Tag Archives: Archaeological Ages

Supplement to ‘Just How Global Was the Great Flood’?

Amaic

Preface

“… at the end of the sixth age-day [sic] of Gen. 1:26-30, we have Old Stone Age Man with his agricultural revolution in the “Garden of Eden” 10,000 years B.C. This is followed by surprising New Stone Age City developments of Catal Hüyük in Turkey, and Jericho, 8000 to 5000 B.C. [sic]“.

reconstruction. Thus he continues (ibid.):

“… the Chalcolithic period is referred to

I give here some quotes from Pearce’s book, relevant to the above:

at the proper Stone Age, and archaeological, alignments for early Genesis.

Introduction

A.     The Geological Ages;
B.     The Stone Ages; and
C.     The Archaeological Ages.

Points of Co-ordination

contrast the standard linear time system with my revised version.
These revised charts (see pp. 7, 11 & 13) are only rudimentary at this stage and will need further development.
Firstly, the conventional sequence for A-C is basically as follows (all dates are BC and are most approximate):

Chart 1 (Conventional Arrangement)
A: Geological Ages

Date 3000 Million Plus 600 Million 500 Million 450 Million 400 Million 350 Million 310 Million 280 Million 220 Million 180 Million 130 Million 60 Million 1 Million

Era Proterozoic/ Archaeozoic Palaeozoic Mesozoic Cenozoic

Period Cambrian Ordovician Silurian Devonian Mississippian Pennsylvanian Permean Triassic Jurassic Cretaceous Eocene Oligocene Miocene Pliocene Pleistocene

Evolving Life Algae/Bacteria Molluscs, Sponges Jelly Fish Insects, Mosses Sharks, Ferns Amphibians Reptiles, Coal Reptiles Dinosaurs, Conifers Flowering, Birds Primates, Mammals Monkeys Apes Hominids Man

B: Stone Ages

Date 2-1500,000 Million 90,000 40-38,000 17,000-8500 8300-6000 6000-5000 4500 3500

Period Palaeolithic (Lower) (Middle) (Upper) Mesolithic/Epi-Palaeolithic Neolithic (Early) (Late) Chalcolithic (Ubaidian)

Culture Acheulean Mousterian Aurignacian Kebaran Natufian ( Black Sea Flood) Eridu Ware Ghassulian Beersheba

Activity Scavengers & Gatherers Hunters & Gatherers Farmers, Hunters & Gatherers, Herding Agriculture, Crops Orchard, Mixed farming Copper, Ivory

5
C: Archaeological Ages

Date 6000 5500 5000 4000 3500 2900 2750 2650-2350

Period Chalcolithic Ancient Bronze Historic Early Bronze Age/Early Dynastic (1A-C) (II) (III) [Middle Bronze Age Late Bronze Age Iron age – Not Relevant to this study]

Culture Hassuna, Samarra , Halaf Eridu (Ubaid I) Ubaid Uruk Period Jemdet Nasr Sumerian Civilization Uruk I Canaanite and Egyptian cities

Activity City Building Use of copper First temples First seals Wide use of brick Temples , houses of increasing size Urbanization Expanding trade City states Fortified towns

Now, turning to my Flood article, I shall use the data arranged there to attempt to build a new version of Chart 1 (A-C), as Chart 2 (A-C) (revised charts to be found on pp. 7, 11 & 13).  

A: Geological Ages
(p. 14):

(p. 26):
“Pleistocene and Holocene [our age] changes in world climate … were … responsible for wide fluctuations in the level of the Gulf waters …”.
(p. 27):
After the Fall … a harsher environment may have set in … glaciation (an Ice Age).
(p. 39):

(pp. 40-41):
“… the Palaeolithic phase for Palestine has the following three standard subdivisions:

(a)     The Lower Palaeolithic – Acheulean.
(b)     The Middle Palaeolithic – Mousterian.
(c)     The Upper Palaeolithic – Aurignacian”.

[Osgood] … though will … challenge this linear view, referring to “the possible horizontal contemporaneity of at least the last two of these cultures, the Mousterian and the Aurignacian”. But the more interesting point that Dr. Osgood makes is that of the need … for radically re-locating the Acheulean phase, and its characteristic hand-axe, downwards … from the early Stone Age to the early post-Flood period …:
“There is strong evidence for a very wet climate in The Middle East and for left-over basins of water over many areas of the Middle East in the early days which the biblical model would allow to be called post-Flood, but which the evolutionary model would call the stone age. ….
… [east Jordan] … the stratification in the north, west, and south trenches reflects the existence of a Pleistocene pluvial lake that shrank until a widespread marsh formed during the Early Neolithic”.

The evidence suggests a starting point for Egyptian prehistory at the end of the Abbassia Pluvial period in the Middle Palaeolithic (c. 120,000-90,000 BC).

The Naqada I and II phases in Egypt , whose cultures are, respectively, Amratian and Gerzean, are conventionally assigned to the Chalcolithic stage of the Stone Ages. But Osgood … appears to re-assign Naqada I and II to the same wet phase of the Acheulean culture, when large trees were growing in every part of the Nile Valley ….

Chart 2 (Revised Arrangement)

A: Geological Ages

Date 4000 2750 2300 2100-2000

Era [Palaeozoic Mesozoic Cenozoic] Palaeolithic Mesolithic Neolithic Chalcolithic Palaeolithic Mesolithic Neolithic Chalcolithic (Ghassul IV)

Period Cambrian 6 miles of sedimentary rock Genesis Riverine System The Fall [Ordovician Silurian Devonian Mississippian Pennsylvanian Permean Triassic Jurassic Cretaceous] [Eocene Oligocene Miocene Pliocene Pleistocene] The Flood [Lower Pleistocene Oldowan] Abbassia Pluvial Acheulean Naqada I (Amratian) Naqada II (Gerzean) ( Upper Palaeolithic ) Mousterian Aurignacian Cush/Nimrod Babel Abram (Abraham)

Life/Climate Plants, Animals, Reptiles Man Ice Ages ( Jericho spring dries up) City Building (especially in S. Mesopotamia ) Development of Metals Temple building ( Black Sea Flood) Destruction of local life Wet climate Forestation (invention & use of hand axes) City Building Ur III

B: Stone Ages
(p. 7):

(p. 8):

• … the eventual cultural evolution (beyond Palaeolithic) from Mesolithic to Neolithic must not be confined entirely to post-diluvian times … having its origins at least in antediluvian times, primarily with Cain, likely the first city builder (Genesis 4:17) – hence Neolithic? – and with Cain’s descendants, all in southern Mesopotamia , who became more and more ‘civilized’, technologically speaking (Chalcolithic),
  

• • … culminating in the vibrant Chalcolithic mid-late Ubaid period (still antediluvian), at Eridu, Uruk and Ur in southern Mesopotamia, that absorbed the Hassuna, Samarra and Halaf cultures in the north, and beyond Iraq – this archaeological phase perhaps corresponding with the likes of the highly ‘civilized’, polygamous Lamech and his sons before the Flood (Neolithic/Chalcolithic?).
    

  … then interrupted by the Great Flood.
  

• But that, soon afterwards, Mesopotamian civilization in particular (cf. Genesis 11:2) was resumed … especially by Nimrod, the empire builder …; Nimrod’s phase representing the imperial Uruk I and Jemdet Nasr archaeological civilizations in southern Mesopotamia (c. 3000-2900 BC, conventional dating).
  
• That finally, after Babel , there occurred the Dispersion primarily westwards, shown archaeologically most especially by the Jemdet Nasr expansion (c. 2900 BC, conventional dating), leading to the Early Bronze Age/Early Dynastic phase.
  

(p. 24):

Ø      Adam (Palaeolithic)
Palaeolithic, the text books tell us, entirely fills the geological period called Pleistocene (part of the Quaternary period of the Palaeozoic era).
(p. 27):
Even the perennial Jericho spring dried up in Mesolithic times, necessitating a long-time abandonment of that ancient site.
(p. 28):
By the time that Adam’s sons had reached maturity, there were, recorded, features of human living that a palaeontologist might perhaps associate with Mesolithic (or Epipalaeolithic) man. I refer to the basic cultivation of crops, cultic religion and simple animal husbandry. But still largely a hunting-gathering culture. The fertile site of Jericho , a spring-fed oasis, is considered to be the most ancient cultivated site on earth (its first level of occupation being Me Continue reading →