Foraging Societies

Settled Agriculture

Primary Urbanization

Classical Empires

• Early River Valley Empires
• Expansion and Contraction of Empires
• Cosmopolitan Empires

• Formation of Eurasian Ecumene
• Barbarian Invasions
• Islamic Expansion
• Mongol Dominance
• Second Islamic Age

Unification of the Hemispheres

• Voyages of Exploration
• Chinese Dominance
• The New Imperialism

Formation of World Culture

• Modern Western Civilization
• The New Imperialism
• The World Wars
• Decolonization
• After the Cold War

© 2003 David Koeller.  All rights reserved.

While it is often described as the "Agricultural Revolution," the development of settled societies took several millennia after the first discovery of agriculture. Moreover, this process occurred at different times in different parts of the world based on the domestication of different plants. If one is going to speak in term of revolution, one might better speak in terms of "agricultural revolutions."

c. 10,000 BC: Beginnings of Settled Agriculture 10,000 BC: First agricultural villages 10,000 BC: Invention of the bow and arrow 10,000 BC: Dogs and reindeer are domesticated 10,000 BC: Beginnings of settled agriculture 10,000 BC: Earliest pottery (Japan) c. 8,000 to 6,500 BC: Settled Agriculture in Mesopotamia c. 7,000: Beginning of Settled Agricultural Revolution c. 6,500-5,650 BC: Catal Hulyuk c. 6,000 BC - c. 2,000 BC: Settled Agriculture in Africa 6,000 BC: Beginning of Settled Agriculture in the Nile River Valley 2,000 BC: Beginning of Settled Agriculture in the Niger River Valley 200 BC: Height of Nok culture c. 6,000 to 3,000: Settled Agriculture in India c. 5,000 to 3,000 BC: Settled Agriculture in China 10,000 to 4,000 BC: Painted Pottery Bowl (China) 5,0000 to 2,700 BC: Yangshao culture 3,5000 to 2,000 BC: Longsham culture 6, 000 BC: Village of Ban Po in China c. 4,000 to 1,000 BC: Settled Agriculture in Europe ca. 4000 BC: The Culture of Vra ca. 2000 BC: Stonehenge c. 3,000 BC to AD 700: Settled Agriculture in the Americas c. 500 BC to AD 400: Adena and Hopewell Cultures

Resources Primary Sources Secondary Sources

Copyright 1996-9 by David W. Koeller.  All rights reserved.