The History Book

IN CONTEXT

Focus

Climate change

Before

c.2.58 million years ago The Pleistocene, or Ice Age, begins.

c.200,000 years ago Homo sapiens emerges as a species.

After

c.9700 bce The Pleistocene ends, marking the beginning of today’s relatively warm and stable climates—the Holocene.

c.9000–8000 bce Agriculture becomes established in the Near East.

c.5000 bce Sea level reaches near-modern levels; low-lying land is submerged.

c.2000 bce The last mammoths are thought to have died out, on Wrangel Island, Russia.

Scientists have only recently begun to appreciate how the two-way relationship that exists between humans and our environments has affected the development ...