SCITECH

• Prehistory is the period of time from the appearance of the first human being to the invention of writing, starting 3 million years ago and lasting to the 3,000 B.C (Before Christ).
• Prehistory is studied with material remains such as the human body itself, hunting instruments, paintings, sculptures, etc.
• The Stone Age is divided into Paleolithic and Neolithic, with the Paleolithic stage characterized by nomadism, hunting and gathering, invention of fire, clothing made from fur, and the Neolithic stage characterized by agriculture and farming, sedentism, permanent houses, and clothes made by the skin of animals.
• The first metal used by humans seems to have been copper, with the Bronze Age being the new period in the development of technology when metals are first used regularly in the creation of tools and weapons.
• Iron is the key metal of history, with the Iron Age being the new period in the development of industry that begins with the general use of iron and continues into modern times.
• Ancient History started when people invented writing, with civilizations appearing all over the world, such as the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans.
• A civilization can be defined as the way of life of a people and how they organize themselves into a society.
• Early people joined together to create villages, city-states, nations, and empires.
• The first governments were formed, people started to trade, and archaeologists have learned a great deal about these early civilizations from the artifacts they left behind.
• Important constructions were built during ancient history, such as Egyptian Pyramids, Greek Parthenon, and Roman theatres.
• Ancient History finished when the Roman Empire ended.
• Egypt is a dry, hot desert country and ancient life depended on the waters of the River Nile.
• Egyptian houses were almost built from bricks of Nile mud, with the palaces of the Pharaohs being built from stone.
• The richer families in ancient Egypt had houses with beautiful gardens, looked after by slaves or servants.
• The Egyptians enjoyed story-telling, parties, and music, with a number of great public festivals such as the celebration of the resurrection of Osiris, where thousands of people danced to the music of harps and flutes.
• By the 1400s, after the plague, Europe looked very different, and the wars were over, and the Middle Ages were coming to an end.
• Education was taken very seriously in school.
• Castles were built for the lords and kings who lived in them.
• In school, math was difficult, as six Roman letters (I, V, X, L, C, and M) were considered as numbers.
• By the early 1300s, Europe suffered from both war and disease.
• When a person was born into a certain group, they rarely moved to another level.
• The church had a great influence over the people.
• The Middle Ages occurred between the fall of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance.
• Kings ruled by what they believed was their “Divine Right”, meaning they believed God made them the King, and their kingdom was passed down through generations.
• The Middle Ages was defined by a feudal system in much of Europe.
• When you read about castles and the characters that lived around them, these stories are being told about this time in history.
• At night, Romans used lamps that burned olive oil.
• Many fairy tales have their roots in the Middle Ages.
• When conflict arose, the peasants would leave their fields and villages and come into the safety of the castle walls.
• Historians usually divide the Middle Ages into three smaller periods called the Early Middle Ages, the High Middle Ages, and the Late Middle Ages.
• Greeks adopted and utilized a new alphabet, which is very similar to the one we use today.
• The Middle Ages refers to a time in European history from 400 - 1500 AD.
• During much of the Middle Ages, people in Europe were fighting against the Islamic Empire to take back the Eastern Mediterranean, especially Jerusalem, for the Christian religion.
• The peasants believed that the harder they worked, the more of their money they gave to the church, and the more they served the church, the better the after-life would be for them.
• The people who were part of the church played an important part also.
• The feudal system consisted of kings, lords, knights, vassals, peasants, and serfs.
• The poor lived in huts made from sticks, straw and mud.
• The wars were made much worse by the Black Death (bubonic plague), which spread along the Silk Road from China to Europe starting in 1328, killing millions of people.
• While the kids were in school and the mothers and daughters tended to the household chores, the fathers spent a few hours working each day.
• Greek history is an interesting and wonderful era of human invention, philosophy, art and architecture.