar to that of our hunter - all these groups are closely related, since men of some groups often take wives from others. Behind the territories of neighboring groups, other groups live - almost unrelated, whose speech is incomprehensible, and even further away live and are not at all known. The land and the role that man was to play on it were much grander than our hunter could have imagined.
Two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, the number of people around the world probably did not reach 10 million - that is, they would all fit in one modern Tokyo. But this figure only looks unimpressive - humanity occupied a much larger part of the Earth's surface than any other species taken separately. This hunter lived on the northwestern edge of the human range. To the east, where a wide valley stretched beyond the horizon, which today has become the English Channel separating England from France, groups of five to ten families also roamed. Farther east and south, similar hunting-gatherer groups lived throughout Europe.
In those days, Europe was covered with forests with many wide grassy fields, and the climate was so warm that buffaloes thrived even north of the present Rhine, and monkeys frolicked in the tropical rainforests along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. Asia was far from being so hospitable everywhere, and people avoided its interior regions, because the winters there were harsh, and in the summer the scorching heat dried up the land. However, they lived throughout the southern edge of Asia from the Middle East to Java and further north up to Central China. Africa was probably the most inhabited. It is possible that more people lived in it than in the rest of the world.
The places that these diverse groups have chosen to inhabit provide a good idea of their lifestyle. It is almost always open, grassy or copse. This preference is explained very simply: huge herds of animals grazed there, the meat of which constituted the bulk of the human diet of those times. Where herbivores were not found, there were no people either. Deserts, humid tropical forests and dense coniferous forests of the north remained uninhabited, which in general occupied a very decent part of the earth's surface. True, there were some herbivores in the northern and southern forests, but they grazed alone or in very small groups - because of the limited food and the difficulty of moving among closely growing trees, it was not profitable for them to gather in herds. It was so difficult for people to find and kill single animals at that stage of their development that they simply could not exist in such places.
Another habitat unsuitable for humans was the tundra. It was easy to get meat there: huge herds of reindeer, bison and other large animals, which served as easy prey, found abundant food in the tundra - mosses, lichens, all sorts of grasses, undersized shrubs, and there were almost no trees that interfere with grazing. However, people had not yet learned how to defend themselves from the cold reigning in these areas, and therefore the early Homo sapiens continued to live in the areas that previously fed his ancestor, Homo erectus - in the savannah, in tropical woodlands, in the steppes and sparse deciduous forests of middle latitudes.
It is amazing how much anthropologists were able to learn about the world of early Homo sapiens, despite the hundreds of thousands of years that have passed since then and the paucity of the material found. A lot of that which played the most important role in the life of early people disappears quickly and without a trace. Food reserves, skins, tendons, wood, plant fibers and even bones crumble to dust very soon, unless a rare coincidence of circumstances prevents it. And those few remnants of objects made of organic material that have come down to us, tease curiosity more than satisfy it. Here, for example, is a pointed piece of yew tree found in Clacton in England - its age is estimated at 300 thousand years, and it survived because it got into a swamp. Perhaps it is a piece of a spear, since the tip of it was burned and became so hard that it could pierce the skins of animals. But it is possible that this pointed, hard piece of wood was used for completely different purposes: for example, to dig up edible roots.
Nevertheless, even such objects of obscure purpose are often amenable to interpretation. As for the piece of yew, logic helps here. There is no doubt that people used both spears and digging sticks long before this tool was made. However, it is more likely that the person spent the time and energy in order to burn the spear, and not the digging device. Likewise, we have every reason to believe that people who lived in areas with a temperate climate, many hundreds of thousands of years ago, wrapped themselves in something, although their clothes - no doubt, animal skins - have not survived. It is equally certain that they built some kind of shelter for themselves - in fact, the pits from the pillars discovered during excavations of an ancient site on the French Riviera prove that people were able to build primitive huts from branches and animal skins even in the time of Homo erectus.
A pillar hole, a piece of wood, a sharpened bone fragment, a hearth - all this quietly whispers to us about the achievements of man in time immemorial. But the heroes and heroines of these legends are still stubbornly hiding from us. Only two fossils indicate that about 250 thousand years ago there was an early form of Homo sapiens - flattened massive skulls, which were found near the English city of Swanscombe and the German city of Steinheim.
However, science has some other materials that help look into the past. The geological deposits of each given period reveal quite a lot about the then climate, including temperature and rainfall. By examining the pollen found in such deposits under a microscope, it is possible to establish exactly which trees, herbaceous or other plants prevailed at that time. The most important thing for studying prehistoric eras is stone tools, which are practically eternal. Wherever the early people lived, they left stone tools everywhere, and often in huge quantities. In one Lebanese cave, where people have settled for 50 thousand years, over a million worked flints have been found.
As a source of information about ancient people, stone tools are somewhat one-sided. They do not report anything about many of the most interesting aspects of their life - about family relationships, about the organization of the group, about what people said and thought, about how they looked. In a sense, an archaeologist leading a trench through geological layers is in the position of a man who on the Moon would catch the transmission of terrestrial radio stations, having only a weak receiver: out of the host of signals sent into the air throughout the Earth, only one would sound clear in his receiver and clearly - in this case, stone tools. Nevertheless, a lot can be learned from the programs of one station. First, the archaeologist knows that where the tools were found, people once lived. Comparing tools found in different locations but dating back to the same time can reveal cultural contacts between ancient populations. Comparison of tools from layer to layer makes it possible to trace the development of material culture and the level of intelligence of ancient people who once created them.
Stone tools show that people who lived 250 thousand years ago, although in their intelligence and deserved the name "reasonable", but still retained much in common with their less developed ancestors, who belonged to the species Homo erectus. Their weapons followed a type that had developed hundreds of thousands of years before their appearance. This type is called "Acheulean" after the French town of Saint-Achel near Amiens, where such weapons were first found. Typical of the Acheulean culture is the tool called the hand chopper - relatively flat, oval or pear-shaped, with two working edges along its entire 12-15 cm length (see pages 42-43). This tool could be used for a variety of purposes - to punch holes in skins, butcher prey, chop or peel branches, and the like. It is possible that the choppers were driven into wooden clubs and a composite tool was obtained - something like a modern ax or cleaver, but it is more likely that they were simply held in the hand (perhaps the blunt end was wrapped in a piece of skin to protect the palm).
Early rough stone tools
By the time Neanderthals appeared, humans had been making tools for over a million years and had developed not only certain types of tools, but also traditional methods of making them. One of the oldest and most widespread methods, called the Acheulean, was adopted and used by Neanderthals around the world, although some Neanderthals preferred the later, Levallois method (see p. 56-57).
The Acheulean tools were made of stone, from which pieces were beaten off by another stone until it got the desired shape. Shown here are three typical Acheulean implements (front and side view), almost life-size.
A heavy, rough and unevenly chipped, Acheulean chopper, made about 400 thousand years ago, was nevertheless a very effective universal tool. Its point and two working edges were used for chopping, piercing and scraping.
This ax, tapering to a thin tip, made about 200 thousand years ago, was hammered with a stone chipper. Then, its edges were retouched with a relatively elastic bumper made of hard wood or bone, which chipped off small flat pieces
The long, almost perfectly straight right edge of the side-scraper, made about 200,000 years ago, is its working edge. Embossed blunt end grooves provide better finger support
In addition to a hand ax with two working edges, stone plates were used, which were sometimes serrated. With their help, when cutting carcasses or processing wood, more subtle operations were performed. Some groups of ancient people clearly preferred such plates to large choppers, others added heavy cutters to their stone tools for cutting the joints of large animals. However, in all corners of the world, people followed mainly the principles of the Acheulean culture, and only in the Far East was a more primitive type of tools with one working edge kept.
While this widespread uniformity indicates a lack of ingenuity, the hack nevertheless improved little by little. When people learned to work flints and quartz not only with hard bumpers made of stone, but also with softer ones - made of bone, wood, or deer antlers, they were able to create chops with smoother and sharper working edges (see page 78). In the harsh world of early humans, the improved working edge of the utility ax provided many benefits.
In the cultural layers left by early Homo sapiens, there are other stone tools that indicate a developing intelligence and a willingness to experiment. Around that era, some particularly smart hunters found a fundamentally new method of making flake tools. Instead of just banging the flint nodule, beating the plates at random, which inevitably comes with a waste of effort and material, they gradually built up a highly sophisticated and efficient manufacturing process. First, the nodule was knocked off along the edge and on top, obtaining the so-called "nucleus" (core). Then a precise blow to a specific place in the core - and a flake of a predetermined size and shape with long and sharp working edges flies off. This method of stone processing, called Levallois (see page 56), speaks of an amazing ability to assess the potential of the stone, since the tool visibly appears only at the very end of the process of its manufacture.
The hand ax took shape slowly but surely, and when using the Levallois method, the flake flew off the flint core, which did not at all resemble any tool, completely ready, like a butterfly that left the shell of a pupa, which outwardly has nothing to do with it ... The Levallois method appears to have originated about 200,000 years ago in southern Africa and spread from there, although it may have been independently discovered elsewhere.
If we compare all these various data - tools, a few fossils, a piece of organic material, as well as plant pollen and geological indications of the then climate - people of that ancient time acquire visible features. They had well-knit, almost modern-looking bodies, but ape-like faces, although the brain was only slightly inferior in size to the current one. They were excellent hunters and knew how to adapt to any conditions of life and climate, except the most severe ones. In their culture, they followed the traditions of the past, but little by little they were looking for ways to a more lasting and reliable power over nature.
Their world in general was quite welcoming. However, it was destined to suddenly change (suddenly - in a geological sense), and living conditions in it became so difficult that people, perhaps, did not know either before or after. However, Homo sapiens managed to hold out throughout all the cataclysms, and the test went to his advantage - he acquired many new skills, his behavior became more flexible, and his intellect developed.
Cooling began about 200 thousand years ago. Glades and lawns in the deciduous forests of Europe imperceptibly became more and more extensive, the tropical rainforests on the Mediterranean coast dried up, and pine and spruce forests in eastern Europe slowly gave way to steppes. Perhaps the oldest members of European groups recalled with fear in their voices that before the wind did not freeze the body and snow never fell from the sky. But since they had always led a nomadic life, it was natural for them even now to move to where the herbivores left. Groups that previously had little need for fire, clothing, or artificial shelter now learned how to protect themselves from the cold from more northerly groups that have acquired this skill since the days of Homo erectus.
All over the world, so much snow began to fall in the mountains that it did not have time to melt over the summer. Year after year, the snow accumulated, filling deep gorges, condensed into ice. The severity of this ice was so great that its lower layers acquired the properties of a thick putty, and under the pressure of the growing snow layers, it began to crawl down the gorges. Slowly moving along the mountain slopes, giant fingers of ice tore out huge boulders from them, which then, like sandpaper, scrubbed the soil down to bedrock. In summer, stormy streams of melt water carried the fine sand and stone dust far ahead, then they were picked up by the wind, whipped up in colossal yellow-brown clouds and carried across all continents. And the snow kept falling and falling, so that in some places the ice fields were narrower in thickness. two kilometers, buried entire mountain ranges under them and with their weight forced the earth's crust to bend. At the time of their greatest advancement, glaciers covered more than 30% of all land (now they occupy only 10%). Europe has been particularly hard hit. The surrounding ocean and seas served as an inexhaustible source of evaporating moisture, which, having turned into snow, fed the glaciers that slid from the Alps and Scandinavian mountains to the plains of the continent and covered tens of thousands of square kilometers.
This glaciation, known as the Rice glaciation, turned out to be one of the most severe climatic injuries that the Earth has ever suffered in its five billion years of history. Although cold snaps had occurred earlier, in the days of Homo erectus, the Rissian glaciation was the first test of Homo sapiens' resilience. It had to withstand 75 thousand years of severe cold weather, interspersed with small warming, before the Earth regained a warm climate for a relatively long time.
Many experts believe that the slow formation of plateaus and mountain ranges is a necessary precondition for the emergence of glaciers. It is calculated that one era of mountain building raised the earth's land by an average of more than 450 meters. Such an increase in altitude would inevitably lower the surface temperature by an average of three degrees, and in the highest places, possibly much more. The decrease in temperature has undoubtedly increased the likelihood of glaciers forming, but this does not explain the alternation of cold and warm periods.
Various hypotheses have been proposed to explain these fluctuations in the Earth's climate. According to one theory, volcanoes from time to time threw out colossal amounts of fine dust into the atmosphere, which reflected some of the sun's rays. Scientists have indeed observed a decrease in temperature around the world during large eruptions, but this cooling is insignificant and lasts no longer than 15 years, and therefore it is unlikely that volcanoes gave the impetus to glaciation. However, a different kind of dust can have a more significant impact. Some astronomers believe that clouds of cosmic dust can pass between the Sun and the Earth from time to time, blocking the Earth from the Sun for a very long time. But since no such clouds of cosmic dust have been observed within the solar system, this hypothesis remains just a curious guess.
The glaciers that changed the lives of ancient people
For many millennia, while early Homo sapiens evolved into a Neanderthal, his world was cooled down again and again and pressed against the advancing glaciers. In Europe, ancient people were caught between two different streams of ice. Bulks of ice moved from the north, and at the same time mountain glaciers descended from the Alps, like the one shown in the photograph - frozen rivers with many tributaries that filled the valleys and made the passes impassable.
This joint advance of continental and mountain glaciers drove the ancient people of Europe to relatively small areas of the tundra - the surface of the glaciers was so uneven and there were so many dangerous traps that there was nothing to try to get over them. Irregularities occur because the ice is not moving in a straight line. When a glacier crawls over an obstacle or bends around it - for example, encountering spurs like those seen on the left and right in the photograph - the surface of the glacier folds and deep cracks form on it, often hidden under a crust of snow. The furrows at the bottom of the photo are up to thirty meters deep and about three meters wide. Although mountain glaciers are usually not very wide - the tongue below does not reach a kilometer in width - their thickness and treacherous surface make them impassable for both animals and people.
A typical mountain glacier, a remnant of the glacial past of the Earth, consists of four tongues of ice that merge into one ribbed stream about a kilometer wide ice crawls down the slope, peeling off the rocks
Another astronomical explanation for ice ages seems more likely. Fluctuations in the tilt of our planet's axis of rotation and its orbit alter the amount of solar heat received by the Earth, and calculations show that these changes should have caused four long periods of cold snaps over the past three-quarters of a million years. No one knows if such a drop in temperature could have caused glaciations, but it undoubtedly contributed to them. And finally, it is possible that the sun itself played some role in the appearance of glaciers. The amount of heat and light emitted by the Sun changes over a cycle that lasts an average of 11 years. Radiation increases when the number of sunspots and giant prominences on the surface of the star increases markedly, and slightly decreases when these solar storms subside slightly. Then everything is repeated again. According to some astronomers, solar radiation may have another, very long cycle, similar to the short cycle of sunspots.
But whatever their cause, the impact of climate change has been enormous. During periods of cold snap, the world wind system was disrupted. Precipitation has decreased in some places and increased in others. The nature of the vegetation changed, and many animal species either became extinct or developed into new forms adapted to the cold, such as the cave bear or woolly rhinoceros (see pp. 34-35).
During the particularly harsh phases of the Rice glaciation, the climate of England, where early Homo sapiens enjoyed warmth and sunshine, became so cold that temperatures often dropped below freezing in summer. Deciduous forests in the interior and western Europe gave way to tundra and steppe. And even far to the south, on the Mediterranean coast, the trees gradually disappeared, replaced by meadows.
What happened in this era with Africa is not so clear. In some places, the cooling seemed to be accompanied by more abundant rainfall, which made the previously barren areas of the Sahara and the Kalahari Desert green with grass and trees. At the same time, a change in the global wind system led to the drying up of the Congo Basin, where dense moist forests began to give way to woodlands and grassy savannahs. Thus, while Europe became less habitable, Africa became more and more hospitable, and people could settle over a large part of this continent.
In the era of the Rice glaciation, people, in addition, received at their disposal a lot of new land due to the lowering of the level of the World Ocean. So much water was trapped in giant ice strata that this level dropped by 150 meters and exposed vast expanses of the continental shelf - an underwater continuation of the continents, which in some places extends for many hundreds of kilometers, and then steeply goes down to the ocean floor. This is how the primitive hunters got millions of square kilometers of new land and they undoubtedly took advantage of this gift of the Ice Age. Each year, their groups penetrated deeper and deeper into the expanses of the newborn land, and, perhaps, they set up camp near the thundering waterfalls - where rivers fell from the continental shelf into the ocean, rippling far below, at the foot of the cliff.
For 75 thousand years of the Rice glaciation, the inhabitants of the northern latitudes had to overcome difficulties unknown to early Homo sapiens, who were spoiled by a mild climate, and it is possible that these difficulties had a stimulating effect on the development of human intelligence. Some experts believe that the huge leap in mental development that already took place in the era of Homo erectus was due to the migration of man from the tropics to the temperate zone, where much more ingenuity and flexibility of behavior was required for survival. The early upright settlers learned to use fire, invented clothing and shelter, and adapted to the difficult seasonal changes by hunting and gathering plant food. The Rhys glaciation, which caused such profound ecological changes, should have been the same test for the intellect, and perhaps just the same spur on its development.
Early Homo sapiens held their footholds in Europe even in the most difficult times. Stone tools serve as indirect evidence of its continuous presence there, but human fossils that would confirm this have not been found for a long time. Only in 1971, two French archaeologists, the spouses Henri and Marie-Antoinette Lumle (University of Marseille), found evidence that 200 thousand years ago, at the beginning of the Rice glaciation, at least one European group of Homo sapiens was still kept in a cave in the foothills of the Pyrenees ... In addition to a large number of tools (mostly flakes), the Lumle couple found the broken skull of a young man of about twenty. This hunter had a forward-facing face, a massive supraorbital ridge and a sloping forehead, and the size of the cranium was somewhat inferior to the average modern ones. The two lower jaws found in the same place are massive and, apparently, were perfectly adapted for chewing rough food. The skull and jaws are quite similar to the fragments from Swanscombe and Steinheim, and give a pretty good idea of people who occupy an intermediate position between Homo erectus and Neanderthal.
Sitting at the entrance to their vast cave, these people surveyed the countryside, rather dull in appearance, but rich in game. Along the banks of the river at the bottom of a ravine right under the cave, in thickets of willows and various bushes, leopards trapped wild horses, goats, bulls and other animals coming to the watering hole. Beyond the ravine, the steppe stretched to the very horizon, and not a single tree blocked the sight of the hunters from the herds of elephants, reindeer and rhinos, leisurely wandering under the leaden skies. These large animals, as well as rabbits and other rodents, provided an abundance of meat for the hunting group. And yet life was very difficult. In order to go out under the blows of the icy wind carrying sand and prickly dust, it took a lot of physical conditioning and courage. And soon, apparently, it got worse, and people were forced to go in search of more hospitable places, as indicated by the lack of tools in the later layers. Judging by some data, the climate became truly arctic for some time.
More recently, the Lumle couple made in the south of France, in Lazare, another sensational discovery - they found the remains of shelters built inside the cave. These primitive shelters, dating back to the last third of the Rissian glaciation (about 150 thousand years ago), were something like tents - apparently, animal skins were pulled over a frame of poles and pressed along the perimeter with stones (see page 73). Perhaps the hunters, from time to time settling in the cave, built such tents to hide from the dripping water from the vaults, or families were looking for some solitude. But the climate also played an important role here - all the tents stood with their backs to the cave entrance, from which one can conclude that even in this area, near the Mediterranean Sea itself, strong cold winds were blowing.
The cave at Lazar also contained further evidence of the increasing complexity and versatility of human behavior. In each tent near the entrance, the Lumle couple found a wolf skull. The identical position of these skulls clearly indicates that they were not thrown there as unnecessary rubbish: they certainly meant something. But what exactly is still a mystery. One possible explanation is that hunters, migrating to other places, left wolf skulls at the entrance to their homes as their magical guardians.
Approximately 125 thousand years ago, the long climatic cataclysms of the Riss glaciation came to naught and a new warm period began. It was to last about 50 thousand years. The glaciers retreated to their mountain strongholds, the sea levels rose, and northern regions around the world were once again fully habitable. Several interesting fossils are attributed to this period, confirming the continuous approach of Homo sapiens to a more modern form. In a cave near the town of Fonteschevade in southwestern France, fragments of a skull were found, which are approximately 110 thousand years old, and they look more modern than the skull of a Rice man from the Pyrenees.
By the time the first half of the warming that followed the Rissian glaciation, that is, about 100 thousand years ago, has passed, the true Neanderthal appears and the transition period to him from the early Homo sapiens ends. There are at least two fossils that prove the appearance of a Neanderthal: one from a quarry near the German town of Eringsdorf, and the other from a sand pit on the banks of the Italian Tiber River. These European Neanderthals gradually evolved from a genetic line that gave rise first to Pyrenean man, and later to the more modern Fonteshevad man. The Neanderthals were not very different from their immediate predecessors. The human jaw was still massive and lacking a chin protrusion, the face protruded forward, the skull remained low, and the forehead sloped. However, the volume of the cranium has already fully reached its current size. When anthropologists use the term "Neanderthal" to describe a particular evolutionary stage, they mean a type of man with a modern-sized brain but housed in an ancient skull — long, low, with steep facial bones.
A petrified face from a distant past
For the first time, the immediate predecessor of the Neanderthal managed to look directly in the face only in 1971, when, during the excavation of a cave near Totawel on the French slope of the Pyrenees, a skull was found with almost completely preserved fragile facial bones. Archaeologists Anri and Marie-Antoinegte Lumle (University of Marseille) who found it believe that it belonged to a young man, most likely a member of a nomadic hunting group that lived in this cave about 200 thousand years ago - about 100 thousand years after the human species Homo erectus was replaced by the appearance of Homo sapiens, and 100 thousand years before the appearance of the Neanderthal.
The skull of the Totawelian man, like the skull of the Homo erectus, is distinguished by a low forehead, sloping away from the bony supraorbital ridge, but the hollow between the forehead and the ridge is not so noticeable. The face protrudes forward - less than in Homo erectus, but more than in Neanderthal, jaws and teeth are also larger than Neanderthal ones. The volume of the brain, although it is not easy to establish, since the cranium is broken, was, apparently, still more than that of a Homo erectus, and less than that of a Neanderthal. From this comparison, it seems to follow that the Totawelian man occupied an intermediate position between the first people and the Neanderthals.
The teeth that weren't worn out clearly belonged to the youth.
Skull photographed from behind - the entire back of the skull is missing
The massive supraorbital ridge shows that the Totawel man was more primitive than the Neanderthal
A sloping forehead and a protruding face indicate the relationship of a Totawel person with a Homo erectus
It is not easy to assess this brain. Some theorists believe that its size does not mean that the intellectual development of the Neanderthals reached the current level. Based on the fact that the size of the brain usually increases with increasing body weight, they make the following assumption: if the Neanderthals were several kilograms heavier than the early representatives of the species Homo sapiens, this already sufficiently explains the increase in the cranium, especially since in the end it is only about a few hundred cubic centimeters. In other words, Neanderthals were not necessarily smarter than their predecessors, but simply taller and tighter in build. But this argument seems dubious - most evolutionists believe there is a direct relationship between brain size and intelligence. Undoubtedly, this dependence is not easy to define. To measure intelligence by the volume of the brain is to some extent the same as trying to assess the capabilities of an electronic computer by weighing it.
If we interpret the doubts in favor of the Neanderthals and recognize them - on the basis of the volume of the skull - equal in natural intelligence to modern man, then a new problem arises. Why did the increase in the brain cease 100 thousand years ago, although intelligence is of such great and obvious value to humans? Why didn't the brain continue to get bigger and better, presumably?
Biologist Ernst Mayr (Harvard University) offered an answer to this question. He thinks that intelligence developed at an astonishing rate before the Neanderthal stage of evolution, because the smartest men became the leaders of their groups and had multiple wives. More wives, more children. As a result, the next generations received a disproportionately large share of the genes of the most developed individuals. Mayr believes that this accelerated growth of intelligence stopped about 100 thousand years ago, when the number of hunting-gatherer groups increased so much that fatherhood was no longer the privilege of the most intelligent individuals. In other words, their genetic heritage - especially developed intelligence - was not the main, but only a small part of the total genetic heritage of the entire group, and therefore was not decisive.
Anthropologist Loring Brace (University of Michigan) prefers a different explanation. In his opinion, human culture in Neanderthal times reached the stage when almost all members of the group, having absorbed collective experience and skills, received an approximately equal chance of survival. If speech was already sufficiently developed by that time (an assumption disputed by some experts) and if intelligence reached such a level that the least capable member of the group could learn everything necessary for survival, exceptional ingenuity ceased to be an evolutionary advantage. Individuals, of course, were particularly resourceful, but their ideas were communicated to others, and the whole group benefited from the innovations. Thus, according to Brace's theory, the natural intelligence of mankind, taken as a whole, stabilized, although people continued to accumulate new knowledge about the world around them.
Both of the above hypotheses are highly speculative, and most anthropologists prefer a more specific approach. According to them, the potential of the Neanderthal brain can be estimated only by establishing how these early humans coped with the difficulties around them. Such scholars focus their attention on stone tool handling - the only clear signal from the depths of time - and everywhere they see signs of growing intelligence. The ancient Acheulean tradition of the hand chopper continues but grows more diverse. Double-sided axes now have a variety of sizes and shapes, and they are often processed so symmetrically and carefully that it seems as if their creators were driven by aesthetic motives. When a person made a small ax to trim off the points of spears, or cut notches on a flake in order to rip off the bark from a thin trunk that was to become a spear, he carefully gave these tools the shape that best suited their purpose.
The primacy in updating the methods of processing tools belongs, apparently, to Europe. Because it is surrounded on three sides by seas, early Homo sapiens did not have an easy escape route to warmer regions with the onset of the Rice glaciation, and even Neanderthals sometimes found themselves cut off from the rest of the world for a period of time when, during the warm period following the Rice glaciation, cold snaps suddenly set in. Abrupt changes in the world around them naturally gave impetus to the ingenuity of the inhabitants of Europe, while the inhabitants of Africa and Asia, where the climate remained more even, were deprived of such an incentive.
About 75 thousand years ago, Neanderthal man received an especially strong push - the glaciers again went on the offensive. The climate of this last ice age, which received the name Würm, was relatively mild at first: the winters simply became snowy, and in summer the weather was cool, rainy. Nevertheless, the forests began to disappear again - and throughout Europe, up to the north of France, they were replaced by tundra or forest-tundra, where open spaces overgrown with moss and lichen were interspersed with clumps of stunted trees.
In earlier ice ages, early Homo sapiens groups usually fled from such inhospitable lands. But the Neanderthals did not leave them - at least in the summer - and hunted for meat, following the herds of reindeer, woolly rhinos and mammoths. They were probably first-class hunters, since it was impossible to survive for a long time only on the meager plant food provided by the tundra. Without a doubt, death reaped an abundant harvest in these northern outposts of humanity, the groups were small and, perhaps, easily fell prey to various diseases. Far from the harsh boundary of the glaciers, the number of groups was noticeably higher.
The tenacity with which the Neanderthals held out in the north, and the prosperity of those who lived in milder climates, were due, at least in part, to a shift in the art of stone working that occurred at the beginning of the Würm glaciation. The Neanderthals invented a new method of making tools, thanks to which a variety of flake devices won the final victory over simple chipped stones. Fine tools from flakes have long been made using the Levallois method - two or three ready-made flakes were fought off a pre-processed core, and in some places this method persisted for a long time. However, the new method was much more productive: many Neanderthals now chipped off a stone nodule, turning it into a disk-shaped core, and then hammered along the edge, directing the blow to the center, and chipped off flake after flake until almost nothing remained of the core. Finally, the working edges of the flakes were trimmed so that it was possible to work the wood, butcher carcasses and cut the skins.
The main advantage of this new method was that many flakes could be obtained from one disc-shaped core without much effort. Flakes, on the other hand, with the help of further processing, the so-called retouching, was not difficult to give the desired shape or edge, and therefore disc-shaped cores open a significant era of specialized tools. The stone inventories of the Neanderthals are much more varied than that of their predecessors. French archaeologist François Borde, one of the leading experts in Neanderthal stone working, lists more than 60 different types of tools used to cut, scrape, pierce and gouge. Not a single group of Neanderthals had all of these tools, but nevertheless, the inventory of each of them included a large number of highly specialized tools - serrated plates, stone knives with one blunt edge to make it easier to press on it, and many others. It is possible that some sharpened flakes served as spearheads - they were either pinched at the end of the spear, or tied to it with narrow strips of leather. With such a set of tools, people could receive from nature much more benefits than before.
Everywhere north of the Sahara and east as far as China, such whitewashed tools are becoming prevalent. All tools made in this vast area are called Mousterian (after the French cave of Le Moustier, where flake tools were first found in the 1860s). Sub-Saharan Africa is emerging with two distinct new types. One, dubbed "Forsmith", is a further development of the Acheulean tradition, including small choppers, a variety of side-scrapers, and narrow flake knives. Forsmith tools were made by people who lived in the same open grassy plains that the ancient Acheulean hunters preferred. The second new type, the Sangoan, was characterized by a special long, narrow and heavy weapon, a kind of combination of machete and thrusting weapon, as well as choppers and small side-scrapers. This type, like the Mousterian, marked a decisive departure from the Acheulean tradition. Although the Sangoan tools were rather crude in appearance, they were convenient for chopping and processing wood.
During the period from 75 to 40 thousand years BC, Neanderthals managed to establish themselves in many areas that were inaccessible to their ancestors. The European Neanderthals were not afraid of the advance of the tundra and mastered it. Some of their African cousins, armed with Sangoan guns, have invaded the forests of the Congo Basin, cutting paths through the lush thickets that have changed meadows with the return of the rainy seasons. Other Neanderthals settled on the vast plains in the west of the Soviet Union or climbed over the mighty mountain ranges in southern Asia and, entering the very heart of this continent, opened it up to human habitation. And yet some Neanderthals, finding ways where the bodies of water were not too far apart, penetrated into areas almost as dry as real deserts.
These conquests of new areas were not migrations in the strict sense of the word. Not a single even the most adventurous group could have come up with the suicidal idea of collecting their meager belongings and going one and a half hundred kilometers to places unknown to any of its members. In reality, this dispersal was a process that anthropologists call budding. Several people separated from the group and settled in the neighborhood, where there were sources of food. If everything went well, the number of their group gradually increased, and after two or three generations they were resettled to an even more remote area.
Now specialization becomes the main thing. The northern Mousterians were the best clothing designers in the world of that time, as evidenced by the numerous scrapers and scrapers left from them, which could be used to make skins. The Sangoans probably became the finest connoisseurs of the forest and, perhaps, learned how to make traps, since the four-legged inhabitants of the dense thickets did not roam in herds like the animals of the savannah, and it was much more difficult to track them down. In addition, people began to specialize in certain game - a significant step up from the "catch what you catch" principle, which has remained the basis of hunting since time immemorial. Evidence of this specialization can be found in one of the European inventories, which is called the jagged Mousterian type, since it is characterized by flakes with jagged edges. Jagged Mousterian implements are always found in close proximity to the bones of wild horses. Apparently, those who made them were so adept at hunting wild horses that they were not interested in other herbivores grazing nearby, but concentrated all their efforts on game, the meat of which they especially liked.
Where there were no certain necessary materials, the Neanderthals overcame this difficulty, looking for a replacement for them. In the treeless plains of central Europe, they began experimenting with bone tools instead of matching wooden implements. Water was also scarce in many areas, and people could not go far from streams, rivers, lakes or springs. However, the Neanderthals made their way into very dry areas using vessels for storing water - not clay, but made from eggshells. Recently, the shells of ostrich eggs were found along with Mousterian implements in the sun-baked Middle Eastern desert of the Negev. These eggs, neatly opened, turned into excellent flasks - filled with water, the group could safely set off on a long journey through the dry hills.
The sheer abundance of Mousterian tools is already sufficient proof that the Neanderthals far surpassed their predecessors in the ability to take from nature everything they needed for life. They have undoubtedly greatly expanded the realm of man. The conquest of new territories during the time of the Neanderthals took people far beyond the limits that Homo erectus was limited to, when, hundreds of thousands of years earlier, he began to settle from the tropics to the middle latitudes.
However, the failures of the Neanderthals also speak volumes. They did not penetrate into the depths of tropical rainforests, and, probably, the dense forests of the north also remained practically inaccessible to them. The settlement of these areas required such an organization of the group, such tools and devices, the creation of which was not yet capable of them.
Well, what about the New World? Theoretically, at the beginning of the Wurm glaciation, access to the incredible wealth of the Americas was open to them. Glaciers again fettered the water, and the level of the World Ocean dropped. As a result, a wide flat isthmus connected Siberia with Alaska, where the tundra habitual for them, abundant with big game, was widespread. The road south from Alaska was at times intercepted by the glaciers of western Canada and the Rocky Mountains. Nevertheless, thousands of years fell when the passage was open. However, it was very difficult to reach the isthmus. Eastern Siberia is a mountainous region crossed by several ridges. Even today, the climate there is very harsh and winter temperatures reach record lows. And during the Wurm glaciation, it could not help but be even worse.
Apparently, separate brave groups of Neanderthals established themselves in the south of Siberia, where then grass-covered plains stretched in place of the present dense taiga, in some places turning into the forest-tundra. Looking north and east, these Neanderthals saw endless hills stretching into the unknown. There was a lot of meat - horses, bison, shaggy mammoths with huge curved tusks, which are so convenient for breaking through the snow crust in order to get to the plants hidden under it. The temptation to follow the herds there was probably very great. And if the hunters knew that somewhere beyond the horizon lies an isthmus leading to the land of unafraid game, they probably would have gone there. After all, these were undoubtedly a dozen awkward people. Strongly built, hardened by the constant struggle for existence, long accustomed to the possibility of premature death, they were created for daring. But they instinctively knew that they had already invaded the lands of death itself - one cruel winter storm, and for them it would be over. This is how the Neanderthals never made it to America. The New World had to remain deserted until man acquired more effective weapons, learned to dress better and build warmer dwellings.
From the height of modern knowledge, it is very tempting to criticize Neanderthals for missing such a wonderful opportunity, for not making it to Australia, for retreating in front of dense jungle and thickets of coniferous forests. And in many other ways, they cannot compare with the people who came after them. Neanderthals never grasped the possibilities of bone as a material for tools, and the art of sewing, requiring bone needles, remained unknown to them. They did not know how to weave baskets and make earthen vessels, and their stone tools were inferior to those of those who lived after them. But there is another way of looking at Neanderthals. If a hunter who lived in warm England 250 thousand years ago suddenly found himself in a Neanderthal camp in ice-bound Europe during the Wurm glaciation, he would undoubtedly be amazed and delighted with what his mind - the mind of a Homo sapiens - managed to achieve. He would have seen people living well in conditions in which he would not have lasted even a few days.
Specialized tools of the skilled craftsmen
Neanderthal man used many methods of making tools, but he especially preferred the method, called Mousterian, in which the tools in these photographs were made. Unlike the early tools, which were chipped stones (see p. 42–43), the Mousterian tools were made from flakes that were chipped off from a core that had been previously processed in such a way that the shape of the flake was essentially predetermined.
The original method of making tools from flakes, called Levallois, existed for about 100 thousand years, and only then the Mousterian stone craftsmen improved it. In their skilful hands, from one core, the maximum amount of flakes was obtained, which could then be adapted to Neanderthal needs with the help of retouching!
Disc-shaped core and two tools
The core at the top was chipped off so that only a small disc-shaped piece remained of it - the thoughtful preliminary processing of the core and the precision of the blows allowed the craftsman to use this core almost entirely. With the same skill, the flakes were then turned into tools like a double-sided scraper.
The core at the top was chipped off so that only a small disc-shaped piece remained of it - the thoughtful preliminary processing of the core and the precision of the blows allowed the craftsman to use this core almost entirely. With the same skill, the flakes were then transformed into tools and a narrow thin point. Both of these guns are shown from the front and side.
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The Ice Age has always been a mystery. We know that he could shrink entire continents to the size of frozen tundra. We know there were eleven or so, and they seem to happen on a regular basis. We definitely know there was a lot of ice. However, there is much more to ice ages than meets the eye.
By the time the last ice age came, evolution had already "invented" mammals. The animals that chose to breed and reproduce during the Ice Age were quite large and covered in fur. Scientists have given them the common name "megafauna" because she managed to survive the ice age. However, since other, less cold-resistant species could not survive it, the megafauna felt pretty good.
Megafauna herbivores are accustomed to foraging in icy environments, adapting to their surroundings in a variety of ways. For example, Ice Age rhinos may have had a shovel-shaped horn for removing snow. Predators like saber-toothed tigers, short-faced bears, and dire wolves (yes, wolves from Game of Thrones did once exist) have also adapted to their surroundings. Although times were brutal, and the prey could well turn a predator into a prey, there was a lot of meat in it.
Ice age people
Despite their relatively small size and small hairline, Homo sapiens survived in the cold tundra of the ice ages for millennia. Life was cold and difficult, but people were resourceful. For example, 15,000 years ago, people of the Ice Age lived in hunter-gatherer tribes, built comfortable dwellings from mammoth bones and sewed warm clothes from animal fur. When food was plentiful, they stored it in natural permafrost refrigerators.
Since hunting tools at the time were mainly represented by stone knives and arrowheads, sophisticated weapons were rare. People used traps to capture and kill the huge animals of the Ice Age. When an animal fell into a trap, people attacked it in a group and beat it to death.
Little ice ages
Sometimes small ice ages occurred between large and long ones. They were not nearly as destructive, but could still cause hunger and disease due to bad harvests and other side effects.
The most recent of these small ice ages began sometime between the 12th and 14th centuries and peaked between 1500 and 1850. For hundreds of years, the Northern Hemisphere has had damn cold weather. In Europe, the seas were regularly frozen, and mountainous countries (such as Switzerland) could only watch as glaciers moved, destroying villages. There have been years without summer, and nasty weather conditions have affected all aspects of life and culture (perhaps this is why the Middle Ages seem dark to us).
Science is still trying to figure out what caused this little ice age. Possible reasons include a combination of severe volcanic activity and a temporary decrease in solar energy from the Sun.
Warm ice age
Some ice ages could be quite warm. The land was covered with a huge amount of ice, but in fact the weather was quite pleasant.
Sometimes the events that lead to the ice age are so severe that even if full of greenhouse gases (which trap the sun's heat in the atmosphere, warming the planet), ice will still continue to form because if there is a thick enough layer of pollution, it will reflect the sun's rays back into space. Experts say it would turn the Earth into a giant Baked Alaska dessert - cold on the inside (ice on the surface) and warm on the outside (warm atmosphere).
The man whose name recalls a famous tennis player was in fact a respected scientist, one of the geniuses that defined the scientific environment of the 19th century. He is considered one of the founding fathers of American science, although he was French.
In addition to many other achievements, it is thanks to Agassiz that we know at least something about the ice ages. Although this idea was touched by many before, in 1837, the scientist became the first person to seriously bring ice ages into science. His theories and publications on ice fields that covered most of the earth were foolishly dismissed when the author first presented them. Nevertheless, he did not deny his words, and further research ultimately led to the recognition of his "crazy theories."
Notably, his pioneering work on ice ages and glacial activity was a simple hobby. By the nature of his activity, he was an ichthyologist (he studied fish).
Man-made pollution prevented the next ice age
Theories that ice ages recur on a semi-regular basis, no matter what we do, often conflict with theories about global warming. While the latter are undoubtedly reputable, some believe that it is global warming that may be beneficial in the future fight against glaciers.
Carbon dioxide emissions from human activities are considered to be an essential part of the problem of global warming. However, they have one strange side effect. CO2 emissions may be able to stop the next ice age, according to researchers at the University of Cambridge. How? Although Earth's planetary cycle is constantly trying to start an ice age, it will only start if the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is extremely low. By pumping CO2 into the atmosphere, humans may have accidentally made ice ages temporarily inaccessible.
And even if worries about global warming (which is also extremely bad) force people to reduce their CO2 emissions, there is still time. We are currently sending so much carbon dioxide into the sky that the ice age will not begin for at least another 1000 years.
Ice Age Plants
It was relatively easy for predators during the ice ages. After all, they could always eat someone else. But what did the herbivores eat?
It turns out that everything they wanted. In those days, there were many plants that could survive the Ice Age. Even in the coldest times, there were steppe-meadow and tree-shrub areas that allowed mammoths and other herbivores not to starve to death. These pastures were full of plant species that thrive in cold, dry weather, such as spruce and pine trees. In warmer areas, birches and willows were abundant. In general, the climate at that time was very similar to that of Siberia. Although the plants were most likely seriously different from their modern counterparts.
All of the above does not mean that ice ages did not destroy some of the vegetation. If the plant could not adapt to the climate, it could only migrate through the seeds or disappear. Australia once had the longest lists of diverse plants until glaciers destroyed a good portion of them.
The Himalayas may have caused an ice age
Mountains, as a rule, are not famous for actively challenging anything other than occasional landslides - they just stand and stand. The Himalayas can refute this belief. Perhaps it is they who are directly responsible for causing the ice age.
When the landmasses of India and Asia collided 40-50 million years ago, the collision grew massive rock ridges into the Himalayan mountain range. This brought out a huge amount of "fresh" stone. Then a process of chemical erosion began, which removes significant amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere over time. And this, in turn, could affect the climate of the planet. The atmosphere "cooled down" and caused the Ice Age.
Snowball Earth
In most ice ages, ice sheets cover only part of the world. Even a particularly severe ice age is believed to have covered only about one third of the globe.
And what is "Snowball Earth"? The so called Snowball Earth.
Snowball Earth is the chilling grandfather of the ice ages. This is a complete freezer that literally froze every particle of the planet's surface until the Earth froze out into a huge snowball flying through space. The little that could survive a complete freeze either caught on rare spots with relatively little ice, or, in the case of plants, caught on spots where there was enough sunlight for photosynthesis.
According to some reports, this event happened at least once, 716 million years ago. But there could be more than one such period.
Garden of Eden
Some scholars seriously believe that the very Garden of Eden was real. They say that he was in Africa and was the only reason why our ancestors survived the ice age.
A little less than 200,000 years ago, a particularly hostile ice age killed the views left and right. Fortunately, a small group of early humans were able to survive the terrible cold. They stumbled across what is now South Africa. Despite the fact that ice has reaped its benefits around the world, this area remained ice-free and completely habitable. Its soil was rich in nutrients and provided a lot of food. There were many natural caves that could be used as hiding places. For young species struggling to survive, it was paradise.
The human population of the Garden of Eden numbered only a few hundred individuals. This theory is supported by many experts, but it still lacks conclusive evidence, including studies that show that humans have much less genetic diversity than most other species.
Ecology
Ice ages, which have occurred more than once on our planet, have always been covered with a lot of mysteries. We know that they shrouded entire continents in cold, turning them into sparsely populated tundra.
It is also known about 11 such periods, moreover, they all took place with regular constancy. However, we still do not know much about them. We invite you to get acquainted with the most interesting facts about the ice ages of our past.
Giant animals
By the time the last ice age came, in the course of evolution already mammals appeared... The animals that could survive in the harsh climatic conditions were quite large, their bodies were covered with a thick layer of fur.
Scientists have named these creatures "megafauna", which was able to survive at low temperatures in ice-covered areas, for example, in the area of modern Tibet. Smaller animals could not adapt to the new conditions of glaciation and perished.
Herbivorous representatives of the megafauna learned to find food for themselves even under layers of ice and were able to adapt to the environment in different ways: for example, rhinos ice age had shovel horns, with the help of which they dug out snow drifts.
Predatory animals, for example saber-toothed cats, giant short-faced bears and dire wolves, survived well in the new conditions. Although their prey could sometimes fight back due to their large size, there was plenty of it.
Ice age people
Despite the fact that modern man Homo sapiens could not boast at that time of large size and wool, he was able to survive in the cold tundra of the ice ages for millennia.
Living conditions were harsh, but people were resourceful. For instance, 15 thousand years ago they lived in tribes that were engaged in hunting and gathering, built original dwellings from mammoth bones, sewed warm clothes from animal skins. When food was plentiful, they made supplies in the permafrost - natural freezer.
Mainly used for hunting were such tools as stone knives and arrows. To catch and kill large ice age animals, it was necessary to use special traps... When the beast fell into such traps, a group of people attacked him and killed him to death.
Little Ice Age
Between major ice ages, sometimes there were small periods... This is not to say that they were destructive, but they also caused hunger, disease due to crop failure and other problems.
The most recent of the small ice ages began around 12-14 centuries... The most difficult time can be called the period from 1500 to 1850... At this time, a fairly low temperature was observed in the Northern Hemisphere.
In Europe, it was a common thing when the seas froze, and in mountainous regions, for example, in the territory of modern Switzerland, the snow did not melt even in summer... Cold weather has influenced every aspect of life and culture. Probably, the Middle Ages remained in history as "Time of Troubles" also because the planet was dominated by the Little Ice Age.
Warming periods
Some ice ages actually turned out to be quite warm... Despite the fact that the surface of the earth was shrouded in ice, the weather was relatively warm.
Sometimes a fairly large amount of carbon dioxide accumulated in the planet's atmosphere, which is the reason for the appearance greenhouse effect when heat is trapped in the atmosphere and heats up the planet. As it does so, ice continues to form and reflect the sun's rays back into space.
According to experts, this phenomenon led to the formation giant desert with ice on the surface but rather warm weather.
When is the next ice age?
The theory that ice ages occur on our planet at regular intervals runs counter to theories of global warming. There is no doubt about what is observed today widespread climate warming which could help prevent the next ice age.
Human activities lead to the emission of carbon dioxide, which is largely responsible for the problem of global warming. However, this gas has another strange one. side effect... According to researchers from University of Cambridge CO2 emissions could stop the next ice age.
According to the planetary cycle of our planet, the next ice age is about to begin, but it can only take place if the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will be relatively low... However, CO2 levels are now so high that no ice age is out of the question anytime soon.
Even if a person suddenly stops emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere (which is unlikely), the existing amount will be enough to prevent the onset of the ice age. at least another thousand years.
Ice Age Plants
The easiest life during the ice age was predators: they could always find food for themselves. But what did the herbivores actually eat?
It turns out that there was enough food for these animals. During the ice ages on the planet a lot of plants grew who could survive the harsh conditions. The steppe area was covered with bushes and grass, which fed on mammoths and other herbivores.
Larger plants could also be found in a great variety: for example, they grew in abundance spruce and pine... In warmer areas, there were birch and willow... That is, the climate is, by and large, in many modern southern regions resembled the one that exists in Siberia today.
However, the plants of the Ice Age were somewhat different from the modern ones. Of course, with the onset of cold weather many plants died out... If the plant was not able to adapt to the new climate, it had two options: either move to more southern zones, or die.
For example, present-day Victoria in southern Australia had the richest plant diversity on the planet until the Ice Age, which resulted in most of the species died.
Cause of the Ice Age in the Himalayas?
It turns out that the Himalayas, the highest mountain system of our planet, directly related with the onset of the ice age.
40-50 million years ago the land masses, where China and India are located today, collided, forming the highest mountains. As a result of the collision, huge volumes of "fresh" rocks from the bowels of the Earth were exposed.
These rocks eroded, and as a result of chemical reactions, carbon dioxide began to be displaced from the atmosphere. The climate on the planet began to become colder and colder, the ice age began.
Snowball Earth
During different ice ages, our planet was mostly shrouded in ice and snow. only partially... Even during the most severe ice age, ice covered only one third of the globe.
However, there is a hypothesis that at certain periods the Earth was still completely covered in snow, which made it look like a giant snowball. Life still managed to survive thanks to the rare islets with relatively little ice and sufficient light for plant photosynthesis.
According to this theory, our planet turned into a snowball at least once, more precisely 716 million years ago.
Garden of Eden
Some scholars are convinced that Garden of Eden described in the Bible actually existed. It is believed that he was in Africa, and it was thanks to him that our distant ancestors were able to survive during the ice age.
About 200 thousand years ago a severe ice age ensued, ending many forms of life. Fortunately, a small group of people were able to survive the extreme cold. These people moved to the area where South Africa is today.
Despite the fact that almost the entire planet was covered with ice, the area remained free of ice. A large number of living creatures lived here. The soils of this area were rich in nutrients, so there was abundance of plants... The caves created by nature were used by humans and animals as hiding places. It was a real paradise for sentient beings.
According to some scholars, in the "Garden of Eden" lived no more than a hundred people which is why humans do not have the same genetic diversity as most other species. However, this theory has not found scientific evidence.
Elements of spiritual culture were already found in the communities of Pithecanthropus (Homo erectus), but the Neanderthals had a fully developed spiritual culture. The rudiments of religion, magic, healing, sculpture, painting, dances and songs, musical instruments, the spiritualization of nature were characteristic of the Cro-Magnons. The burial of the corpses of deceased and deceased comrades distinguishes man from animals. Grief for the departed speaks of the strength of people's attachment to each other, of friendship and love. In the burials of ancient people, tools, jewelry, bones of killed animals are found. Consequently, even at that distant time, our ancestors believed in an afterlife and equipped their dead for this life. All these questions are well sanctified in the literature and I will not dwell on them.
The number of people and population density are closely related to the type of culture and the way food is produced. The area of the territory that is needed to feed three people who get their own food in different ways is different. For hunter-gatherers for a family of 3, at least 10 sq. km, for farmers not using irrigation - about 0.5 sq. km, and for farmers using irrigation - 0.1 sq. km. Consequently, with the transition from hunting and gathering to irrigated agriculture, the population should have increased by about 100 times. This is a very important factor, which is clearly not taken into account by anthropologists. All ancient technologically advanced civilizations were created by farmers.
However, it should be noted that agricultural civilizations are more vulnerable to abrupt climate changes. When the climate dries up, the civilizations of farmers either perished or were transformed into the civilizations of nomadic pastoralists. Some may have returned to hunting and gathering again.
The future of humanity
From the group of primates, poorly protected from the effects of the external environment, evolution has selected our prolific species, which has a unique ability to reproduce, migrate and transform our planet.
Will the evolution of man as a biological being continue? Nowadays, many say: “No. Cultural evolution has protected us from biological overloads that eliminated the weak, slow and poorly intelligent individuals. Now the use of machines, computers, clothing, glasses and modern medicine has devalued the previous inherited benefits associated with a powerful physique. intellectual ability, pigmentation, visual acuity and resistance to diseases such as malaria.In every society there is a high percentage of physically weak or malformed people, as well as people with low vision or skin color and poor resistance to diseases that do not match climatic conditions of the area they live in. Physically imperfect people who would have died in childhood 100 years ago now survive and give birth, passing on their genetic defects to future generations.
Migration also contributed to the suspension of human evolution. Now, not a single group of the Earth's population lives in isolation for a sufficiently long time necessary for its transformation into a new species, as it happened in the Pleistocene epoch. And racial differences will be smoothed out as the number of mixed marriages between representatives of the peoples of Europe, Africa, America, India and China increases. "Yes, this grim scenario for the future of humanity is quite real. The extinction of humanity as a biological species seems more likely than its further evolution.
However, the development of technology can lead to the emergence of certain hybrids - people and mechanisms. Already now, teeth are being boldly replaced; if necessary, artificial kidneys and an artificial heart are being built into the human body. Arm and leg prostheses are controlled by signals from the brain. Connecting the human brain to a powerful computer, or the Internet, can create a monster whose actions are incomprehensible and unpredictable. Hybrids of people and mechanisms (robotic people) may well explore other worlds, penetrate into the depths of space. This is the second scenario for the development of mankind and the evolution of creatures-mechanisms.
A third scenario is also possible. By the way, it seems to me the most probable. The rapidly increasing population of the Earth is dependent on increased production of food and energy. But both require overexploitation of our planet's natural resources. Increased tillage leads to soil erosion, which reduces fertility, and the depletion of fossil fuels poses a threat to energy supply. Climate change can exacerbate both of these problems. The overly abundant, food and fuel shortage of Homo sapiens can dramatically decrease its numbers from war, hunger and epidemics. The remaining handfuls of surviving humans will be returned to hunter-gatherer status. The natural factors of evolution - mutations and natural selection - will begin to act again. Groups of people will be isolated from each other by great distances, water barriers, language barriers and prejudice. I can say one thing - in this case, not residents of multimillion-dollar policies and large cities, not residents of the so-called civilized countries, but the aborigines of Australia, the Arctic, inhabitants of tropical rainforests will survive and pass on their genes to descendants, in the oral traditions of which mentions of iron birds, wars will remain titans-demons, etc.
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