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The Stone Age

What was the Stone Age?

The Stone Age is the name given to the earliest period of human culture when stone tools were first used . In Britain, the Stone Age was around 12,000 years ago .

When people began smelting metal around 4500 years ago the Bronze Age began in the British Isles.

Top 10 facts

• Our ancestor, modern man  Homo sapiens , emerged around 200,000 years ago.
• Homo habilis , an early human who evolved around 2.3 million years ago, was probably the first to make stone tools.
• Neanderthals died out around 30,000 years ago.
• Flint was commonly used for making stone tools but other stones such as chert and obsidian were also used.
• The Stone Age is divided into three periods; the Palaeolithic (old Stone Age), Mesolithic (middle Stone Age) and the Neolithic (new Stone Age).
• Palaeolithic and Mesolithic people were nomadic hunter gatherers . They moved frequently following the animals that they hunted and gathering fruits and berries when they could.
• The dog was the first animal to be domesticated. This happened during the Mesolithic period. Dogs could help with the hunt, warn of danger and provide warmth and comfort.
• The gradual development of agriculture and the domestication of animals during the Neolithic period meant that people could live in settled communities.
• Some isolated tribespeople were still effectively living in the Stone Age as recently as the twentieth century.
• The houses in Skara Brae , a Neolithic Orkney village, had beds, cupboards, dressers, shelves and chairs.

Stone Age Timeline

• 300,000-150,000 years ago Appearance of Homo sapiens in Africa

• 35,000 years ago Tally sticks (for counting)
• 30,000 years ago Neanderthals become extinct
• 28,000-20,000 years ago Use of needles, saws and harpoons
• 27,000 years ago Earliest evidence of weaving
• 25,000 years ago Earliest pottery
• 15,000 years ago Domestication of pigs
• 13,000-10,000 years ago End of last Ice Age
• 10,500 years ago Cattle domesticated
• 10,000-9000 years ago Barley and wheat cultivated
• 9,500 years ago Cat domesticated
• 8,000 years ago Sheep and goats domesticated; irrigation began; wheel invented
• 7,000 years ago Gold treasure in burials in Bulgaria
• 7,500 years ago First smelting of copper
• 6,000 years ago Domestication of horse and chicken

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Did you know?

• The Palaeolithic period lasted for such a long time that it accounts for 99% of all human history.
• The first cities did not have streets. The houses were joined together and you walked across the roofs.
• Forty percent of the skeletons recovered from an Egyptian Mesolithic cemetery showed signs of violent injuries. Archaeologists believe that they may provide the earliest evidence of warfare.
• The city of Jericho was founded 11,000 years ago.
• Dogs were domesticated from wolves.
• The houses in Skara Brae had toilets flushed by streams.

Stone Age gallery:

• A Stone Age tool set (Photo Credit: Michael Greenhalgh)
• Skara Brae in Scotland
• The stone circle at Avebury
• Castlerigg in the Lake District
• A Neolithic grave in Sweden
• Neolithic tools
• Recreated Neolithic stilt houses
• Carnac in Brittany, France, known for its unique rows of ancient standing stones
• A recreated Neolithic village

The Palaeolithic or old Stone Age lasted from 2.7 million years ago to around 20,000 to 10,000 years ago . Britain would have looked very different during the Paleolithic: there were a number of cold periods called ice ages and the shape of landscapes changed as it became warmer and colder. During the Lower Palaeolithic Britian was not an island, but connected to mainland Europe. Some time between 400,000 and 200,000 years ago that changed and the area between the British Isles and what is now Denmark flooded and finally disappeared under the sea about 7500 years ago. A number of distinct groups of humans lived during the Paleolithic but only our ancestor Homo sapiens has survived. During this time men were hunter gatherers , finding food from their local environment and moving from site to site depending on the season. Tools were made of stone but also of wood, bone, leather and vegetable fibres. Language also developed and its early forms may have been similar to the click languages used by some South and East African peoples today. The period also saw the beginnings of art , such as the cave paintings of Chauvet in France and Venus figurines (statues of pregnant women) and the development of religion . The Mesolithic or middle Stone Age saw the development of finer, smaller stone tools such as arrow or spear heads. The first evidence for homes in Britain comes from this period, and the first  canoes were made. This meant that men could fish as well as hunt. The dog was also domesticated during this period, probably by the selection and breeding of the least aggressive wolves. The Neolithic or new Stone Age, from around 6000 years ago, saw the beginnings of agriculture . Farmers from mainland Europe probably brought seeds and farming tools to Britain. Growing crops was a more reliable food supply than gathering wild plants and the landscape was transformed by a new type of life, linked to settled communities of people. Animals such as the cow and sheep were domesticated and provided a ready supply of meat, milk, wool, leather and bone. Grain was the first food that could be stored for long periods of time. Grain needed to be processed so stones were used for scything (cutting grass crops) and grinding. The need to harvest and store grain meant that it became necessary to stay in one place and settlements could develop. Trees were cut down to make clearings where crops could be grown and people worked together to construct trackways and paths.  Large scale construction could take place, trade developed and people began to have different roles such as leader, priest, fighter, farmer, hunter or slave. By the end of the Stone Age people created enclosures by piling up circular earth banks, perhaps to protect themselves and their animals, and buried their dead in huge earth mounds and under stone slabs . Silbury Hill, in Wiltshire, is the largest prehistoric earth mound in Europe. Built around 4500 years ago, its height and volume are similar to those of Egyptian pyramids , which were built at around the same time, 2500BC. It's been estimated that its construction must have taken around 4 million man hours of work.

Related Videos

Just for fun...

• Make your own Stone Age paper axe tool
• Stone Age jigsaw puzzles
• Could you make it in the stone age? Take this quiz and find out!
• Get into the minds of Ancient Britons, build a stone circle, create cave art and read some great fiction and non-fiction books about Ancient Britain
• Watch a video about Stone Age Hunter-Gatherer Cooking
• Make your own Stone Age cheese!
• Play a game on the Chauvet Cave website to discover just how much we have in common with prehistoric humans
• Learn all about ancient stone tools
• Download two brilliant comics about Stone Age Wales  sites:  Barclodiad y Gawres  and  Bryn Celli Ddu
• Try a Stone Age counting activity
• Learn to make your own Stone Age string (cordage)
• Can you match the prehistoric track to the animal that made it ?
• Get creative and make some Stone Age rock art
• Complete the Museum of London's prehistoric archaeology activity pack
• Download and print an instant Stone-Age dress-up kit
• Show off your knowledge with a hunter-gatherer quiz and try some Stone-Age storytelling

Children's books about the Stone Age

Find out more about the Stone Age

• A general introduction to prehistoric Britain from BBC Bitesize
• Read about  a 9000-year-old human settlement at Mountsandel  in Northern Ireland
• Understand how Stone Age hunter-gatherers lived  and who the first farmers were
• Read kids' historical fiction set in the Stone Age
• Introduction to Stone Age including cave art
• Download fantastic information booklets about Yorkshire in the Mesolithic period, Mesolithic life and hunter-gatherer people
• Visit a virtual museum of the Stone Age
• An archeological experiment in London tried out ways of moving large stones which might have been used in places like Stonehenge
• Find out about food  in prehistoric times
• See a Paleolithic  handaxe, found in Somalia in East Africa, which was made about 1.5 million years ago !
• Join historian Greg Jenner for a  BBC Sounds kids' homeschool history lesson on the Stone Age
• Using virtual reality, scientists have recreated the sounds of Stonehenge from 3,000 years ago
• Read about Stone Age tools found in Yorkshire
• Take a close look at Stone Age objects found in Britain: a piece of small, portable Ice Age art showing an animal from Britain, a carved stone ball from Skara Brae , a 500,000 year old hand axe , a  Mesolithic woodworking tool , a  Mesolithic headdress made from deer antlers and a  Neolithic quern for making flour
• Download a Neolithic Britain image bank from the British Museum
• Information about prehistoric pottery , made for the first time in the Neolithic period
• Why were flint and mining so important to prehistoric Britons?
• Find out more about daily life in prehistoric Britain , with links to more information about art, commerce, religion and more
• Stonehenge food and feasting : how people cooked and served their food
• Read about the mystery of Stonehenge engineering : how was it built by prehistoric people?
• Discover Stone Age art and images of daily life on the 10,000 Years BC website

See for yourself

• Creswell Crags in Derbyshire : first inhabited by Neanderthals, these cave dwellings with carvings date back to the Palaeolithic era
• Stonehenge is Britain’s foremost neolithic site. You can take a virtual tour of Stonehenge from your living room with a 360 degree view from the monument.  
• Look through the BBC Bitesize kids' guide to Stonehenge
• Visit the Wiltshire Museum to see treasures dating to the time of Stonehenge and worn by people who worshipped inside the stone circle
• Silbury Hill , the Avebury Ring and the Sanctuary are all close to Stonehenge in Wiltshire
• See replica Stone Age artefacts and listen to experts explain how the objects were created and used
• Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands is one of Northern Europe’s best preserved Neolithic villages; look through a Skara Brae gallery to see inside the houses
• Castlerrig stone circle near Keswick
• Bryn Celli Ddu is a Neolithic chambered tomb in Wales
• The Megalithic Portal offers a map of ancient sites in the British Isles and Europe
• Visit the reconstruction of a Neolithic log cabin at the Ancient Technology Outdoor Education Centre
• Butser Ancient Farm features archaeological reconstructions of ancient buildings from the Stone Age
• Chauvet Cave is a 36,000-year-old French "art gallery". Take an immersive journey through the cave with Star Wars actress Daisy Ridley in a new Virtual Reality experience

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Stone Age for kids

Stone Age for kids learning in KS 1 & KS2 at Primary School. Homework help with the history of the Stone Age, cavemen and stone age tools.

Time: 5 million - 10,000 years ago

When was the stone age?

Over five million years ago lived a group of southern apes in Africa called Hominids. Hominids looked different to us they could walk upright like us but they were much shorter. They also had small brains and ape-like faces.

They used to spend a lot of time in the trees so their bodies were adapted to living in trees with long arms and curved fingers and toes to grip the branches. We believe that they started walking upright because the weather changed and a lot of the forests died out so they had to walk further to find food and it was much easier to walk on two feet than four. They could also see far away by standing up to see if any danger was coming.

The Stone Age Videos

When were stone tools first used?

Around two and a half million years ago a new species evolved (changed into something new) from the Hominids to be Homo habilis. They had a bigger brain and they were more skilled. They made their own tools using thin flakes of stone for cutting and larger stones for smashing hard objects. They used long thin stones called hammer stones to chip off flakes of stone from the bigger stones. Wooden sticks were sharpened into a sharp point so they could dig up roots to eat.

The Homo habilis used their tools to cut meat from dead animals they could find. Because these early men started to eat meat meant that they didn’t have to stay close to plants and fruit and could travel further. It also gave them more energy and helped their brains grow bigger.

When was fire discovered?

A million years ago Hominids evolved again because of their bigger brains into Homo erectus which means ‘upright man’ in Latin. Homo erectus discovered fire. To start with they probably waited until lighting caught grass alight then used branches to transfer the fire.

Fire changed their lives. They discovered that meat tasted better and was easier to eat when it was cooked. Their teeth and jaws then changed to be smaller as they didn’t need to chew the meat so much. As they ate more meat their brains became bigger and their bodies were taller and stronger.

Fire was also used to help create new tools. By heating the stone they found that they could shape them more easily. They could keep safe by scaring away dangerous animals with the flames. They could keep themselves warm too. Until now they would sleep at night as there was no way of lighting the dark, but now they had fire, they could stay awake and carry on working at night.

Over time the Homo erectus travelled from Africa to other countries such as China and to Europe to France and Spain. As the population was growing they had to move to find more food which led them to new places.

Horrible Histories - Savage Stone Age

What was life like during the Stone Age?

Around two-hundred thousand years ago Homo erectus evolved to become Homo sapiens which means ‘wise man’ in Latin. They had bigger brains again and big strong muscular bodies and a ridge of bone above their eyes.

The Neanderthal people were an early type of Homo sapiens that appeared in Europe and western Asia during an ice age. It was hard to find plants to eat during the ice age so they had to strip meat from dead animals like horses and reindeer. Mammoths and rhinos were too dangerous to go near so the early men used to scare them away with fire. Sometimes they would scare them to the edge of a cliff where they would fall to their death. The Neanderthals could then take their meat.

It was very cold during the ice age so they made basic clothes from the skins of animals. They would shelter in caves to keep warm or make shelters from branches in the open. These men were also good at making better tools for hunting, cutting food and making other tools.

The Neanderthals where clever and worked as families. Hunting was very dangerous and often they would get hurt. The others would then care for them as some would never be able to hunt again. They were also the first to bury their dead. They would dig a hole with their sharpened sticks and lay the body inside. They believed in the after-life so they would bury horns, stone tools and pollen from flowers to help the dead in their next life.

It is believed that the Neanderthals were the first to start talking. It would only be simple words and had gestures to organise each other and warn each other of any dangers.

The Neanderthals began to die out 40,000 years ago. A new type of people who were good a hunting drove the Neanderthals away and many starved to death. Others became weak and died of illness.

Evolving to the humans of today

150,000 years ago Home sapiens evolved to become Homo sapiens sapiens. All humans today are evolved from these people and they would have looked a lot like us.

There tools were now more advanced with handles and spears with tied sharp stone ends for blades. Bone was used to make fish hooks.

They would wander from place to place sharing information and trading items. People began to sew clothes and many people believed in spirits or gods possibly to help with hunting and to guide them in the after-life.

At this time the early man was now travelling and spreading all across the world. They would travel by boats made from bamboo stems tied together with thin strips of bamboo.

30,000 years ago tribes of people arrived in Eastern Europe and survived only on the mammoths there using their meat for food and bones to make shelters and skin for warm clothes and to cover their shelters. They used a weapon called a spear-thrower which could be thrown much further than before. This made it possible to hunt these dangerous animals.

How old are the oldest cave paintings?

35,000 years ago man started painting on cave walls with paint made from grinding soft rocks into a paste. They would then use their finger or animal skin to create the paintings.

Paintings were of animals like bison, deer, horses and mammoths. No one is really sure why they started painting in caves, it could have been for meetings or ceremonies.

When was the end of the last ice age?

The last ice age ended 12,000 years ago. The ice melted as the weather became warmer and huge forests began to grow. The mammoths died out and people hunted smaller animals. Tribes grew crops such as wheat and barley and grew their own food as well as living off hunting animals and fishing.

Hunters discovered that if they took baby wolves and looked after them they would become tame and help them with their hunting. They tamed other animals such as sheep, goats and cattle. This meant they always had meat, milk and use of fur and skins.

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Stonehenge: Stone Age primary resource

Discover the secrets of stonehenge and its stone age ceremonies.

This primary resource uncovers some of the mysteries of Stonehenge. Discover more about life in Stone Age Britain. What legends exist about the stones? How are people trying to uncover the truth? What evidence has been found at the site?

Pupils will learn about the different theories that Stonehenge suggests about Stone Age ceremonies, architecture and diet in our National Geographic Kids’ Stonehenge primary resource sheet.

The teaching resource can be used in study group tasks about interpreting evidence, as a printed handout for each pupil to review and annotate, or for display on the interactive whiteboard, as part of a class reading exercise examining the New Stone Age.

Activity: Ask children to design their own stone structure in the style of Stonehenge and explain its purpose and how it might be made. On a printed handout, pupils could highlight all the theories within the resource in one colour, and all the facts in another colour. How can they tell fact from theory?

N.B. The following information for mapping the resource documents to the school curriculum is specifically tailored to the English National Curriculum and Scottish Curriculum for Excellence . We are currently working to bring specifically tailored curriculum resource links for our other territories; including South Africa , Australia and New Zealand . If you have any queries about our upcoming curriculum resource links, please email: [email protected]

This History primary resource assists with teaching the following History objectives from the National Curriculum :

• Know and understand significant aspects of the history of the wider world: the nature of ancient civilisations; the expansion and dissolution of empires; characteristic features of past non-European societies; achievements and follies of mankind.
• Know and understand the history of these islands as a coherent, chronological narrative, from the earliest times to the present day: how people’s lives have shaped this nation and how Britain has influenced and been influenced by the wider world.  
• Gain historical perspective by placing their growing knowledge into different contexts, understanding the connections between local, regional, national and international history; between cultural, economic, military, political, religious and social history; and between short- and long-term timescales.  

National Curriculum Key Stage 1 History objective:  

• Pupils should be taught significant historical events, people and places in their own locality

National Curriculum Key Stage 2 History objective:

• Pupils should be taught about changes in Britain from the Stone Age to the Iron Age

This History primary resource assists with teaching the following Social Studies Early level objective from the Scottish Curriculum for Excellence :

• I am aware that different types of evidence can help me to find out about the past

Scottish Curriculum for Excellence First level Social Studies objective :

• I understand that evidence varies in the extent to which it can be trusted and can use this in learning about the past

Scottish Curriculum for Excellence Third level Social Studies objective :  

• I can use my knowledge of a historical period to interpret the evidence and present an informed view

Download primary resource

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STONE AGE to IRON AGE WORKSHOP

A brilliant prehistoric key stage 2 primary school workshop in the comfort of your school.

Free Stone Age lesson plans

This page contains a full scheme of work plus many one off lessons so you, can create your own stone age to iron age long term plans.  , ( sharing note :  while i am happy to let you share the resources far and wide with colleagues, please let them know where it comes from and share this page), full stone age year 3 or year 4 scheme of work.

6 weeks of Stone Age to Iron Age lesson plans!

Stone Age beasts powerpoint presentation

Lesson 1 match up cards

Lesson 1 wordsearch

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The Stone Age

The Stone Age  by Scoilnet

Monoliths, passage tombs, stone age toolkits and all the facts you can handle about the Stone Age people.

Ireland’s Early Inhabitants

From the Ask About Ireland site, notes about Stone Age people and tombs as well as Bronze Age people. Links also for a timeline of early people in Ireland.

How it maps to the curriculum

Strand: Early People /Ancient Societies

Strand unit: Bronze Age Peoples

Content objective: This resource should enable a child to:

• become familiar with aspects of the lives of these peoples
• examine and become familiar with evidence we have which tells us about these people, especially evidence of these people which may be found locally
• record the place of these peoples on appropriate timelines

Suggestions for use: Get the children to draw a timeline for early people in Ireland. This site will provide the information needed.

NOVA - Stone Age Toolkit

Explains some of the tools, weaponry, and other artifacts that were used by Stone Age people. Covers such tools as blade cores, burins, awls as well as various types of spears and harpoons. There is an interactive version and a printable version.

Strand unit: Stone Age Peoples

• become familiar with some aspects of the lives of these peoples

Suggestions for use: Use the interactive version first and then print out the notes. If the students had to choose two items, which ones would they pick. Get them to justify their answer.

BBC - Day In The Life: Stone Age

One of four episodes created by Beakus for BBC History to help get kids in to ancient history. This episode sees Eric, a 10-year old time-travelling boy, whizz off to the Stone Age. Duration 2.20 mins.

Suggestions for use: Discuss what life would have been like in the Stone Age. What would people eat? Where would they live?

Create Some Ancient Art - BBC

Classroom activities and ideas to - tell a story without words; carving or painting your own cave painting. Clear step-by-step guide for each activity

Suggestions for use: Good for station teaching.

• examine critically, and become familiar with, evidence we have which tells us about these people, especially evidence of these people which may be found locally and in Ireland, where appropriate

Suggestions for use: Useful for station teaching.

Strand: Paint and Colour

Strand unit: Painting

• discover pattern and rhythm in natural and manufactured objects and use them purposefully in his/her work
• express his/her imaginative life and interpret imaginative themes using colour expressively
• paint from observation

Suggestions for use: good for station teaching.

• explore colour with a variety of colour drawing instruments, media and techniques
• make paintings based on recalled feelings and experiences and discover ways of achieving spatial effects

Build A Stone Circle

Lesson activity that gets children to build their own version of Stonehenge out of modelling clay.

Strand: Clay

Strand unit: Developing Form in Clay

• develop line, shape, texture and pattern in clay
• explore and discover the possibilities of clay as a medium for imaginative expression
• make sturdy figures in clay using the medium expressively and with imaginative detail
• work inventively and expressively with cubes or oblong blocks of clay

Suggestions for use: Perfect for combining with a History class on Early Peoples.

The Stone Age was a time in prehistory when humans made and used stone tools . . .

Cave Paintings

This is an article about cave paintings, the kinds of cave paintings, how they were made, and when they were made.

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Stone Age — Recognising Types of Evidence (Years 3-4)

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Put children's historical skills to the test with this PowerPoint, which is also a great way to teach them about the Stone Age. It recaps the difference between primary and secondary sources and provides eight examples of historical evidence relating to the Stone Age. Children must identify whether the examples are primary or secondary sources.

• Key Stage: Key Stage 2
• Subject: History
• Topic: Historical Skills
• Topic Group: Historical Skills
• Year(s): Years 3-4
• Media Type: PowerPoint
• Resource Type: Activities & Games
• Last Updated: 16/12/2021
• Resource Code: H2PAC1387

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Stone Age Day Ideas

Plan a ‘Stone Age’ day with your children and take part in a wide range of activities to explore early human history! Of course, these ideas could also be used as part of your regular History lessons.

Don’t forget to explore  our Early Human History resource pack  too!

If you have any other ideas, please leave a comment below.

Teaching Ideas and Resources:

• Write a leaflet – “How to survive in the Stone/Bronze/Iron Age”. You could use some information from  the BBC’s Horrible Histories videos .
• Research theories about the reasons why Stonehenge was built and write an account of them.
• Write a letter describing a hill fort.
• Read a book set in the Stone, Bronze or Iron Age (e.g.  Stone Age Boy ,  Ug  and  Boy ). Books for Topics also have  a great list !
• Write a diary entry from the point of view of someone living in the Stone, Bronze or Iron Age.
• Imagine that you are a hunter gatherer, following herds of animals. Write a description of a day in your life.
• Share the information on our Fact Cards  and discuss the pictures in  our Image Pack .
• Try  this great nrich activity  about stone age counting.
• Look at pictures of Ice Age animals (e.g. mammoths) – how were they adapted for their habitats? What happened to them when the climate changed?
• Find out about fossils. What are they? How are they formed?
• Make a video report on life in the Stone, Bronze or Iron Ages. Use a green screen to put it an authentic-looking background!
• Play  this Stone Age Survival game .
• Make an animation about life in the Stone Age. Look at this example from Peters Hill Primary:

Design Technology

• Build an iron age cart – what materials would have been available?
• Look at early human homes – how were they different from today? What do humans need to survive?
• Design an outfit for a human living in the stone/bronze/iron age. What materials would they have used?
• The wheel was invented during early human history. How would life be different if it hadn’t been invented?
• Look at some examples of objects from early human history. Look at “The Stone Age to the Iron Age”  on this fantastic site  from the British Museum. What were they for? How were they made?
• Try out some Stone Age recipes. Early Stone Age people were hunter-gatherers, so their meals would have mainly consisted of meat and things they could forage, like fruit. Later in the Stone Age, people began to farm, so they began to eat crops such as cereals and wheat.
• Make a model of Stonehenge.
• Design your own cave art. Try taping paper to the underside of the tables and letting children draw while lying on their backs, as if they were working on the walls and ceiling of a cave. Pull down the blinds and turn the lights off to mimic painting in a dark cave.
• Try mixing up your own cave paint using oil and different types of mud, clay or ground-up charcoal.
• Learn about Stone Age art in this video:

• Research what happened in the Ice Age and the effect that had on humans in Britain when the land became cut off from the rest of Europe.
• Try flint knapping using a piece of soap instead of the flint and some simple cutting tools (clay tools or table knives).
• Bury some artefacts in a tray of sand and let the children have a go at being archaeologists. Provide a paper grid for them to record their finds.
• Get outside and build some simple shelters. What makes a good shelter?
• With adult supervision , build a campfire in a safe location. Try lighting it using flint stones.

Wind Power Challenge

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