Upper Paleolithic Period

In literature, the oldest ceramic objects are said to be anywhere between 26,000 and 15,000 years old. They date from the Stone Age, or more precise from the period which is called the Upper Paleolithic Period (figure 2.2)... 

Fig. 6.7 A baton de commandant of reindeer antler from the Upper Paleolithic period in France...

The Old Stone Age, or Paleolithic Age, extends to about 8000 bce. Paleolithic humans were food-gathering nomads who learned to use language, control fire, and fashion tools of stone and bone. There is evidence that during the upper Paleolithic period people cooked food, which could easily be considered the first chemical process. Cooking uses heat to break down the chemical networks in vegetable and muscle fiber and accomplishes a sort of predigestion that takes some of the burden off teeth, stomach, and intestine. 

Just at the end of the Upper Paleolithic a Mesolithic cultural period emerged and with it several new innovations made hunting even more energy... 

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