Climate Change in Prehistory: The End of the Reign of Chaos
Cambridge University Press, 8/21/2008
EAN 9780521070102, ISBN10: 0521070104
Paperback, 372 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 2.1 cm
Language: English
How did humankind deal with the extreme challenges of the last Ice Age? How have the relatively benign post-Ice Age conditions affected the evolution and spread of humanity across the globe? By setting our genetic history in the context of climate change during prehistory, the origin of many features of our modern world are identified and presented in this illuminating book. It reviews the aspects of our physiology and intellectual development that have been influenced by climatic factors, and how features of our lives - diet, language and the domestication of animals - are also the product of the climate in which we evolved. In short: climate change in prehistory has in many ways made us what we are today. Climate Change in Prehistory weaves together studies of the climate with anthropological, archaeological and historical studies, and will fascinate all those interested in the effects of climate on human development and history.
1. Introduction
2. The climate of the last 100,000 years
3. Life in the Ice Age
4. The evolutionary implications of living with the Ice Age
5. Emerging from the Ice Age
6. Recorded history
7. Our climatic inheritance
8. The future
Appendix
Bibliography
References.
Review of the hardback: 'This is an intriguing book of unexpected relevance to the 21st century. The main narrative is a climate history from the last ice age to the 10,000 years of relative tranquillity that has followed. Burroughs also shows how humans took advantage of this period of calm to build a vaulting dominance of the planet. He invites hard questions on how societies will cope with the return to climatic turbulence.' New Scientist