Early Societies and way

of life
Hunter-gatherers
 Hunter-gatherers
● In the past, people had to either
catch or find everything they
could eat.
● People either hunted or gathered
food.
● This is called the hunter-gatherer
economy

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 Hunter-gatherers
● food is obtained by
hunting wild animals
or by gathering wild
plants
● Such people are called
hunter-gatherer

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Hunter-gatherers
● Some wild animals
which people hunted in
the past included bezoar
goats and woolly rhinos.

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Hunter-gatherers
● Some food people
gathered included wild
plants, roots, nuts, fruits,
seeds, shellfish and
insects.

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 Hunter-gatherers
● Hunting was very important
for the people because it
provided meat for food,
bones for tools and hides for
clothing.

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 Hunter-gatherers
● They used animal skin to
make clothes and shelters.
● At first, they hunted with
sharpened sticks.

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Hunter-gatherers
● Later, they used bows, arrows
and spears tipped with flint or
bones.

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Hunter-gatherers
● They cut up their food
with sharpened stones and
cooked it on fire.
● They went fishing using
spears, bows, arrows,
harpoons, nets and hooks.

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 Hunter-gatherers
● As time went on, some
early humans built
canoes and rafts to go
out into deeper water to
catch larger fi sh.

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 Hunter-gatherers
● In the past, people mainly used to
hunt in groups.
● This was because it was easier for
an animal to attack a person who
hunted alone, than attacking a
group of people who hunted
together.

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 Hunter-gatherers
● By working and co-operating
together, they used to fulfill basic
needs for food, clothing and
shelter.
● This also helped with the
development of social living that
we are so used to today.

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Hunter-gatherers
● People depended on their
natural environment for
shelter.
● They mainly lived in caves
and shelters like tents,
made of bones, rocks,
branches and animal skin.

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Hunter-gatherers
● They lived in areas where
there were more animals
and plants and they
migrated when food,
including plants and
animals, became scarce in
one location.

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Hunter-gatherers
● When people got ill or
injured, they found
wild plants and used
them for medication

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Hunter-gatherers
● They collected wood to
make fire.
● They used the fire to
keep them warm and to
keep wild animals like
bears and wolves away at
night.

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Hunter-gatherers
● They also collected
freshwater to drink and
cook the meat of the
animals they caught.

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nomads

In the past, people used

to move a lot from place
to place in search of food,
so they were called
nomads.

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 Hunter-gatherers
● People observed the weather
while they travelled and moved
according to the changes in the
weather.

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Hunter-gatherers
● This way, they spread
throughout the world.

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“
For millions of years, human beings were
hunters and gatherers.

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