Unit 1 Review

Master the Neolithic Revolution and early civilizations with this review worksheet!

Neolithic Revolution. Read the text and fill in the blanks. During the Paleolithic Era, humans lived in small groups and moved from place to place following herds of animals and wild plants as they produced fruit. At that time, people were nomads. Around 10,000 BCE though, this all changed. People learned how to grow crops instead of gathering plants and to domesticate animals. They raised animals to help them carry things, produce milk, and to be slaughtered for meat. This change from hunting and gathering to agriculture is known as the Neolithic Revolution .This was the first major turning point in human history because it had significant effects on the way people lived their lives and led to the establishment of civilizations. The first place where this change took place was in an area of the Middle East known as the fertile crescent , an area with rich silt. People built permanent settlements here because the soil was fertile as a result of being close to the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers which offered an excellent place to farm. Early River Valley Civilizations. Fill in the blanks. In several places where the Neolithic Revolution took place, permanent settlements grew into what we call civilizations that had systems of government, laws, written language, and record keeping. Most of the first civilizations were established in river valleys because they provided fertile soil so people could farm and produce enough food to support a large population. To get that water from its source to the fields, people came up with innovative forms of irrigation. You studied four civilizations in this unit including Shang China in East Asia on the Huang He River, Indus River Valley located in South Asia, Ancient Egypt on the Nile, and Mesopotamia which means “The Land Between Two Rivers” and was located in the Middle East between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. One of the civilizations located between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers was called the Babylonian Empire. There, a powerful king made a list of the rules that his subjects had to follow and the punishment for not doing so. This list is known as the Code of Hammurabiand it is the oldest set of laws that we have record of. A close examination of the rules showed that people were treated differently depending on their position in society. This was evidence that the civilization had different social classes.