Venus figurines
Paleolithic carvings of the female form, often with exaggerated breasts, buttocks, hips, and stomachs, which may have had religious significance
Dreamtime
The native Australian Aborigines' belief about how they came to be
Clovis Culture
prehistoric culture of North America
megafaunal extinction
Dying out of a number of large animal species, including the mammoth and several species of horses and camels, that occurred around 11,000-10,000 years ago, at the end of the Ice Age. The extinction may have been caused by excessive hunting or by the changing climate of the era.
Austronesian migrations
The last phase of the great human migration that established a human presence in every habitable region of the earth. These people settled the Pacific Islands & Madagascar in a series of seaborne migrations that began around 3500 years ago.
trance dance
Dance conducted to view the spiritual world with the aid of the psychoactive drugs.
Gobekli Tepe
oldest religious structure. made by hunter gathers. Indicates that religion came before organization of labor, settlement and agriculture
Fertile Crescent
an area of rich farmland in Southwest Asia where the first civilizations began
Teosinte
The wild ancestor of maize.
Diffusion
Movement of molecules from an area of higher concentration to an area of lower concentration.
Bantu Migration
The movement of the Bantu peoples southward throughout Africa, spreading their language and culture, from around 500 b.c. to around A.D 1000
Ishi
The last surviving member of a gathering and hunting group known as the Yahi who lived in northern California. His people were driven into extinction during the second half of the nineteenth century by the intrusion of farming and herding "civilized" societies.
Banpo
A Chinese archeological site where the remains of a significant Neolithic village have been found
pastoral societies
societies whose subsistence derives from the rearing of domesticated animals
Catalhuyuk
An important Neolithic site in what is now Turkey.
Cheifdoms
groups of tribes with common goals and beliefs that unite for power
Shamans
Spiritually adept men and women who communicated with the unseen world
Paleolithic
Old Stone Age