Mesolithic
Middle stone era
The Mesolithic is the middle Stone Age, roughly 10,000 to 5,000 BCE in Europe, bridging the end of the last Ice Age and the dawn of agriculture.
This transitional period saw humans developing microliths—tiny stone blades—and shifting from pure hunting-gathering toward fishing, foraging, and early settlement: Mesolithic hunter-gatherers, the Mesolithic period. (Lowercase mesolithic functions as an adjective.)
Current geological epoch
- postglacialAfter ice ages ended
- Stone AgeEra of knapped tools
- prehistoryEra before writing
- Bronze AgeEarly metalworking civilization period
interglacial · Pleistocene · chronology · radiocarbon dating · stratigraphy
Those seeking wild food
- fishingCatching aquatic creatures
- gatheringCollection of people meeting
- shellfishAquatic creatures with exoskeletons
- hazelnutsEdible tree nuts
acorns · wild boar · aurochs · red deer · fish traps · fowling · sealing · dugout canoes
After ice ages ended
- afforestationIntroducing woods to treeless land
- sea level riseIncreasing ocean surface height
- tundraFrigid treeless biome
- birchPale deciduous hardwood
pine forests · steppe · wetlands · coastlines · temperate forests · paleoclimate · boreal · river valleys
Arched timber-shaping implements
- scrapersTools for stripping surfaces
- arrowheadsSharpened projectile tips
- harpoonsBarbed hunting spears
- awlsPointed hole-making tools
blades · flint · bone tools · grindstones · knives · axes · chisels · flintknapping
Without fixed residence
- base campsExpedition starting locations
- hutsSmall crude dwellings
- cemeteriesGrounds for interring dead
- ornamentsDecorative embellishments for display
ochre · territoriality · hunter-gatherers · egalitarian · kinship · shamanism
Cultivation of land, livestock
- domesticationAdapting species to captivity
- potteryFired clay objects
- farmingCultivating land for food
- animal husbandryRaising domesticated beasts systematically
Holocene
Current geological epoch
- postglacialAfter ice ages ended
- Stone AgeEra of knapped tools
- prehistoryEra before writing
Bronze Age · interglacial · Pleistocene · chronology · radiocarbon dating · stratigraphy
foragers
Those seeking wild food
- fishingCatching aquatic creatures
- gatheringCollection of people meeting
- shellfishAquatic creatures with exoskeletons
hazelnuts · acorns · wild boar · aurochs · red deer · fish traps · fowling · sealing · dugout canoes · hunting
postglacial
After ice ages ended
- afforestationIntroducing woods to treeless land
- sea level riseIncreasing ocean surface height
- tundraFrigid treeless biome
birch · pine forests · steppe · wetlands · coastlines · temperate forests · paleoclimate · boreal · river valleys · estuaries
adzes
Arched timber-shaping implements
- scrapersTools for stripping surfaces
- arrowheadsSharpened projectile tips
- harpoonsBarbed hunting spears
awls · blades · flint · bone tools · grindstones · knives · axes · chisels · flintknapping · bows
nomadic
Without fixed residence
- base campsExpedition starting locations
- hutsSmall crude dwellings
- cemeteriesGrounds for interring dead
ornaments · ochre · territoriality · hunter-gatherers · egalitarian · kinship · shamanism
agriculture
Cultivation of land, livestock
- domesticationAdapting species to captivity
- potteryFired clay objects
- farmingCultivating land for food
MesolithicPaleolithic
Earliest archaeological era
Neolithic · Lower Paleolithic · Bronze Age · modern era · contemporary
monolith, monolithic, megalith, Neolithic, megaliths, neolithic, lithic, megalithic, monoliths