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Ancient technology

Ancient technology encompasses the diverse tools, techniques, and systems invented by early human societies from the Paleolithic era through classical antiquity, roughly spanning 3.3 million years ago to the early centuries CE, which facilitated survival, societal organization, and cultural development across regions like Africa, the Near East, Europe, and Asia.^[1]^[2] The earliest examples include simple stone tools such as hammerstones and sharp flakes from the Lomekwian and Oldowan industries, dating back to 3.3 million and 2.6 million years ago respectively, used by hominins for butchering animals and processing plants, marking a pivotal shift in human evolution by enabling access to new food sources and promoting cognitive advancements.^[3]^[1] In the Neolithic period (ca. 8500–3000 BCE), technological progress accelerated with the domestication of plants and animals, leading to innovations in agriculture such as irrigation systems, sickles for harvesting, and pottery for storage, which supported settled communities in the Fertile Crescent and beyond.^[2] Metallurgy emerged during the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age (ca. 4500–1200 BCE), with the smelting of copper, bronze, and later iron in regions like Mesopotamia and Anatolia, enabling stronger tools, weapons, and trade networks that underpinned early urban civilizations.^[2] Concurrently, advances in textiles, including weaving and dyeing with natural agents like murex snails, and bonding materials such as bitumen and plaster, facilitated construction and daily life enhancements.^[4] Monumental engineering defined later ancient technologies, exemplified by Egyptian pyramids and obelisks (ca. 2700–1000 BCE), built using ramps, levers, and copper tools without iron or wheels, alongside Mesopotamian ziggurats and city walls constructed from mudbrick and stone masonry.^[5]^[2] In the classical Mediterranean world (ca. 800 BCE–400 CE), Greek and Roman innovations included water management via aqueducts and hydraulics, siege engines for warfare, and early machines like Archytas' mechanical pigeon (ca. 425 BCE) and Heron's steam-powered aeolipile (ca. 60 CE), representing foundational steps toward automation and feedback control systems.^[5]^[6] These developments, studied through archaeology, texts, and experimental reconstruction, reveal how ancient peoples harnessed natural resources and mathematical principles to solve practical challenges, laying groundwork for modern engineering.^[6]^[4]

Overview

Definition and Scope

Ancient technology refers to the practical knowledge, tools, techniques, and mechanical principles developed by early human civilizations to extend human capabilities for survival, production, and societal organization, spanning roughly from 3000 BCE to 500 CE before the onset of the Middle Ages.^[7] This period emphasizes human ingenuity in devising solutions through manual craftsmanship and simple mechanics, without reliance on industrial-scale machinery or fossil fuel-based power systems.^[7] The scope of ancient technology broadly encompasses innovations in tools for daily use, agricultural systems for food production, engineering feats like structures and infrastructure, and proto-scientific methods involving observation and experimentation to harness natural forces.^[7] Its study is inherently interdisciplinary, integrating evidence and methodologies from archaeology to excavate and analyze artifacts, history to contextualize developments within timelines and events, and anthropology to explore the social and cultural roles of these technologies in shaping human behavior and organization.^[8] Central characteristics of ancient technology include empirical innovation driven by iterative trial and error rather than formalized theory, labor-intensive processes dependent on human or animal effort, and profound cultural integration where technologies often intertwined with religious practices, governance structures, or symbolic expressions of power.^[7] In distinction from prehistoric technology, which applies to non-literate societies and rudimentary adaptations prior to widespread urbanization and writing systems, ancient technology focuses on the advancements of literate civilizations capable of recording and transmitting knowledge through scripts like cuneiform or hieroglyphs.^[7]

Chronological Framework

The chronological framework of ancient technology builds upon prehistoric foundations (detailed in the Prehistoric Foundations section) and is typically divided into broad periods that reflect major shifts in human innovation and societal organization, extending through the early centuries of the common era. The Bronze Age, spanning roughly 3000 to 1200 BCE, marked the widespread adoption of bronze metallurgy, enabling advanced tool-making, urbanization, and trade networks primarily in the Near East, Europe, and parts of Asia.^[9] The Iron Age followed from about 1200 to 500 BCE, with iron smelting revolutionizing agriculture, warfare, and construction due to its abundance and durability, particularly in the Mediterranean and Near East.^[10] Classical Antiquity, from approximately 500 BCE to 500 CE, saw the refinement and integration of these technologies across empires like Greece, Rome, and Persia, fostering engineering feats in hydraulics, architecture, and mechanics.^[11] Key transitions shaped the progression of technological development within this framework. The Neolithic Revolution, beginning around 10,000 BCE in the Fertile Crescent, served as a foundational shift by introducing domesticated plants and animals, which supported population growth and the specialization of labor essential for later technological advances.^[12] Conversely, the Bronze Age collapse around 1200 BCE disrupted established systems across the eastern Mediterranean and Near East, leading to the decline of palace economies and hindering the diffusion of metallurgical and administrative technologies for centuries.^[13] Regional variations highlight the uneven pace of technological chronology, influenced by geography and resource availability. In the Near East, innovations like early metallurgy appeared by 3000 BCE, while in the Americas, analogous developments such as agriculture in Mesoamerica began around 7000 BCE but complex metallurgy lagged until about 1000 BCE in the Andes.^[14]^[15] Several interconnected factors drove the timing and spread of ancient technologies. Climate changes, such as the warming following the last Ice Age around 10,000 BCE, facilitated the Neolithic Revolution by creating habitable environments for cultivation, while later droughts around 1200 BCE contributed to societal disruptions.^[16] Human migrations, including Indo-European movements into Europe and Asia during the late Bronze and early Iron Ages, carried knowledge of tools and farming techniques across continents.^[17] Trade routes, such as those connecting Mesopotamia to the Indus Valley by 2500 BCE, accelerated the exchange of materials like tin and ideas for alloying, influencing technological adoption timelines.^[18]

Sources of Evidence

Knowledge of ancient technology is primarily derived from physical artifacts, such as tools, weapons, and structural ruins, which provide direct evidence of manufacturing techniques and material use.^[19] These objects, often recovered from archaeological sites, reveal insights into processes like stone knapping, metalworking, and pottery production through their form, wear patterns, and composition.^[19] Written texts, including clay tablets from Mesopotamia and papyri from Egypt, document technical knowledge such as mathematical calculations for construction and recipes for alloys or dyes.^[20] Iconography, including wall paintings and carved reliefs in tombs and temples, depicts tools, machinery, and labor practices, offering visual records of technologies in use.^[21] Archaeological methods are essential for contextualizing these primary sources. Excavation techniques systematically uncover and preserve artifacts and structures, allowing reconstruction of technological sequences through careful documentation of site layouts.^[22] Stratigraphy, based on the principle of superposition where upper layers are younger than lower ones, establishes relative chronologies for technological developments by analyzing soil and deposit layers.^[23] Radiocarbon dating (C-14 method) provides absolute dates for organic materials like wood, charcoal, and textiles associated with technologies; it measures the decay of carbon-14 isotopes with a half-life of 5730 years, reliably dating remains up to approximately 50,000 years old.^[24] Secondary sources complement primary evidence by interpreting and expanding on it. Historical accounts, such as those by Herodotus in the fifth century BCE, describe Egyptian technologies like canal irrigation and pyramid construction machinery, though filtered through the author's observations.^[25] Modern analyses apply scientific techniques to primary materials, including metallurgical testing to determine alloy compositions and heat treatments in ancient metals, and ancient DNA (aDNA) extraction to trace trade networks through genetic markers in traded goods or human remains.^[26] These methods reveal, for instance, long-distance exchanges of raw materials essential for technological innovation.^[26] Reconstructing ancient technology faces significant challenges due to incomplete records, as many perishable materials and sites have not survived, leading to gaps in understanding everyday or experimental technologies.^[27] Biases in ancient texts, often written by elites or for propagandistic purposes, can exaggerate achievements or omit failures, requiring cross-verification with physical evidence.^[27] Recent discoveries, such as the Göbekli Tepe site in Turkey excavated starting in the 1990s, have updated views of prehistoric capabilities by revealing complex monumental architecture built by hunter-gatherers around 9600 BCE, challenging assumptions about the timeline of technological and social complexity.^[28]

Prehistoric Foundations

Paleolithic Innovations

The Paleolithic era, spanning from approximately 3.3 million years ago to around 10,000 BCE, marked the initial phase of human technological development, characterized by hunter-gatherer societies reliant on rudimentary tools for survival. Innovations during this period primarily involved stone, bone, and wood implements designed for scavenging, hunting, and basic processing of resources, reflecting early hominin adaptations to diverse environments. These technologies originated in Africa and gradually spread to Eurasia, facilitating the migration of species like Homo habilis and Homo erectus. Evidence derives from archaeological sites yielding tool assemblages, often analyzed through stratigraphic dating and use-wear studies. The earliest known stone tools, from the Lomekwian industry, emerged around 3.3 million years ago at Lomekwi 3 in West Turkana, Kenya. These consisted of large hammerstones and sharp flakes produced by pounding and battering, likely used for cutting and scraping by early hominins such as Australopithecus or Kenyanthropus.^[29] Succeeding this, the Oldowan industry appeared around 2.6 million years ago in East Africa. These simple choppers and flakes, crafted by striking hammerstones against cores of basalt or quartzite, enabled scavenging meat from carcasses and processing plant materials. Associated with early hominins such as Homo habilis, Oldowan tools represent systematic evidence of intentional modification of natural materials for practical use. Sites like Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania provide key assemblages, demonstrating their role in expanding dietary options beyond what teeth alone could achieve.^[3]^[30] The Acheulean toolkit appeared approximately 1.7 million years ago and persisted until about 200,000 years ago, linked to Homo erectus. This industry introduced bifacial hand axes, symmetrical tools knapped on both sides to create sharp edges for cutting, scraping, and woodworking. Crafted from durable stones like flint or quartzite, these implements allowed more efficient butchery of large animals and shaping of wooden spears, enhancing hunting capabilities. Acheulean sites, such as those at Konso in Ethiopia, reveal standardized forms that suggest cognitive advancements in planning and symmetry.^[31]^[32] In the Upper Paleolithic, beginning around 50,000 years ago, technological sophistication increased with the use of diverse materials. Bone needles, dated to about 40,000 years ago in Eurasian sites like Denisova Cave in Siberia, featured eyed holes for sewing animal hides into fitted clothing, providing protection against cold climates. This innovation supported territorial expansion into higher latitudes. Complementing this, the atlatl—a wooden spear-thrower—emerged around 30,000 years ago, acting as a lever to propel darts with greater velocity and range, thus improving hunting efficiency for small game and distant targets. Artifacts from European sites, such as those in France, illustrate its widespread adoption among early modern humans.^[33]^[34] Control of fire, evidenced by hearths dating back to about 1 million years ago at sites like Wonderwerk Cave in South Africa, transformed Paleolithic life by enabling cooking, which improved nutrient absorption from food and reduced disease risk from raw consumption. Hearths—concentrations of ash, charred bone, and heated sediments—indicate habitual maintenance, offering warmth for social gatherings and deterring predators, thereby aiding migrations into cooler regions. This capability, initially opportunistic but later deliberate, underpinned physiological changes like smaller guts in later hominins.^[35]^[36] Paleolithic technologies originated in Africa, with Lomekwian, Oldowan, and Acheulean tools spreading to Eurasia via hominin dispersals starting around 1.8 million years ago. This diffusion is traced through similar assemblages in the Levant and Asia, such as at Dmanisi in Georgia, reflecting adaptive responses to new ecosystems without major technological reinvention. By the Upper Paleolithic, these foundations supported the global reach of Homo sapiens, though innovations remained tied to mobile foraging lifestyles.^[37]

Neolithic Developments

The Neolithic period marked a profound transition from nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyles to settled agricultural communities, beginning around 10,000 BCE in the Fertile Crescent of the Near East, where innovations in resource management laid the groundwork for surplus production and population growth.^[38] Central to this shift was the domestication of plants and animals, which enabled reliable food sources and permanent villages. Archaeological evidence from sites like Abu Hureyra reveals the earliest domesticated forms of wheat (einkorn and emmer) and barley emerging between 10,000 and 9,000 BCE in the northern Fertile Crescent, where wild progenitors were selectively cultivated in fertile river valleys.^[39] Similarly, animal domestication focused on herd animals suited to pastoralism; goats and sheep were managed and bred in the same region starting around 9,000 BCE, with genetic and osteological data indicating selective breeding for traits like reduced horn size and increased wool production to support human needs.^[40] These developments relied on rudimentary harvesting tools, such as composite sickles featuring flint blades hafted into wooden or bone handles, which allowed efficient cutting of cereal stalks without uprooting plants, as evidenced by wear patterns on artifacts from early Neolithic sites in the Levant.^[41] Parallel to agricultural advancements, the invention of pottery revolutionized storage and cooking, originating in East Asia around 20,000 BCE during the late Paleolithic but becoming widespread across Neolithic societies by 7,000 BCE.^[42] Early pottery consisted of coiled or slab-built vessels from local clays, fired in open hearths or simple kilns at temperatures of 800–1,000°C to achieve durability and water resistance, facilitating the storage of grains and liquids essential for sedentary life.^[43] In Europe and the Near East, this technology spread rapidly, with vessels from sites like Çatalhöyük in Anatolia demonstrating standardized forms for communal use by 6,500 BCE. Complementing these subsistence tools were polished stone implements, particularly ground axes made from hard stones like jadeite or flint, which were meticulously abraded to a smooth finish for superior cutting efficiency.^[44] These axes, hafted to wooden handles, were instrumental in clearing dense forests for farmland and building materials, as shown by experimental replications and site distributions in the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B period (around 8,500–7,000 BCE), enabling the expansion of settlements in previously wooded areas like the Levant and Europe.^[45] Monumental architecture also emerged, exemplified by megalithic structures that served ritual and communal purposes. In Britain, precursors to Stonehenge—such as timber circles and earthworks at sites like Durrington Walls—date to around 3,000 BCE, constructed using wooden levers, ramps, and rollers to position large stones weighing up to several tons, reflecting organized labor and astronomical alignments.^[46] These feats underscore the Neolithic capacity for large-scale engineering without metal tools. Supporting these technological shifts were nascent trade networks, evidenced by the distribution of obsidian—a sharp volcanic glass ideal for blades—from sources in central Anatolia, such as Cappadocia, reaching sites across the Fertile Crescent and Mediterranean by 8,000 BCE.^[47] Chemical sourcing of artifacts from settlements like Aşıklı Höyük confirms exchange over distances of 500–800 kilometers, fostering inter-community ties and the spread of ideas.^[48]

Technologies by Civilization

Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia, encompassing the Sumerian, Akkadian, and Babylonian civilizations in the region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, pioneered technologies that facilitated urban growth and centralized administration from the fourth millennium BCE onward. One of the earliest innovations was the wheel, first developed around 3500 BCE as a potter's wheel for ceramics production before evolving into wheeled vehicles for transport, which enhanced trade and construction efficiency in burgeoning city-states like Uruk.^[49]^[50] This technological advancement supported monumental architecture, such as ziggurats—massive stepped temple platforms constructed primarily from sun-dried mud bricks for the core, faced with durable baked bricks bound by bitumen, a natural asphalt-like sealant that improved stability against the region's floods and erosion.^[51]^[52] These structures, rising up to 30 meters high, symbolized religious and political authority, integrating engineering with urban planning to create focal points for community rituals and governance. Administrative technologies advanced significantly with the invention of cuneiform writing around 3200 BCE in Sumer, a wedge-shaped script impressed on clay tablets using a reed stylus, initially for economic record-keeping of goods and transactions.^[53]^[54] This system evolved to document laws, literature, and diplomacy, exemplified by the Code of Hammurabi circa 1750 BCE, a Babylonian legal compilation inscribed in Akkadian cuneiform on a diorite stele that standardized justice, commerce, and social norms across the empire.^[55]^[56] The durability of fired clay tablets preserved vast archives, enabling bureaucratic oversight in complex urban societies where scribes managed taxation, labor, and resource allocation, laying foundations for state administration. To sustain these urban centers amid the unpredictable Tigris-Euphrates floodplains, Mesopotamians developed sophisticated irrigation systems by the late fourth millennium BCE, constructing extensive networks of canals and levees that diverted river waters to fields, transforming arid lands into fertile agricultural surpluses supporting populations of tens of thousands.^[57]^[58] These gravity-fed channels, often spanning hundreds of kilometers, were maintained through communal labor and engineering feats like adjustable sluice gates, while shaduf-like devices—counterweighted poles with buckets—facilitated water lifting from lower canals to higher fields, boosting crop yields of barley and dates essential for urban economies.^[59]^[60] In astronomy and mathematics, Mesopotamians employed a sexagesimal (base-60) system from the third millennium BCE, which subdivided hours into 60 minutes and circles into 360 degrees for precise timekeeping and celestial observations, influencing calendars and navigation without relying on modern equations but through tabular calculations on tablets.^[61]^[62] Recent archaeological analyses, such as radiocarbon dating of paleo-canal systems near ancient Girsu in the 2020s, have revealed integrated urban planning in southern Mesopotamia, where Uruk-period tablets from the fourth millennium BCE detail coordinated land allocation and water distribution, underscoring early state control over infrastructure.^[63]^[64]

Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egyptian technology was profoundly shaped by the Nile River's annual floods, which necessitated innovative systems for resource management and monumental construction to support a centralized society. Engineering feats like pyramid building exemplified their mastery of large-scale projects, while advancements in writing, irrigation, and preservation techniques facilitated administration, agriculture, and religious practices. These innovations, dating from the Old Kingdom onward, emphasized precision, labor organization, and integration with natural cycles, enabling the civilization's longevity from approximately 3100 BCE to 30 BCE. Pyramid construction reached its zenith during the Old Kingdom around 2630 BCE at Giza, where the Great Pyramid of Khufu was built using ramps for transporting massive limestone blocks, levers to position them, and copper chisels to shape the stone. Workers quarried and cut blocks weighing up to 80 tons with these tools, then hauled them via straight or spiraling ramps lubricated with water or mud to reduce friction.^[65]^[66] The pyramids' precise alignment to the cardinal directions, with deviations of less than 3 arcminutes from true north, was achieved through stellar observations, tracking the simultaneous transit of circumpolar stars like those in Ursa Major and Minor during their meridian passages.^[67]^[68] This astronomical method ensured the structures' orientation toward the eternal north, symbolizing cosmic order (ma'at) and facilitating the pharaoh's afterlife journey. Hieroglyphic writing, developed around 3000 BCE, combined with papyrus production revolutionized record-keeping and administration, allowing for the documentation of taxes, laws, and religious texts on durable scrolls. Papyrus, made by pressing and drying strips from the Cyperus papyrus plant native to the Nile Delta, formed sheets up to 20 meters long that were glued into rolls for bureaucratic use in temples and palaces.^[69]^[70] These scripts, comprising over 700 signs for phonetic, logographic, and determinative functions, were employed in the Book of the Dead, a collection of spells inscribed on papyrus to guide the deceased through the underworld, often customized for elites with vignettes of judgment scenes.^[71]^[72] Irrigation technologies harnessed the Nile's predictable inundation through basin systems, where earthen dikes divided fields into rectangular plots to capture and retain floodwaters for soil enrichment with silt. Nilometers, graduated stone pillars installed in temples like those at Philae and Elephantine, measured flood heights to predict agricultural yields and coordinate planting, with markings calibrated against historical data for levels between 4 and 8 meters above low water.^[73]^[74] Complementing this, the shaduf—a counterweighted lever with a bucket on one end and a clay counterpoise on the other—enabled manual water lifting from canals to higher fields, with each operation capable of raising approximately 100 liters over distances up to 3 meters, significantly boosting productivity during dry seasons from the New Kingdom onward.^[75]^[76] Mummification preserved bodies for the afterlife using natron salts—a naturally occurring sodium carbonate mixture mined from Wadi Natrun—to desiccate tissues and inhibit bacterial growth, followed by wrapping in hundreds of meters of fine linen strips anointed with resins. The process, conducted by specialized priests in embalming workshops, lasted 70 days: 40 days for drying under natron packs covering the body, and 30 days for rituals, stuffing with linen and spices, and bandaging to restore the form.^[77]^[78] The Ebers Papyrus, dating to around 1550 BCE, represents a pinnacle of medical technology, compiling over 700 prescriptions including surgical interventions with tools like bronze scalpels, probes, and forceps, alongside herbal remedies derived from 328 plant, animal, and mineral sources. It details treatments for fractures using splints and honey dressings, dental issues with willow bark analgesics, and internal ailments via emetics and purgatives, reflecting an empirical approach blended with incantations for holistic healing.^[79]^[80]^[81]

Indus Valley and Ancient India

The Indus Valley Civilization, flourishing from approximately 3300 to 1300 BCE, demonstrated advanced technological achievements in urban infrastructure, textile production, and trade systems, particularly evident in sites like Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa. These innovations reflected a highly organized society without apparent centralized palaces or monumental temples, emphasizing practical engineering for daily life and commerce. Technologies transitioned into the Vedic period (c. 1500–500 BCE), where metallurgical advancements built on earlier bronze traditions, supporting agricultural and artisanal tools. Archaeological evidence from these eras highlights South Asia's contributions to early urbanism and material culture, distinct from contemporaneous developments in riverine civilizations to the west and east. Urban planning in the Indus Valley exemplified sophisticated sanitation and hydrology around 2500 BCE, most notably at Mohenjo-Daro, where cities featured grid-based street layouts oriented to cardinal directions, with residential blocks averaging 30–40 meters wide. Baked bricks, standardized at ratios of 4:2:1 for length, width, and thickness, formed durable structures resistant to moisture, including covered drains lining major streets to channel wastewater from private homes equipped with bathrooms and latrines. Public wells, numbering over 700 in Mohenjo-Daro alone, provided access to groundwater via stepped access points, while the Great Bath—a large, watertight basin measuring 12 by 7 meters with brick-lined walls and a bitumen sealant—suggested ritual or communal cleansing functions, underscoring hygiene priorities in a population possibly exceeding 40,000. This egalitarian design, lacking fortified citadels or elite residences, contrasted with hierarchical monumental architecture elsewhere, prioritizing collective welfare through integrated water management.^[82] Textile technology in the region originated with cotton cultivation and processing as early as 5000 BCE at pre-Harappan sites like Mehrgarh, where mineralized Gossypium arboreum fibers adhered to copper beads, indicating early spinning techniques. By the Mature Harappan phase (2600–1900 BCE), spindle whorls of terracotta and faience—ranging from 16 to 28 grams—facilitated the production of fine yarns, with fabric impressions on pottery revealing plain weaves of 11–20 threads per centimeter and preserved cloths from Mohenjo-Daro showing densities up to 20 warp by 60 weft threads per inch. Dyeing practices employed natural pigments, including madder (Rubia tinctorum or Rubia cordifolia) for reds, as identified in cotton fragments from Mohenjo-Daro dated to around 2500 BCE, and likely indigo for blues, evidenced by chemical traces in burial textiles and figurine depictions of patterned garments. These advancements supported a robust textile economy, with precursors to spinning wheels enabling efficient production for local use and export.^[83]^[84] Standardized weights and seals facilitated extensive trade networks, with cubical limestone weights—based on a binary system doubling from 0.87 grams (equivalent to eight Abrus precatorius seeds) up to 10.8 kilograms—ensuring precise measurement of goods at urban gateways and markets. Over 2,000 such weights have been recovered from sites like Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa, reflecting a uniform economic standard across 1,500 kilometers of territory. Accompanying stamp seals, typically square and made of steatite, bore intaglio carvings of animals (such as the unicorn motif on 65% of examples) and short inscriptions in the undeciphered Indus script, comprising about 400 distinct symbols arranged in logo-syllabic sequences averaging five signs per seal. These artifacts, impressed on clay tags attached to commodities, authenticated ownership and transactions, with examples found in Mesopotamia and the Arabian Gulf indicating maritime and overland exchange of beads, shells, and metals by 2500 BCE.^[85]^[86] In the Vedic period, ironworking evidence now dates back to at least 3345 BCE based on 2025 discoveries at Sivagalai in Tamil Nadu, where iron artifacts were found in burials associated with radiocarbon-dated charcoal; traditional sites in the Gangetic plains also yield slag and artifacts dated to 1800–1500 cal BCE, marking a shift from bronze to ferrous tools that enhanced agriculture and warfare, with early smelting involving bloomery furnaces producing wrought iron, precursors to later crucible processes like wootz steel, used for axes, sickles, and plows that supported expanding settlements. Archaeological evidence from sites such as Atranjikhera and Hastinapur includes iron objects with carbon contents up to 1.5%, demonstrating controlled forging techniques by 1400 BCE. These innovations, independent of Near Eastern influences, integrated with Vedic textual references to metalworking, fostering technological continuity into later South Asian metallurgy.^[87]^[88]^[89]^[90] Recent excavations at Lothal, a key Harappan port in Gujarat, have reinforced evidence of maritime trade capabilities dating to 2400 BCE, with the site's brick-lined dockyard—measuring 219 by 37 meters and connected to tidal channels—facilitating shipbuilding and cargo handling for exports like cotton and beads to the Persian Gulf. 2020s surveys under the Archaeological Survey of India uncovered additional pottery and seal impressions, confirming connections to Mesopotamian markets through standardized weights found in warehouse contexts, highlighting Lothal's role in a networked economy spanning the Indian Ocean.^[91]

Ancient China

Ancient Chinese technology from the Shang Dynasty (c. 1600–1046 BCE) to the Han Dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE) featured remarkable advancements in materials, engineering, and scientific instruments, laying foundations for proto-industrial practices and systematic knowledge. These innovations, often tied to ritual, agriculture, and governance, demonstrated sophisticated craftsmanship and empirical observation, influencing East Asian development for millennia. Key developments included early writing systems for divination, advanced metallurgy for ritual and weaponry, textile production, military mechanisms, seismic detection, and hydraulic engineering for resource management. The oracle bone script, emerging around 1200 BCE during the late Shang Dynasty, represents the earliest known form of systematic Chinese writing, inscribed on turtle plastrons and ox scapulae for royal divination purposes. These inscriptions, discovered at the Anyang site, recorded questions posed to ancestors about weather, harvests, and warfare, providing the first written evidence of Chinese civilization's administrative and spiritual practices.^[92]^[93] Bronze casting reached a pinnacle in the Shang Dynasty around 2000 BCE with the piece-mold technique, enabling the creation of intricate ritual vessels such as ding tripods and gui bowls, which symbolized elite status and ancestral worship. Artisans constructed molds from clay sections around a wax or clay model, allowing for detailed taotie motifs and complex shapes unattainable by lost-wax methods; the alloy typically comprised about 80% copper and 20% tin, sometimes with lead additions for fluidity.^[94]^[95] This technology extended to weaponry, including the crossbow's bronze trigger mechanism, invented around 500 BCE during the Warring States period, which enhanced archery precision and range for infantry.^[96] Silk production, or sericulture, has legendary origins around 2700 BCE, attributed to the mythical Empress Leizu who discovered how to unwind silkworm cocoons and weave the fibers on looms, though archaeological evidence dates domesticated Bombyx mori to the Neolithic Yangshao culture c. 3500 BCE. By the Zhou Dynasty (1046–256 BCE), silk became a major export and luxury good, processed through rearing mulberry-fed silkworms and using advanced looms for patterned textiles. In the Han Dynasty, polymath Zhang Heng (78–139 CE) invented a precursor to the seismograph around 132 CE, a bronze urn adorned with eight dragon heads holding balls above toad mouths; seismic vibrations caused a ball to drop from a dragon into a toad, indicating the earthquake's direction up to 500 kilometers away.^[97]^[98] Canal systems emerged as precursors to the Grand Canal during the Warring States period around 500 BCE, with projects like the Zhengguo Canal (constructed 246 BCE in Qin territory) diverting the Jing River over 100 kilometers for irrigation, supporting agriculture on 28,000 hectares and facilitating grain transport to sustain military campaigns. These hydraulic works, often state-sponsored, integrated flood control with economic infrastructure, exemplifying early engineering prowess in water management./05:The_Maritime_and_Overland_Silk_Road(400_BCE_-50_BCE)/5.04:Qin_Dynasty(221_BCE-_206_BCE))^[99]

Persian Empire

The Achaemenid Persian Empire (c. 550–330 BCE) exemplified advanced technologies that facilitated the administration and connectivity of a vast multicultural domain stretching from the Indus Valley to the Mediterranean. Under rulers like Cyrus the Great and Darius I, innovations in transportation, water management, and economic standardization supported imperial governance, enabling efficient communication and resource distribution across diverse satrapies. These developments emphasized integration of local knowledge while imposing centralized systems, reflecting the empire's policy of tolerance and synthesis.^[100] A cornerstone of imperial connectivity was the Royal Road, a 2,500-kilometer network constructed around 500 BCE, linking Sardis in Anatolia to Susa in Persia via relay stations spaced approximately 24 kilometers apart. These stations provided fresh horses and provisions, allowing couriers to traverse the route in seven days—far faster than contemporary alternatives—thus supporting rapid mail delivery and military logistics essential to satrapal oversight. Herodotus described this system as unparalleled in speed, underscoring its role in maintaining cohesion over the empire's expansive territories.^[101]^[102] Water management innovations complemented this infrastructure, particularly the qanat system originating around 800 BCE in northwestern Iran, which harnessed gravity to channel groundwater through gently sloping underground tunnels from mountain aquifers to arid lowlands. Some qanats extended up to 70 kilometers, with vertical access shafts for maintenance, sustaining agriculture and urban settlements in desert regions like Yazd and Gonabad without surface evaporation losses. This sustainable technology, managed communally, exemplified Persian engineering's adaptation to environmental challenges.^[103]^[104] Administrative efficiency was further enhanced by the satrapy system, where governors oversaw provinces using standardized weights, measures, and coinage introduced by Darius I around 520 BCE. The daric, a pure gold coin weighing 8.4 grams, served as a bimetallic standard alongside silver sigloi, facilitating trade and taxation across satrapies while reducing economic fragmentation. These reforms, inscribed on Darius's Behistun relief, promoted uniformity in imperial transactions. Architectural expressions at Persepolis blended these influences, featuring tall columns with Assyrian-style bases and Egyptian lotus motifs in reliefs, symbolizing multicultural unity. The empire also integrated Babylonian astronomy into its scholarly traditions, adopting lunar eclipse predictions and celestial observations from Chaldean texts to inform calendrical and divinatory practices in Achaemenid courts.^[105]^[106]^[107]^[108]

Greece and Hellenistic World

The technological advancements in ancient Greece and the Hellenistic world, spanning from the Archaic period through the Hellenistic era (roughly 800 BCE to 100 CE), emphasized theoretical innovation, mechanical ingenuity, and practical applications in engineering, navigation, and medicine. Greek thinkers and inventors, building on earlier influences such as Egyptian levers for basic mechanics, integrated philosophy with empirical observation to develop devices that demonstrated principles of physics and astronomy. These innovations often served military, agricultural, and scholarly purposes, laying conceptual foundations later adopted by the Romans in large-scale infrastructure.^[109] A seminal invention was the Archimedes' screw, developed around 250 BCE by the Syracusan mathematician and engineer Archimedes. This device consisted of a helical tube wrapped around a central cylinder, rotated manually or by animal power to lift water from lower to higher elevations, achieving efficiencies suitable for irrigation in arid regions and for removing bilge water from ships.^[110] Attributed to Archimedes during his defense of Syracuse against Roman forces, the screw exemplified Hellenistic hydraulic engineering and remained in use for centuries due to its simplicity and reliability.^[111] The Antikythera mechanism, dating to approximately 100 BCE, represents the pinnacle of Hellenistic analog computing. Recovered from a shipwreck off the Greek island of Antikythera, this bronze-geared device functioned as an astronomical calculator, using over 30 meshed wheels to predict celestial positions, eclipses, and planetary cycles based on Babylonian and Greek models.^[112] Its intricate epicyclic gearing allowed for modeling of the irregular motions of the sun, moon, and known planets, showcasing advanced metallurgical precision and mathematical integration in a portable instrument likely used by scholars or navigators.^[113] In shipbuilding, the Greeks advanced naval technology with the trireme and bireme warships around 500 BCE, transforming maritime warfare. The trireme, a sleek oared galley with three banks of rowers accommodating about 170 oarsmen, featured a bronze-sheathed ram at the prow for ramming enemy vessels, enabling swift maneuvers in battles like Salamis.^[109] The earlier bireme, with two rower banks, served as a precursor for coastal defense and trade, constructed from lightweight woods like pine and oak with advanced hull designs for stability and speed up to 8 knots under oar power.^[114] These vessels underscored Greek emphasis on speed and tactical flexibility over brute force. Hippocratic medicine, emerging in the 5th century BCE on the island of Kos, introduced systematic surgical tools and the theory of bodily humors as a framework for diagnosis and treatment. Practitioners utilized bronze scalpels, forceps, and probes for procedures like trephination and wound suturing, prioritizing observation and natural remedies over superstition.^[115] The humor theory posited that health depended on the balance of four fluids—blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile—corresponding to elemental qualities, guiding therapies such as bloodletting or dietary adjustments without reliance on herbal recipes.^[116] This approach, documented in the Hippocratic Corpus, marked a shift toward empirical medicine and influenced Hellenistic healing practices. Philosophical engineering reached a conceptual milestone with Hero of Alexandria's aeolipile around 10 CE, a rudimentary steam-powered device that demonstrated reactive propulsion. Consisting of a hollow sphere mounted on a boiler, heated water produced steam jets that caused the sphere to rotate, serving as a temple demonstrator of pneumatic principles rather than a practical engine.^[117] Hero's work in pneumatics, including this "steam toy," explored thermodynamic concepts and automated mechanisms, foreshadowing later industrial applications while highlighting the Hellenistic blend of theory and invention.^[118]

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire's technological prowess was epitomized by its extensive infrastructure, which facilitated the administration and expansion of a vast domain spanning three continents. Central to this was the aqueduct system, beginning with the Aqua Appia constructed around 312 BCE under the censorship of Appius Claudius Caecus, designed to deliver fresh water to Rome's growing population. Over the subsequent centuries, engineers developed at least 11 major aqueducts serving the capital, utilizing gravity-fed channels constructed from stone, brick, and concrete, with overall gradients as shallow as 1:4800 to ensure steady flow without excessive velocity.^[119]^[120]^[121] Where terrain necessitated crossing valleys, inverted siphons—pressure-resistant conduits of lead or terracotta—maintained the water's path by descending and ascending while preserving the system's hydraulic gradient.^[122] These innovations not only supplied public baths, fountains, and households but also supported urban sanitation, underscoring Rome's emphasis on practical engineering for civic welfare.^[123] Complementing the aqueducts was the revolutionary use of concrete, known as opus caementicium, developed around 200 BCE and refined for marine environments. This hydraulic cement, comprising lime mixed with pozzolana—a volcanic ash sourced from regions like Pozzuoli—reacted with water to form durable, self-healing structures resistant to seawater corrosion.^[124] A prime example is the harbor at Caesarea Maritima, constructed under Herod the Great circa 20 BCE, where massive concrete breakwaters extended over 60 meters into the sea, utilizing pozzolana to bind aggregates and withstand wave action for centuries.^[125] Recent analyses, including those from the 2020s, reveal how lime clasts in this concrete promote ongoing crystallization, enhancing long-term stability in submerged settings.^[126] The empire's road network further exemplified scaled engineering, totaling approximately 400,000 kilometers by the 2nd century CE, with over 80,500 kilometers paved in stone to enable rapid military deployment and trade.^[127] Initiated with the Via Appia in 312 BCE, these roads featured multilayered construction: a foundation of compacted earth or stone, overlain by gravel for drainage, and topped with fitted polygonal stones or basalt blocks for durability.^[127] Recent LiDAR surveys in Britain, such as those conducted in the early 2020s across Cumbria, Lancashire, and southwest England, have uncovered previously hidden segments, adding dozens of kilometers to the known network and illuminating alignments obscured by modern agriculture and forestry.^[128]^[129]^[130] Military technology integrated these infrastructural advances, with artillery like the ballista—a torsion-powered catapult employing twisted sinew or horsehair springs to propel bolts or stones up to 400 meters—deployed along roads for sieges and field battles. Complementing this was the pilum, a heavy javelin approximately 2 meters long with a soft iron shank designed to bend upon shield impact, rendering enemy defenses ineffective and preventing reuse by foes.^[131] Each legionary carried two pila, hurled in volleys to disrupt formations before close-quarters combat, a tactic honed through rigorous training and supported by the empire's efficient logistics.^[132]

Mesoamerica and Andes

In Mesoamerica and the Andes, ancient societies developed sophisticated technologies independently of Old World influences, emphasizing agricultural innovation, monumental architecture, and non-alphabetic recording systems to support complex urban centers and empires. From the Olmec precursors around 1500 BCE through the Maya, Teotihuacan, Aztec, and Inca civilizations, these advancements facilitated population growth and administrative control without reliance on draft animals or wheeled transport. Key examples include hydraulic farming techniques, precise calendrical computations, and extensive infrastructure networks that integrated environmental adaptation with social organization. The Maya developed one of the most intricate writing systems in the Americas, using glyphs inscribed on stelae and other monuments to record historical events, royal lineages, and astronomical observations starting around 300 BCE during the Late Preclassic period. This logosyllabic script combined logograms and syllabic signs, allowing for detailed narratives and numerical notations. Central to Maya technology was the Long Count calendar, a vigesimal (base-20) positional system that tracked elapsed days from a mythical creation date, incorporating cycles such as the 260-day Tzolk'in ritual calendar and the 365-day Haab' solar year to align religious, agricultural, and political activities. These calendrical tools, often carved on monumental stelae at sites like Tikal, enabled long-term forecasting and synchronization across city-states. At Teotihuacan, a major Mesoamerican metropolis that flourished from approximately 100 BCE to 550 CE, monumental pyramids exemplified advanced engineering around 200 CE, with major constructions like the Pyramid of the Sun and Pyramid of the Moon employing talud-tablero architecture. This style featured alternating sloping taludes (batter walls) and vertical tableros (panels), often coated in smooth lime plaster that could be painted with vibrant murals, providing structural stability on the volcanic landscape while symbolizing cosmic order. The use of lime plaster, derived from heated limestone, not only sealed surfaces against erosion but also facilitated the adhesion of decorative elements, contributing to the city's role as a cultural and economic hub influencing distant regions. In central Mexico, the Aztecs refined chinampa agriculture, constructing artificial islands or "floating gardens" in shallow lake beds like those around Lake Xochimilco by the 14th century CE, which boosted food production to sustain Tenochtitlan's million-plus inhabitants. These raised fields, anchored by willow stakes and enriched with lake sediments and mud, formed a network of canals for irrigation and navigation, yielding multiple crops per year—typically three to four harvests of maize, beans, squash, and chilies—far exceeding rain-fed milpa farming in efficiency and output. This intensive system supported surplus generation and trade, underscoring the Aztecs' mastery of wetland hydrology. The Inca Empire, expanding from the 13th century CE with roots in earlier Andean cultures, engineered the Qhapaq Ñan road system spanning over 40,000 kilometers across diverse terrains from Colombia to Chile, facilitating military mobilization, resource distribution, and imperial administration. This network included paved paths, staircases, and innovative suspension bridges woven from ichu grass or q'oa fibers, spanning rivers up to 40 meters wide and allowing foot traffic for messengers and llama caravans. Complementing the roads, the Inca used quipu—knotted string devices with colored cords and varied knot types—to record numerical data for accounting, such as census figures, tribute payments, and inventories, serving as a portable, non-written ledger system that enabled centralized control without a full phonetic script. Recent LiDAR surveys in 2023 have revealed over 10,000 previously undetected pre-Columbian earthworks across the Amazon Basin, including geoglyphs—large geometric ditches and platforms dating from 500 BCE to 1500 CE—indicating advanced landscape modification by indigenous groups for ceremonial, defensive, or agricultural purposes. These discoveries, concentrated in southwestern Amazonia, suggest a denser network of complex societies than previously thought, with earthworks up to 300 meters in diameter integrated into raised-field farming and village planning, challenging notions of the region as sparsely populated before European contact.

Thematic Advancements

Metallurgy Across Cultures

The earliest evidence of copper smelting dates to approximately 8000 BCE in Anatolia, where hunter-gatherers at sites like Gre Fılla processed native copper ores using controlled fires reaching temperatures around 1083°C, close to the metal's melting point, to extract and shape the material.^[133]^[134] This process involved heating copper to soften it for hammering, a technique known as annealing, which allowed for the creation of simple tools and ornaments without full melting. By around 3000 BCE, metallurgists across the Near East and Europe had developed alloying techniques, combining copper with about 12% tin to form bronze—an alloy typically composed of 88% copper and 12% tin that significantly increased hardness and durability compared to pure copper, enabling more robust implements.^[135]^[136] The transition to the Iron Age around 1200 BCE marked a pivotal shift, as the bloomery process emerged in regions like the Levant and Anatolia, reducing iron ore in furnaces fueled by charcoal to produce wrought iron at temperatures of about 1200°C, below iron's melting point but sufficient to separate the metal from slag in a spongy bloom that was then hammered into shape.^[137] To enhance strength, ancient smiths employed carburization, heating wrought iron in contact with carbon-rich materials like charcoal to infuse it with carbon, creating steel with improved hardness for edges and resilience.^[138] This method spread rapidly, supplanting bronze in many areas due to iron's abundance and workability. Lost-wax casting, a sophisticated technique for producing intricate metal objects, was widely used in Greek bronzes and Indian icons from the Bronze Age onward. The process began with sculpting a detailed wax model over a clay core, encasing it in layers of clay and investment material to form a mold, then heating the assembly to burn out the wax—leaving a hollow cavity—before pouring molten bronze into the mold to replicate the original form precisely.^[139]^[140] Cultural variations in casting highlighted regional innovations: in ancient China, the piece-mold or multi-mold technique involved assembling multiple clay sections around a model to create complex vessels, allowing for sectional pouring and intricate decorations without losing the wax, whereas Mediterranean traditions favored single-pour lost-wax methods for their precision in sculptural works.^[141]^[142] These advancements in metallurgy profoundly impacted societies by enabling the production of superior weapons like iron swords, which enhanced military effectiveness and facilitated conquests, and agricultural tools such as iron-tipped plows, which improved soil tillage, boosted crop yields, and supported population growth and territorial expansion.^[143]^[144]

Engineering and Construction

Ancient engineers across various civilizations employed ingenious methods to handle massive materials, often relying on ramps and lever systems to elevate and position stones weighing several tons. In the Aegean region, Mycenaean builders around 1400 BCE utilized corbelled arches, a technique where successive courses of stones projected inward until they met at the top, forming a stable vault without a keystone; this method was evident in structures like the Treasury of Atreus, demonstrating early advancements in spanning openings using dry-stone construction.^[145]^[146] By contrast, in Mesopotamia as early as the 4th millennium BCE, true arches appeared, featuring wedge-shaped voussoirs that distributed weight evenly to support larger spans in gateways and drainage systems, marking a shift toward more sophisticated load-bearing designs.^[147] Masonry techniques varied significantly by region, reflecting local materials and precision levels. In ancient Greece, particularly during the Mycenaean era, cyclopean masonry involved stacking large, undressed boulders—often exceeding 5 meters in length—without mortar, relying on their sheer mass and careful placement for stability, as seen in defensive walls at sites like Tiryns.^[148] In Egypt, ashlar masonry achieved remarkable accuracy through precision-cut limestone blocks, quarried and shaped with copper tools to fit tightly with minimal gaps, enabling the construction of durable monuments like temple walls that have endured for millennia.^[149] These methods prioritized interlocking forms over binding agents, showcasing an understanding of gravity and friction in structural integrity. Hydraulic engineering flourished in South Asia, where ancient Sri Lankans in the Anuradhapura kingdom constructed earthen dams around 300 BCE to impound seasonal monsoons, creating reservoirs such as Tissa Wewa that could hold up to 13.5 million cubic meters for irrigation and urban supply.^[150] Measurement tools were essential for such feats; Mesopotamian builders used simple yet effective implements like plumb lines—weighted strings to ensure vertical alignment—and set squares for right angles, while leveling ziggurats involved sighting along stretched cords or water-filled troughs to achieve precise horizontal platforms across vast bases.^[151] Sustainability considerations influenced designs in seismically active regions, notably the Andes, where Inca engineers incorporated flexible dry-stone joints in their masonry, allowing structures to sway without fracturing during earthquakes; this technique, using irregularly shaped andesite blocks fitted without mortar, enhanced resilience in high-altitude environments prone to tremors.^[152]

Communication and Knowledge Systems

The evolution of writing systems marked a pivotal advancement in ancient communication, transitioning from complex logographic scripts to more efficient alphabetic forms. In Mesopotamia, the Sumerians developed cuneiform around 3200 BCE, an early logographic system using wedge-shaped marks on clay tablets to represent words and syllables, facilitating administrative records, literature, and legal texts.^[53] This script, initially pictographic, evolved to encode phonetic elements, enabling broader knowledge dissemination across the Near East. By approximately 1050 BCE, the Phoenicians introduced the first true alphabet in the Levant, consisting of 22 consonant symbols that simplified writing by focusing on sound units rather than entire words or ideas, which revolutionized trade documentation and cultural exchange in the Mediterranean.^[153] Mathematical tools emerged as essential technologies for computation and abstraction, supporting economic and astronomical applications. Precursors to the abacus appeared in ancient Babylon around 2000 BCE, where Akkadian merchants used counting boards with pebbles or tokens to perform arithmetic operations like addition and multiplication in base-60 systems, as evidenced in clay tablet records.^[154] In China, during the late Warring States period around 200 BCE, counting rods—bamboo or wooden sticks arranged on a board—served as a precursor to slide rule-like devices, allowing positional notation for complex calculations including fractions and square roots, as described in early mathematical texts..pdf) These tools underscored proto-scientific precision, integrating with numeral systems that varied across cultures. Observational technologies for timekeeping enabled systematic study of celestial patterns, foundational to proto-science. Sundials, first attested in ancient Egypt around 1500 BCE during the New Kingdom, used a gnomon to cast shadows on marked surfaces, dividing the day into 12 hours for ritual and agricultural purposes.^[155] Complementing these, water clocks or clepsydrae appeared in Egypt circa 1400 BCE, employing an outflow mechanism where water dripped from a calibrated vessel at a near-constant rate, independent of sunlight, to measure nighttime intervals for temple ceremonies.^[156] Such devices facilitated astronomical observations, linking time to seasonal cycles. Knowledge preservation reached institutional scale through libraries, which centralized and protected intellectual output. The Library of Alexandria, founded around 300 BCE under Ptolemy I in Egypt, amassed up to 700,000 papyrus scrolls by the 1st century BCE, encompassing works in mathematics, astronomy, and philosophy from across the Hellenistic world, serving as a hub for scholarly collaboration.^[157] Cross-cultural exchanges amplified these systems; for instance, the Mayan numeral system's incorporation of zero as a placeholder around 36 BCE, evident in Chiapa de Corzo stelae, enhanced positional arithmetic and calendrical accuracy, influencing Mesoamerican proto-science independently of Old World traditions.^[158] Roman roads briefly aided the diffusion of Greek and Near Eastern scripts and numerals into Europe, while Inca quipus represented a knotted-string alternative for record-keeping in the Andes.

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Jan 1, 1972 · Sexagesimal place notation arose from an interaction between the numerational framework of the Sumerian language and the symbols used to write those numbers.<|separator|>
[62]
[PDF] Theories on the Origins of the Sexagesimal System Y. Shane Wang ...
This paper will examine the exisCng theories and argue that the divisibility of the number 60 was the most important reason leading to the adopCon of the ...
[63]
DATING ANCIENT CANAL SYSTEMS USING RADIOCARBON ...
Aug 8, 2023 · We present the first direct dating of a palaeo-canal system at the ancient city of Girsu, Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) (occupied between 4800 and 1600 BC).<|separator|>
[64]
Urbanscape, Land Use Change and Centralization in the Region of ...
Nov 2, 2022 · Within and around Uruk, canals specifically were an essential part of urban planning, both for the irrigation of orchards and agricultural ...Missing: 2020s | Show results with:2020s
[65]
Probing Question: How were the Egyptian pyramids built? - Penn State
Apr 15, 2014 · Scholars have found evidence that copper chisels were used for ... construction site, ramps were built to get them into place on the pyramid.
[66]
Ancient History in depth: Building the Great Pyramid - BBC
Feb 17, 2011 · Ian Shaw discusses the debate around the building of the great structure and investigates the methods used in its construction.
[67]
Ancient Egyptian chronology and the astronomical orientation of ...
... Egyptians aligned them to north by using the simultaneous transit of two circumpolar stars. Modelling the precession of these stars yields a date for the ...
[68]
Stars Date Egyptian Pyramids | Science | AAAS
The pyramids at Giza might have been aligned to two northerly stars. By looking at the stars, an Egyptologist claims to have found a new way to date the ...
[69]
How Egyptian hieroglyphs were decoded, a timeline to decipherment
Writing in Egypt was 'invented' around 3250 BC to organise the distribution and storage of goods as society became more complex. The oldest Egyptian text at the ...
[70]
History of the Book – Chapter 3. Literacy in the Ancient World
Of the major writing systems that emerged in the ancient world, only two are still in use today: variations of the alphabet and descendants of Chinese ...
[71]
Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs overview - Smarthistory
Egyptian hieroglyphs were used for record-keeping, but also for monumental display dedicated to royalty and deities.
[72]
What is a Book of the Dead? | British Museum
Sep 22, 2010 · The Book of the Dead is a collection of magical spells, a practical guide, usually on papyrus, to help Egyptians navigate the afterlife.
[73]
[PDF] Egypt's Nile Valley Basin Irrigation - WaterHistory.org
A noria, buckets attached to a waterwheel, was another device used to lift water. The blessings of the Nile were many, but they did not come without some costs.Missing: scholarly | Show results with:scholarly
[74]
https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/138919/hic312394_am.pdf
[75]
Performance characteristics of the shaduf: a manual water-lifting ...
Aug 6, 2025 · The total number of buckets was 8, with the capacity of 4.994 liters. ... Irrigation: Water Resources, Types and Common Problems in Egypt.
[76]
[PDF] Early Hydraulic Civilization in Egypt
Abandoned shaduf and irrigation ditch, Kalabsha West. 43. 8. Shadufs of the ... Water lifting in Old Kingdom times was limited to manual transport of ...
[77]
Egyptian Mummies | Smithsonian Institution
The embalmers next removed all moisture from the body. This they did by covering the body with natron, a type of salt which has great drying properties, and by ...
[78]
Herodotus on mummification - Livius.org
Jul 14, 2020 · Then the body is placed in natrum for seventy days, and covered entirely over. ... Then fastening the case, they place it in a sepulchral chamber, ...
[79]
Traditional ancient Egyptian medicine: A review - PMC - NIH
Jun 19, 2021 · The Ebers papyrus. The famous Ebers Papyrus has been written in 1550BCE using 328 different ingredients (most of them are derived from plant ...
[80]
Medicine in Ancient Egypt: A Comprehensive Study - ResearchGate
Aug 10, 2025 · - Ebers Papyrus (1550 BCE):. Contains over 700 prescriptions and treatments for various ailments,. including herbal remedies and surgical pro ...
[81]
Papyrus of Ebers and Smith
The Ebers papyrus (1500 BC) contains medical recipes, while the Edwin Smith papyrus (1700 BC) is a surgical treatise. Ebers also mentions three types of ...<|control11|><|separator|>
[82]
[PDF] Ancient Cities Of The Indus Valley Civilization
evidence of standardized baked bricks ... Mohenjo-Daro: The Marvel of Urban Planning ... urban characteristics, including fortifications and a grid layout.
[83]
None
### Summary of Indus Valley Cotton Textiles from the Document
[84]
Investigation of Asian Dyes and Pigments from the Artifact of ...
Jan 4, 2023 · The earliest madder (Rubia tinctorum and Rubia cordifolia) seems to be found in cotton from Mohenjo-Daro in the Indus Valley about 5000 years ...
[85]
[PDF] Kenoyer2008-Indus-Valley-Article.pdf - Center for South Asia
The Indus script and inscribed seals were no longer used, and writing disappeared along with the use of cubical stone weights and many forms of symbolic objects ...
[86]
None
### Summary on Seals, Weights, Script, and Trade (Indus Valley Civilization)
[87]
(PDF) The origins of iron-working in India - Academia.edu
The evidence from excavated sites indicates that India's iron production was likely independent, with origins dating back to 1800-1500 cal BC.
[88]
[PDF] Historical perspective of iron in ancient India - Eprints@NML
Rapid developments in iron making and its use took place around 1400 B.C. The history of early iron smelting, practised by the tribal artisans in different ...
[89]
[PDF] National Reports 2022 - 2025 XIX TICCIH CONGRESS Kiruna ...
Aug 25, 2025 · Taken together, the 2022–2025 cycle of TICCIH. National Reports presents a sweeping yet intricate panorama of global industrial heritage, not as ...
[90]
Oracle Bone Script (甲骨文)
Oracle-bone script is the earliest systematic Chinese writing, from 14th to 11th century BCE, used for divination on tortoise shells and animal bones.
[91]
[PDF] ORACLE-BONE INSCRIPTIONS OF THE LATE SHANG DYNASTY ...
Discovered and translated beginning only in 1899, these oracle bones are the earliest written records of. Chinese civilization. The inscriptions give us a ...Missing: ancient writing
[92]
Shang and Zhou Dynasties: The Bronze Age of China
Oct 1, 2004 · In piece-mold casting, a model is made of the object to be cast, and a clay mold taken of the model. The mold is then cut in sections to release ...
[93]
Insights into late Shang Dynasty bronze casting techniques
The ICP results indicate copper and tin contents of 76.68 % and 16.87 ... The bronze alloy composition is Cu86Sn13Pb1, with a liquidus temperature of ...3. Results And Discussion · 3.1. Observation Results Of... · 3.3. Restoration Of The...
[94]
Crossbows in Ancient Chinese Warfare - World History Encyclopedia
Jul 17, 2017 · Traditionally, the Chinese crossbow was first invented by Ch'in Shih of the Chu state sometime in the 6th century BCE.Missing: date | Show results with:date
[95]
[PDF] Artifact Information Sheet - Spurlock Museum
Recent archaeological evidence puts our earliest-known dates for sericulture (silk production) back as far as 7000 years ago. The cocoons spun by caterpillars ...
[96]
What was the first instrument that actually recorded an earthquake?
The earliest seismoscope was invented by the Chinese philosopher Chang Heng in AD 132. This was a large urn on the outside of which were eight dragon heads.
[97]
Socio-economic Impacts on Flooding: A 4000-Year History of the ...
During the Warring State period, the Qin state built the Zheng Guo Canal diverting the water of the Jing River, a tributary of the middle Yellow River (Fig.
[98]
https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/what-was-first-instrument-actually-recorded-earthquake
[99]
Royal Road - Livius.org
Dec 16, 2019 · Royal road: according to the Greek researcher Herodotus ... distance of 552 kilometers) and about other main roads in the Achaemenid empire.
[100]
(PDF) Connectivity and Communication in the Achaemenid Empire
Aug 9, 2025 · according to his description of the royal road, the average distance. between stations is approximately twenty-four kilometers, and a person.
[101]
https://www.livius.org/articles/concept/royal-road/
[102]
The Persian Qanat - UNESCO World Heritage Centre
The water is transported along underground tunnels, so-called koshkan, by means of gravity due to the gentle slope of the tunnel to the exit (mazhar), from ...Missing: 800 BCE 70
[103]
DARIC - Encyclopaedia Iranica
DARIC (Gk. dareikós statḗr), Achaemenid gold coin of ca. 8.4 gr, which was introduced by Darius I (522-486 B.C.E.) toward the end of the 6th century B.C.E. ...
[104]
Aspects of the Administration of the Achaemenid Empire: Weights ...
This thesis is about official terminology for and standards of weights and measures in the Achaemenid empire ... Achaemenid standards of weight and coinage.<|separator|>
[105]
Features - Rise of the Persian Princes - July/August 2023
Colors that adorned pillars and walls were inspired by pigments invented in Egypt. And the lamassu were adapted from Assyrian and Babylonian iconography. “They ...
[106]
ASTROLOGY AND ASTRONOMY IN IRAN - Encyclopaedia Iranica
The earliest mathematical astronomy that developed in territory under Iranian control was that which originated in Mesopotamia, was improved during the ...
[107]
The First Greek Triremes | The Classical Quarterly | Cambridge Core
Feb 11, 2009 · The introduction of the trireme into Greek navies was an event of great political importance, which may fairly be compared to the ...
[108]
The development of the screw pump from Assyrian King ...
The literary and archaeological evidence suggests that Archimedes was the first to design and construct a mechanical water-raising screw pump.
[109]
Sennacherib, Archimedes, and the Water Screw: The Context of ...
Invention of the water screw is traditionally credited to the third-century BC Greek scientist-engineer Archimedes, on the basis of numerous Greek and Latin ...
[110]
A Model of the Cosmos in the ancient Greek Antikythera Mechanism
Mar 12, 2021 · The Antikythera Mechanism, an ancient Greek astronomical calculator, has challenged researchers since its discovery in 1901.
[111]
The Antikythera Mechanism - Communications of the ACM
Apr 1, 2020 · The Antikythera Mechanism is an astronomical calculator, considered the world's first analog calculator, that determines the positions of the ...Key Insights · Astrolabe, Planetarium, or... · Is the Antikythera Mechanism...
[112]
(PDF) Ancient Greek Warship, 500-322 BC - Academia.edu
The paper discusses the historical significance and technological features of ancient Greek warships, specifically focusing on triremes used between 500 and ...
[113]
Surgical Knife - PMC - NIH
Hippocrates was the first to describe the surgical knife. He used the word macairion, derived from machaira, an old Lacedaemonian sword, which had a broad ...Missing: scholarly | Show results with:scholarly
[114]
World Academy of Sciences Journal - Spandidos Publications
Feb 29, 2024 · Hippocrates' theory of humours used four elements (fire, air, earth, water) to explain disease, with humours being blood, phlegm, yellow bile, ...
[115]
Heron of Alexandria (c. 10–85 AD) - SpringerLink
Heron of Alexandria was a mathematician, physicist and engineer who lived around 10–85 AD. He taught at Alexandria's Musaeum and wrote many books on ...
[116]
(PDF) Heron of Alexandria (c. 10–85 AD) - ResearchGate
His most important invention was the Aeolipile, the first steam turbine. Other inventions include automated machines for temples and theaters, surveying ...
[117]
Roman Aqueducts | EarthDate
Eleven aqueducts, some as long as 57 mi (92 km), were constructed to supply ancient Rome between 312 BC and AD 226, and each was built to exacting standards.
[118]
Aqueducts: Quenching Rome's Thirst - National Geographic
Rome had as many as 11 aqueduct systems, the most ancient of which was the mile-long Aqua Appia, first operational in 312 B.C. It was named for its sponsor, the ...Missing: flow gradient
[119]
Roman Aqueducts and Water Management - Ancient Rome - Fiveable
Typical gradient ranged from 1:4800 to 1:3000; Allowed water to flow naturally ... Inverted siphons used to cross deep valleys and maintain water pressure.
[120]
Siphons in Roman Aqueducts | Papers of the British School at Rome
Aug 9, 2013 · This gives a hydraulic gradient normal for an ordinary surface aqueduct but impossibly shallow for a siphon. ... Roman Inverted Siphon System at ...
[121]
The Aqueducts and Water Supply of Ancient Rome - PubMed Central
Most Roman aqueducts used springs, often augmented by tunneling to increase groundwater flow, providing abundant water for the city.
[122]
Roman Concrete - Ancient Engineering Technologies
Roman concrete used volcanic ash (Pozzolana), lime, and water mixed with rock. Seawater creates Tobermorite crystals, strengthening it.Missing: opus caementicium 200
[123]
Volcanic rocks resembling Roman concrete explain record uplift
Jul 9, 2015 · Archeologists have recently found that piers in Alexandria, Caesarea, and Cyprus are all made from Roman concrete and have pozzolana as a ...Missing: harbor | Show results with:harbor
[124]
Mechanistic insights into the durability of ancient Roman concrete
Jan 6, 2023 · Ancient Roman concretes have survived millennia, but mechanistic insights into their durability remain an enigma. Here, we use a multiscale ...Missing: harbor | Show results with:harbor
[125]
Roman roads
The whole comprised more than 400,000 km of roads, of which over 80,500 km were stone-paved. ... gravel and stone ... Via Appia, the Appian way (312 BC), from Rome ...Missing: BCE | Show results with:BCE
[126]
Cumbria's Roman Roads - A Second LiDAR Update
(2020). Cumbria's Roman Roads - A Second LiDAR Update. Transactions of the Cumberland & Westmorland Antiquarian & Archaeological Society 20 (series 3). Vol ...
[127]
[PDF] Lancashire's Roman Roads - A Lidar Update
Introduction. Recently an update was presented on the progress made in determining the Roman road network around Lancaster using LiDAR data (Ratledge 2020).
[128]
Mapping Roman Roads in Southwest England
Jan 18, 2025 · Also new sections of Roman roads in southwest Britain identified through the 2022 National LiDAR Programme data, shown in red. Figure 2 ...
[129]
Weapons Of Rome - Stanford EdTech Lab
The pilum was another ingenious weapon in the Roman arsenal. This heavy javelin, typically around 6 to 7 feet long, was designed to penetrate enemy shields and ...
[130]
The Roman Army in the First Century - BYU Studies
The two major legionary weapons were the javelin (pilum) and double-edged short sword designed for stabbing (gladius). The javelin was generally thrown at the ...
[131]
Copper smelting in Anatolia pre-dates previous findings by 3000 years
Apr 2, 2025 · ... Anatolia dates back 3000 years earlier than previously known, originating around 8000 B.C.E. at the Gre Fılla excavation site in the ...
[132]
Study: Anatolian hunter-gatherers smelted copper 9,000 years ago
Apr 4, 2025 · An analysis suggests the copper was exposed to temperatures exceeding 1,000 degrees celsius, indicating a much more advanced control of fire ...
[133]
Ancient Metallurgy. An Overview for College Students
Oct 31, 2001 · Copper melts at about 1,083°C (1,981°F). As ancient pottery workers experimented with the effects of higher temperatures on ceramics they began ...
[134]
A Critical Review of the Prehistory of Tin Bronze Alloying
Aug 1, 2024 · The Accepted Narrative on Tin Bronze Alloying Development. Bronze is an alloy of copper (Cu) and tin (Sn). Although other Cu alloys have been ...
[135]
Iron History - Bloomery Furnace - Metal Casting Institute
Iron began to be used as a productive material around 1200 BC. With early metals being produced from Copper and Bronze during the Bronze Age.Missing: transition C
[136]
[PDF] Ancient Carburization of Iron to Steel - Donald B. Wagner
Immersion of iron in a bath of molten cast iron held just above its melting point will carburize iron rapidly. The advent of steel-carbon-containing iron that ...Missing: BCE | Show results with:BCE
[137]
The early history of lost-wax casting - Academia.edu
Lost-wax casting was a common process in much of the ancient world from the time that copper metallurgy was first developed.
[138]
Bronze casting using the “lost wax” technique - Smarthistory
Bronze casting using the “lost wax” technique ... It takes many hands—and a lot of heat—to cast bronze. Follow the steps of this complex, non-intuitive process.
[139]
Bronze Age Casting - Smithsonian's National Museum of Asian Art
Chinese founders made their metal objects using clay for both models and removable section molds. (This differs from the Mediterranean and European practice of ...Missing: multi- single- pour
[140]
Between piece molds and lost wax: the casting of a diatrete ... - Nature
Jul 31, 2023 · This article presents my thinking about lost wax versus piece molds in early Chinese casting practices.
[141]
The Innovation and Adoption of Iron in the Ancient Near East
Feb 21, 2019 · This review synthesizes field research, textual analysis, and archaeometric data to evaluate different explanations for the spread of iron in the ancient Near ...
[142]
Archeometallurgy related to swords - ScienceDirect.com
This tutorial describes the development of swords, their influence on the evolution of materials, and their impact on society.
[143]
Mycenaean Civilization - Lake Forest College
The Myceneans developed a construction technique known as corbelling, where each successive row of stones in a wall is laid a bit farther out from the lower ...
[144]
Treasury of Atreus.Dome interior. - World Images
Mycenaean (Greek Helladic) Dome Mycenae. Argolis. Greece. AEG01049. Caption: MYCENAEAN | Treasury of Atreus. Dome interior. | c. 1400 BCE | Aegean | Mycenaean.<|separator|>
[145]
[PDF] The History of Architecture
True, animal and floral forms find their way into architecture, but only then as decoration applied to architecture. Sculpture and painting are often spoken of ...Missing: BCE | Show results with:BCE<|separator|>
[146]
Cyclopean Masonry - Brown University
Dec 13, 2007 · Cyclopean masonry is a term used to describe a type of megalithic architecture entailing the working of unusually large blocks of stone, ...
[147]
[PDF] Ashlar Masonry Art History Definition
precision-cut limestone blocks used in the Great Pyramid of Giza exemplify the technical mastery achieved by ancient stonemasons. Similarly, Mesopotamian ...
[148]
The Waterlords of ancient Sri Lanka - UNESCO Digital Library
The kingdom of Anuradhapura (2nd century BC-10th century AD) cre¬ ated a ... reservoir dates to the founding of the Sinhala kingdom in the sixth century BC.
[149]
[PDF] SURVEYING INSTRUMENTS OF GREECE AND ROME
As we shall see, there were the ubiquitous plumb-line, level and square for building, the cord and rod for measuring, and possibly a crude precursor of the ...
[150]
[PDF] Engineering Failure Analysis - UPCommons
Jan 20, 2024 · 1) Inca carved stone masonry with dry joints. The edges of carved stones have recesses highlighting the joints with other rocks. No texture ...
[151]
The Phoenician Alphabet in Archaeology
Sep 14, 2017 · There are 22 letters in Phoenician, and 24 in ancient Greek, but the Akkadian syllabic script has close to 1,000 signs. This makes it much ...
[152]
Babylonian mathematics - MacTutor - University of St Andrews
The Akkadians invented the abacus as a tool for counting and they developed somewhat clumsy methods of arithmetic with addition, subtraction, multiplication and ...
[153]
Telling Time in Ancient Egypt - The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Feb 1, 2017 · Beginning in the New Kingdom (ca. 1500 B.C.), there is evidence that sundials, shadow clocks ( 12.181.307 ) ...
[154]
The Oldest Surviving Water Clock or Clepsydra - History of Information
The oldest surviving water clock dates to c. 1417-1379 BC, used in the Temple of Amen-Re at Karnak. It was a stone vessel with a hole for water to drip out.
[155]
[PDF] The Great Library of Alexandria? - UNL Digital Commons
In order to explore these questions and to bring clarity to the topic of the Great Library, this paper will examine the founding and history of the Great.
[156]
“Nik” — The Zero in Vigesimal Maya Mathematics - Bulletin of the AAS
Jan 11, 2021 · The oldest stelae with number symbols are found in Chiapa de Corzo, Chiapas, Mexico, with a date of 36 BCE and in Tres Zapotes, Veracruz, ...Missing: earliest | Show results with:earliest