Why Civilization Began Where It Did

Have you ever wondered why civilization began where it did? The first place that we usually think of in regard to early civilization is the Middle East and eastward to the Indus Valley, in the eastern hemisphere, and southern Mexico to northwestern South America, in the western hemisphere.

The primary factor which moved humans from nomadic hunting and gathering to permanent communities is generally considered to be the development of agriculture. Someone probably noticed that if seeds are pulled off a plant and dropped on the ground, copies of the plant will later sprout there. This led to planting and harvesting and a settled community.

The development of agriculture is certainly not the only factor in bringing about civilization. The control of fire and learning to measure time, beyond the day, were other important factors. The word "historic" means written, prehistoric means before writing was developed and this was also a vital step in civilization.

But I think that the development of agriculture, planting and harvesting instead of foraging, can be considered as by far the most important step in the development of civilization.

(Note-Remember, once again, the amazing fact that we saw in "The Grass Hypothesis" on the creation blog. The whole reason that civilization exits is really that humans are unable to digest grass. If we could digest grass, like sheep or cattle, there would be essentially an abundance of food and no need for civilization to provide a steady supply of food).

The strange thing about the development of civilization is where it began. If civilization is based on agriculture, then why did it begin in some of the dryest and least hospitable areas to farming? I find that this leads us to a great untold story of human history, there is a major factor that is being left out.

I have just about always had an interest in archeology, particularly that of the Middle East. The reason that I have never written much about archeology here, with the exception of "Ancient Egypt And Hinduism" on the world and economics blog, is that I want this blog to only contain what is new, or at least a new way of looking at things, and I am not in a position to make new archeological discoveries in the Middle East.

But I think I have found a factor here, without going to the Middle East, that explains a lot about why civilization began where it did. That factor is the glaciers of the last ice age, which ended about 12,000 years ago.

An ice age begins when the temperature periodically gets cold enough so that the snow of one winter has not melted when the following winter begins. Snow begins to pile up year after year, decade after decade and, century after century. The weight of the snow above compresses that below into ice, and the landscape ends up covered by a vast sheet of ice that might be 2 km thick.

When an object is large enough, such as a vast sheet of ice, it is affected by the rotation of the earth. The force of this rotation pulls the glacial ice sheet toward the equator, at the same time the momentum of the earth's eastward rotation pulls the glacier somewhat eastward. Usually glacial ice covers about 10% of the earth's surface, during the ice ages this increases to about 30%.

One implication of this is that sea level would have to drop across the world simply because so much more water would be locked up in glaciers. In "Sea Levels During The Ice Ages" on the glacier blog, we saw how this would enable the movement of people to areas of land that would be otherwise inaccessible such as the migration of people from Asia to North America and to Japan.

What I want to point out about the movement of glaciers today is that they would have also forced people away from many areas of the earth's surface and into areas that were more free of glacial movement.

This explains why the Middle East, despite being dry and far from the best area for farming, is considered as "the cradle of civilization". There were mountain glaciers, which came down from the Zagros Mountains of Iran, that were beneficial to the region because they plowed up nutrients in the soil along the so-called Fertile Crescent, and the water from the melting of these mountain glaciers formed the beginning of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. But the area was free of the main glaciers, and this is why early civilization was to be found in such an apparently illogical place.

Northern Europe has fertile soil, a moderate climate and is well-watered. Yet civilization in Europe was first found in much hotter and drier Mediterranean lands. Once again, this is explained by glacial movement. There was far less glacial ice in the Mediterranean area, and this gave it a head start on civilization.

Archeologists can see the human history, but the glacial history is a part of the story too. Areas like northern Europe look ideal for farming today but the flora and fauna of a region may have taken thousands of years to fully recover from being covered by glacial ice.

We find exactly the same pattern in the western hemisphere. There are native Indians throughout North and South America. But there were three truly great civilizations to be found, and all were close together in the relatively limited area of southern Mexico, Central America and, northwestern South America.

These great Indian civilizations were the Aztec, the Maya and, the Inca. They were found, as we might expect, in those areas that were furthest from the encroachment of glacial ice during the ice ages. Mountains also produce smaller glaciers, and the Inca were among the Andes Mountains. But their settlements were mainly to the west of the Andes, and remember that the earth's eastward rotation tends to pull glaciers eastward so that the Inca would have been away from the path of glacial ice.

The ice ages, then, explain not only human settlement such a show the Indians got to the western hemisphere, but also why civilization began where it did. I have never seen this pointed out before, but it is where natural history meets human history.