Welcome! This comprehensive guide provides detailed, text-backed solutions for all the Questions and activities for NCERT Solutions Class 9 Social Science Chapter 4 Early Humans and Beginning of Civilisation NCERT textbook. These answers are compiled directly from the lines of the textbook to help you write precise answers and prepare for your school examinations.
Questions and activities
1. Do you think life became easier or more challenging after humans started farming? Give two reasons for your answer.
Answer:
The transition to a food-producing way of life, known as the Neolithic revolution, made life both easier and more challenging for early humans. Here are two reasons for both perspectives based on the text:
Why life became easier:
1. Stable Food Supply: Instead of relying on wild animals and seasonal wild plants, the domestication of select animals and plants allowed humans to produce their own food (like wheat, barley, rice, and millets) and raise sheep, goats, and cattle under human control.
2. Settled Life (Sedentism): It enabled the establishment of the first permanent village settlements (such as Mehrgarh) with handmade sun-dried brick houses and granaries, meaning humans no longer had to live a nomadic lifestyle constantly migrating in search of food.
Why life became more challenging:
1. Harder Physical Labour: Farming required intensive physical work, including tilling the soil, sowing seeds, weeding, harvesting, and processing food, which required the development of new specialized stone tools.
2. Vulnerability and Crop Dependancy: While hunter-gatherers had a diverse range of wild resources, farmers became highly dependent on specific crops and weather patterns. A weak monsoon or crop failure could result in severe food shortages or famine, with less flexibility to move elsewhere.
2. The environment offers human societies both opportunities as well as challenges. Explain with reference to early farming communities and river-valley civilisations.
Answer:
The relationship between the environment and early societies is characterized by both opportunities and challenges:
Opportunities offered by the environment:
1. Fertile Soils: River valleys like the Nile (Egypt), Tigris and Euphrates (Mesopotamia), Huang He (China), and Indus-Sarasvati (India) provided highly fertile alluvial soils due to seasonal floods, which allowed high crop yields.
2. Water Resources: The rivers offered a constant supply of water for irrigation. For example, in Egypt, farmers dug ditches to divert water from the Nile into their fields, and Sumerians built canals to irrigate their crops.
3. Natural Transportation Highways: Rivers and seas served as natural routes for transport and trade, enabling civilisations to establish contacts with distant regions (such as Harappan contact with Mesopotamian cities through the Persian Gulf).
Challenges posed by the environment:
1. Unpredictable Flooding: Rivers could cause severe destruction through sudden floods. The Huang He (Yellow River) was historically known as ‘China’s Sorrow’ due to its devastating floods.
2. Arid Borders and Nomadic Raids: Desert and mountain terrains surrounding fertile valleys presented physical barriers. For instance, the Chinese had to build the Great Wall of China as a defence mechanism against raids from northern nomadic tribes.
3. Resource Depletion and Degradation: Intense agriculture and environmental degradation put pressure on agricultural lands, which historically contributed to the decline of city-states like Babylonia.
3. Why do historians divide early human history into different ages such as Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age? What does this classification tell us about human progress?
Answer:
Why historians divide early history into different ages:
Historians classify early human history into distinct periods based on technological progress, particularly the primary materials used to create tools and implements, changes in lifestyles, and settlement patterns.
What this classification tells us about human progress:
1. Cognitive and Technological Growth: It shows the transition from using basic natural stone tools (extracorporal limbs) to discovering and mastering metallurgy. Humans moved from copper-stone tools (Chalcolithic) to complex alloying processes (mixing copper and tin to make bronze), and finally to smelting iron for stronger implements.
2. Socio-Economic Development: Each age corresponds to a higher level of social complexity. The Stone Age is dominated by hunting-gathering (Palaeolithic/Mesolithic) and early farming (Neolithic). The Bronze Age is characterized by urban cities, writing, and long-distance trade. The Iron Age represents more advanced societies with stronger tools and weapons.
3. Mastery of Nature: It reflects how humans gradually developed better techniques to harness natural resources, leading to food surpluses, urbanisation, and the emergence of civilisations.
4. Imagine you are a Neolithic farmer. Describe one day of your life. What challenges would you face that a hunter-gatherer would not?
Answer:
One Day of My Life:
I wake up inside my house built of handmade sun-dried bricks in the village of Mehrgarh. My first task is to check on our cattle and lead the sheep and goats out for grazing. In the morning, I head to the fields with my polished stone tools to tend to the barley and wheat crop. My family also works on shaping earthenware clay pottery to store the harvested grains for the coming months. Later in the afternoon, we work with other villagers to repair the local granary. In the evening, we gather near our permanent homes, safe from wild animals, preparing food on our hearths.
Challenges faced by a Neolithic farmer (that a hunter-gatherer would not face):
1. Fixed Settlement Vulnerability: Unlike hunter-gatherers who can easily pack up and migrate when local resources run dry, my entire livelihood is tied to my fields and brick home. If crops fail, I cannot easily move.
2. Crop Protection: I have to constantly guard the fields against wild animals, birds, and pests, and maintain irrigation channels.
3. Grain Preservation: I face the constant challenge of protecting stored grain in granaries from dampness, rodents, and insects to ensure survival through the dry season.
5. Imagine that the Harappan script gets deciphered tomorrow. What new types of information do you think historians might learn?
Answer:
Deciphering the Harappan script would transform our understanding of the Sindhu–Sarasvatī civilisation by providing written, direct evidence:
Political and Administrative Structure: We would learn the names of their rulers, how their city-states were governed, and whether they had formal laws or codes like the contemporary Code of Hammurabi.
Details of Trade Transactions: The inscriptions on Harappan seals would reveal the names of merchants, trade guilds, goods shipped, and exact commercial contracts, clarifying their extensive maritime links with Mesopotamia (Meluhha).
Religious Beliefs and Deities: It would provide the actual names and myths associated with figures represented on seals, such as the horned figure (often called Pashupati) or the Mother Goddess, which are currently only interpreted visually.
Language and Names: Historians would finally identify the language spoken by the Harappans, their personal names, and what they called their own cities and geographical features.
6. Prepare a table with three columns—Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic—and fill in their distinctive features: tools, settlements, art, and subsistence.
Answer:
| Feature | Palaeolithic (Old Stone Age) | Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age) | Neolithic (New Stone Age) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tools | Simple stone tools: large cutting tools including handaxes, cleavers, scrapers, and choppers made of quartzite or limestone. Later developed points, scrapers, borers, and burins. | Microlithic (tiny stone) tools, microblades fixed in handles, bone points, and the bow and arrow. | Polished stone tools, specialized tools for food production and processing (grinding stones), and earthenware pottery. |
| Settlements | Lived in caves or temporary open camps. Oldest human settlements (e.g. Attirampakkam, Isampur, Bhimbetka). | Occupied temporary settlements near rivers and lakes, caves, and rock shelters (e.g. Bhimbetka). | Established the first permanent village settlements (e.g. Mehrgarh) with handmade sun-dried brick houses and granaries. |
| Art | Decorated cave walls with rock paintings, used pigments to decorate bodies, and made early beads from stone, bone, and shell. | Rock paintings flourished, depicting social scenes, animals, and hunting activities on shelters (Bhimbetka). | Developed decorated earthenware pottery in various shapes and sizes, and ornaments made from lapis lazuli, carnelian, and shells. |
| Subsistence | Hunting-gathering lifestyle: hunting animals, gathering wild plants, digging tubers, and extracting bone marrow. | Hunting-gathering, with fishing and gathering marine or freshwater aquatic food as the mainstay. | Food-producing way of life: domestication of select animals (sheep, goats, zebu cattle) and plants (wheat, barley, rice, millets). |
7. “Bronze Age civilisations developed independently but shared common features.” Examine this statement with reference to the civilisations given in the chapter.
Answer:
The major Bronze Age civilisations—Sindhu–Sarasvatī, Mesopotamia, Egypt, and China—emerged independently in different geographical regions, yet they shared several defining common features:
River Valley Origins: All emerged in fertile river valleys (Sindhu-Sarasvati, Tigris-Euphrates, Nile, Huang He and Yangtze) that provided water and fertile silt for agricultural production.
Agricultural Surplus: Each mastered water control and farming. Harappans ploughed fields at Kalibangan; Egyptians dug irrigation ditches; Sumerians constructed canals. This surplus supported urban cities.
Writing Systems: They independently developed scripts to record transactions and thoughts: Harappan script in India, Cuneiform in Mesopotamia, Hieroglyphs in Egypt, and Logographic oracle bone script in China.
Social Hierarchy and Stratification: Societies were organized into hierarchies. In Egypt, it was the Pharaoh, nobles, free landholders, and slaves. In Mesopotamia, priests and scribes held ruling class status. In China, ruling class, nobles, and aristocrats sat above farmers and labourers.
Bronze Metallurgy and Crafts: All mastered metallurgy (bronze weapons and ritual vessels in China; tools and ornaments in India, Mesopotamia, and Egypt) and specialized crafts (bead-making, pottery, weaving).
Long-Distance External Trade: They exchanged goods over vast distances. Akkadian records document trade with Meluhha (identified with the Harappan civilisation) in semiprecious stone beads, ivory, timber, and gold.
8. Although rivers provided many benefits, they also created challenges for early societies. Discuss both the advantages and disadvantages of settling near rivers.
Answer:
Advantages of settling near rivers:
1. Agricultural Productivity: Rivers deposited fertile silt over the floodplains, providing natural fertilizer for crops.
2. Water Supply: Provided a constant source of water for irrigation, drinking, and domestic use.
3. Communication and Trade: Rivers served as transport highways, allowing early societies to transport heavy goods and trade with neighboring settlements.
Disadvantages of settling near rivers:
1. Devastating Floods: Rivers were prone to unpredictable seasonal flooding, which could destroy crops, sweep away villages, and cause loss of human lives (e.g. Huang He floods).
2. Changing River Courses: Rivers could dry up or shift courses due to environmental factors, forcing entire populations to abandon their urban cities (as seen in the dried river belt of the Sarasvati).
3. Swampy Environments: Nearby marshes could present health hazards, waterlogging, and make constructions difficult without collective community labor to build embankments.
9. With the help of your teacher, find out more about the Code of Hammurabi. Why was it important? Do you think it was fair to all sections of society? Give reasons for your answer.
Answer:
Why it was important:
The Code of Hammurabi, compiled by the Babylonian king Hammurabi starting in 1792 BCE, was a compilation of rules and regulations for civil and social conduct inscribed in cuneiform on a stone stele (Fig. 4.27). It was important because it was one of the earliest written law codes in human history, establishing written standards of justice throughout the empire and serving as a foundational model for future legal systems.
Was it fair to all sections of society?
No, it was not fair to all sections of society. The reasons are:
1. Class-Based Justice: The code did not treat everyone equally. Punishments were strictly based on social hierarchy. If a noble injured a commoner, they paid a small fine; but if a commoner or slave injured a noble, they faced physical mutilation or death.
2. Unequal Gender Rights: The laws heavily favored men over women and children, treating them with unequal legal status under the law.
3. Harsh Treatment of Slaves: Slaves were treated as property under the law, and injuring a slave was punished by paying compensation to the owner, rather than respecting the slave as a human being.
10. If you had to choose one major innovation from early civilisations that changed the world permanently, what would it be and why?
Answer:
The **Invention of Writing** (such as Cuneiform, Hieroglyphs, or Chinese logographic script) is the major innovation that changed the world permanently.
Why:
1. Preservation of Knowledge: Writing allowed early societies to move beyond oral traditions and record economic transactions, administrative decisions, laws, and creative literature, preserving them across generations.
2. Administrative Efficiency: It enabled rulers to run large empires by writing down codes of law (like Hammurabi’s Code) and keeping track of taxation and agricultural storage.
3. Foundation of Civilisation: Without writing, modern science, education, literature, and legal institutions would not exist. It remains the primary tool for human communication and history-keeping.
11. Compare the social hierarchy and daily life of people in the Egyptian civilisation with those in Mesopotamia or China. What similarities and differences do you notice?
Answer:
Similarities:
1. Highly Stratified Structures: All three civilisations had highly stratified social hierarchies. The ruling class, nobles, and priests sat at the top, while farmers, labourers, and slaves made up the bottom classes.
2. Central Role of State and Religion: In all three, daily and economic activities were tied to central authorities—the temple (ziggurats in Mesopotamia), the state (royal palaces/officials in China), or divine rulers (Pharaohs in Egypt).
3. Occupational Diversity: Daily life in all three civilisations involved specialized artisans (metalworkers, weavers, potters, scribes) alongside farmers who cultivated river floodplains.
Differences:
1. Women’s Status: Egyptian women generally enjoyed more rights than their counterparts in other civilisations; they could own property, run businesses, and rule (e.g. Cleopatra). in China and Mesopotamia, patriarchal control was much stronger.
2. Center of Authority: In Mesopotamia, early daily and economic life was centered on the temple authority (ziggurat) under high priests. In Egypt, authority was centralized around the Pharaoh, worshipped as a living god, with mastabas and pyramids built to secure their afterlife.
3. Official Records: China had a highly developed system of official historiographers who kept abundant records of administrative events, and public officials were chosen through examinations, which was unique compared to the hereditary noble systems of Egypt and Mesopotamia.
12. Activity: Using maps, locate the major rivers and civilisations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, and the Sindhu–Sarasvatī Valley. Mark the trade links between them.
Answer:
(Guidance for Student Map Work):
On a blank outline world map, locate and mark the following rivers and civilisations:
1. **Sindhu–Sarasvatī Valley:** Locate the Indus and dried Ghaggar-Sarasvati river basin in northwest India and Pakistan. Mark major sites like Mohenjo-Daro, Harappa, Kalibangan, Rakhigarhi, and Lothal.
2. **Mesopotamia:** Locate the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in modern Iraq. Mark cities like Ur, Uruk, Babylon, and Assur.
3. **Egypt:** Locate the Nile River in northeast Africa. Mark Lower Egypt (north delta) and Upper Egypt (south).
4. **China:** Locate the Huang He (Yellow River) and Yangtze River in East Asia. Mark Anyang.
5. **Trade Links:** Draw sea routes connecting the Harappan port of Lothal through the Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf to Dilmun (Bahrain), Magan (Oman), and Mesopotamian ports like Ur (as illustrated in Fig. 4.26).
13. Activity: Choose one early civilisation (Mesopotamia, Egypt, or China) and prepare a mini-scrapbook or a presentation showing their innovations in tools, writing, art, and architecture. Include pictures, brief descriptions, and explain their significance.
Answer:
Example Scrapbook Outline: The Mesopotamian Civilisation
Writing (Cuneiform): Explain that cuneiform consists of marks pressed onto damp clay tablets using wedge-shaped reeds (Fig. 4.25). Significance: Allowed record-keeping of farm activities, laws, and the Epic of Gilgamesh.
Architecture (Ziggurats): Grand temples built for chief gods, with palaces and royal storehouses around them. Significance: Served as the city’s administrative center and treasury.
Tools & Science (Wheel and Number 60): Sumerians invented the wheeled cart and sailboat, and developed a number system based on 60 (which gave us the 60-minute hour, 60-second minute, and 360-degree circle). Significance: Revolutionized transportation, calculations, and time-keeping.
Art (Flake Tools and Carved Seals): Flake tools made of bronze, and clay/stone cylinder seals representing scenes of Sumerian daily life. Significance: Reflected complex trade transactions and ownership records.