Wondering about shared interests

Stevie said:

prehistoric humanity

Who isn’t interested in this? I’m no expert but it’s fascinating all the same. 

Since it's prehistory, by definition, there's no historical record.

Which leaves it open to interpretation and speculation based of patchy evidence. Interesting but always subject to revision.

There's some fanciful stuff out there.

But the antikythera mechanism, albeit not prehistory, points to more sophistication than some allow.

People 10,000 or 50,000 were not mentally much different to now. The problem is we have issues to piece it together from what ever scraps survived.

Not all prehistoric evidence is recorded in writing! There may be speculation over some aspects, but we can say much from archaeological analysis of pottery, from scientific analysis of clay composition to representation of culture - DNA - agriculture, diet, health …. There are many facts.

You are correct that the prehistoric period generally refers to the period when something wasn’t written down, but it means more than that. Prehistoric refers to the period before the first known writing systems were developed, so you definitely didn’t consume your breakfast in the prehistoric period.

I was referring to written works, ie, written in the historical period, that are discussing events in the prehistoric period, before writing was invented.  

The timeline of when prehistory begins and ends depends on which part of the world it refers to, as writing systems developed at different times. 

Archaeologists usually refer to the prehistoric period as dating from Neolithic times which in the Levant dates from around 8300 BCE - 4500 BCE, to around 590 BCE.  These dates differ in other parts of the world.  

The Palaeolithic period in the Levant predates 8300 BCE, but it is sometimes loosely described as prehistoric and some people have started referring to prehistoric as any time back to the dawn of the first humans. 

Even though there aren’t written records of a prehistoric person’s last meal, archaeologists sometimes find the remains of food in the stomach of a body that has  been preserved in a peat bog or ice. Scientific analysis can show what their last meal contained. Grains of barley, wheat, berries and other things provide huge amounts of evidence about health, wealth, times of famine and so on. 

You are correct that the prehistoric period generally refers to the period when something wasn’t written down, but it means more than that. Prehistoric refers to the period before the first known writing systems were developed, so you definitely didn’t consume your breakfast in the prehistoric period.

I was referring to written works, ie, written in the historical period, that are discussing events in the prehistoric period, before writing was invented.  

The timeline of when prehistory begins and ends depends on which part of the world it refers to, as writing systems developed at different times. 

Archaeologists usually refer to the prehistoric period as dating from Neolithic times which in the Levant dates from around 8300 BCE - 4500 BCE, to around 590 BCE.  These dates differ in other parts of the world.  

The Palaeolithic period in the Levant predates 8300 BCE, but it is sometimes loosely described as prehistoric and some people have started referring to prehistoric as any time back to the dawn of the first humans. 

Even though there aren’t written records of a prehistoric person’s last meal, archaeologists sometimes find the remains of food in the stomach of a body that has  been preserved in a peat bog or ice. Scientific analysis can show what their last meal contained. Grains of barley, wheat, berries and other things provide huge amounts of evidence about health, wealth, times of famine and so on.