The arts from the prehistory are vital to nowadays to study the history. The paintings, sculptures, and architectures all tell the stories of the past life, represent the cultures of the periods and illustrate the environment of the survival. Some communications conveyed from the arts of the ancient age are fascinating: hunting, fertility, defense, and the death. Hunting was a very important element of survival because the animals were the main source of gathering food and materials. Nevertheless, in different periods and locations, hunting meant differently. In the Paleolithic era, survival was the priority, but the weapons and tools were all made from stones which resulted hunting was extremely hard and dangerous. In the dark caves, Paleolithic …show more content…
In Neolithic Period, from 7200 -6700 BC, Jericho people rebuilt the dead members’ skulls in a monumental scale using various materials and placed them on shelves as a means of remembering. It was also a form of ancestor worship. Move to Sumer, around 2500 BC, Sumerians buried the dead with a number of goods such as instruments. The bull-headed lyre was an example of the objects made of precious materials such as lapis lazuli, which meant to function the dead to act as they acted when they were alive and entertain them in the afterlife. For the Egyptians, the death and the afterlife were a major issue of elites. The elites’ dead bodies would be preserved as mummies or had ka statues for the ka to reside afterlife; otherwise, their ka would dwell in the hell for eternity. Menkaure and Wife is an example of a ka statue of a Pharaoh and his aristocracy. The Pyramids were constructed for keeping the dead bodies and storing the treasures for the Pharaohs in eternity. Great Pyramids of Khufu, Khafre, and Menkaure from the Old Kingdom built around 2551-2472 BC was located the west side of the river which was the land of dead. While in Ancient China of Qin Dynasty, the Terracotta Army was structured for the emperor Qin Shi Huang for his tomb. Thousands of statues which also included some non-military figures, meant to function to as his army and entertain him in his
The significance of the tomb shows Qin’s power he possessed over his people. Inside were over 8,000 Terra Cotta clay soldiers along with horses, carts, merchants, weapons and chariots made from different medal. In all, over 700,000 people were used to build the tomb and it was built in just 38 years. This discovery reveals an immense amount of information about early Chinese civilization. During China’s warring state period, Shihuangdi Qin, from the western state of Qin and his army conquered the neighboring civilizations to them.
First, they wrap the body in cloths this is called mummification. The cloths used in mummification belonged to the deceased and were their Shentis. A Shenti is a piece of clothing that covered the person from the sun and protects the body. They cherished these and were needed for the afterlife. Second, they would make a stone Sarcophagus much like a coffin.
The Tomb and Terra Cotta Army of Qin Shihuang is a remarkable discovery in the world of archaeological excavations. It is a collection of over 8,000 magnificently unique clay soldiers. They are protecting their dead leader, Qin Shihuang, even though he has passed on to the afterlife. Nowhere else in the world can one find a structure of this scale and detail. Because of this, it is a masterpiece of the ancient world and it can teach archaeologists about the culture of this time period.
The Egyptians believed that if you were buried with your riches you would take them with you into the next life. Pharaohs would have been buried with unimaginable wealth, that made their tombs a prime target for robbery. Starting around the time of thutmose the 1st pharaoh were buried in the valley of the kings. Their tombs sunk deep into the mountains. Projecting them from robbery, and allowing for kings to be buried with all their wealth.
Egyptians believed that the “ka” was the person’s lifeforce and it would leave the body (Berger, Page 50). Another part of the soul, known as “ba”, is believed to go between both worlds of the Living and the Dead. Ancient Egyptians firmly thought that if they carried out the rituals just right, the “ka” and “ba” would reunite in afterlife (Berger, Page 50). Ancient Egyptians would make elaborate tombs as a proper send off to their afterlife which included many rituals. As everyone is preparing for the afterlife, the deceased are believed to go somewhere peaceful where the blue skies are endless, the weather is beautiful, and the dead will be greeted by familiar people and things (Berger, Page
There were many explorers, conquistadors, and settlers from the Age of Exploration. They discovered land, metals, spices, and natives. Although, the discoveries of new colonies and the New World did have a major impact on our world today, these men should not be glorified. During the time of exploration the Europeans had three goals in mind, God, glory, and gold.
When it comes to the use of technology and the means of food acquisition, there are many similarities and differences between the Paleolithic Era and the Neolithic Era. Technology during the Paleolithic Era were stone tools. These stone tools were used to cut, scrape, and to engrave. Technology during the Neolithic Era were farming, specialized tools. Farming was used to get food.
The Han ruler believed that it was not only right but crucial for people to “[serve] the dead parents as if [they] are serving the living” (Qian, 2018). This represented the daily life of the Han Dynasty and why tomb carving was valued so much. People apart of the Han Dynasty spent exponential amounts of money on the tombs and what filled the tombs to show they valued the lives of the deceased. Moreover, the Han Dynasty began a new era of furnishing tombs with “objects from life instead of bronze and iron ritual vessels,” which developed a new way of representing the wealth of the deceased (Campbell, 2010). These changes in how the Han Dynasty filled the tombs
The Roman religion though that death was a temporary, so the Egyptian tombs are different because the Roman believed in afterlife. The Roman painted the tombs of them celebrating their accomplishments, affiliations and lineage of the powerful person.
“A false door provided in the tomb structure to allow the deceased’s ka to pass from the burial chamber to partake of the offerings.” (The Afterlife in Ancient Egypt) Because of this, a great amount of time and effort was spent in designing the false door to include the Egyptian’s main form of record keeping, hieroglyphics, and other painstaking details to reflect the owner’s good deeds, keeping them from entering the underworld. The false door was a form of connection between the afterlife and the material world. Without the necessary objects, the afterlife would not mirror the life that they had lived. It was the belief that a pharaoh was destined to be a pharaoh in the afterlife, if the items to signify this were kept inside his tomb.
In recent years, there has been an ongoing debate as to what caused the extinction of the Neanderthals around forty thousand years ago. Some researchers speculate that Neanderthals did not develop sufficient tools that would allow them to gather and hunt food efficiently while others speculate that early modern humans introduced deadly pathogens into Neanderthal populations which led to their extinction. However, researchers led by zooarchaeologist Jamie Hodgkins have found that frequent and lengthy glacial periods may have led to the extinction of the Neanderthals. They hypothesized that glacial periods may have reduced the quantity of prey that the Neanderthals hunted therefore they were unable to intake the required amount of food to survive.
The Egyptians were famous for their skills of preserving the human body for decades and even centuries to come. This expensive and time consuming process was known as Mummification. Once one of the world’s most powerful and renowned civilizations, the Egyptians had an adept ability of preserving the human body for religious and ritualistic purposes. Originally, the Egyptians discovered the secrets of mummification through natural causes, i.e. the weather and the hot sand drying out the bodies of the dead that were left in shallow pits in the desert. As the Egyptians mastered the trade, the service was used mostly for pharos and the extremely wealthy.
The statues were a magic identity-substitute for the dead. The religion of ancient Egypt aimed against death and thus by preserving the flesh and bone they wanted to defeat death and halt the passage of time, for death was the victory of time. For them survival was the practice of embalming the dead corporeal body and it satisfied
I think those days was extremely difficult yet simple compare to these times. I also think the human minds have always wondered into the unknown allowing them to expand their ability to develop the environment they resided in. Humans has always cultivated in order to promote and develop their life styles. As the population increased this allowed the Neolithic life style to change as well. The increase in the number of sedentary farmers is primarily responsible for the leap in human population during the Neolithic transition.
At the time of their death, their bodies were cautiously preserved and buried in extravagant tombs holding their riches to accompany the pharaoh into the afterlife.