Sugarcane, a perennial grass of the genus Saccharum, is cultivated for its juice, which people chew raw to extract its sweetness.

Saccharum officinarum, originally from tropical South Asia and Southeast Asia, has been developed from a wild cane species, Saccharum robustom, and cultivated by natives of southern Pacific Islands.

As early as 7000 BCE, the inhabitants of the island of New Guinea have developed, perhaps partly through indirect contact with developments in Southeast Asia, one of the earliest agricultural complexes, based on root crops and sugarcane cultivation.

New Guinea’s Highlands are settled around 6000 BCE, and sugar cane and bananas are cultivated.

East Europe (2637 – 910 BCE): Forest–Steppe Frontiers and Great River Gateways

Geographic and Environmental Context

East Europe—including Belarus, Ukraine, the European portion of Russia west of the Urals, and the sixteen Russian Republics in this zone—spanned a vast mosaic of taiga, mixed forest, forest–steppe, and open steppe. The Dniester, Dnieper, Don, and Volga rivers linked interior zones to the Black Sea, Sea of Azov, and Caspian Sea, creating major north–south transport arteries. The climate ranged from cool-temperate in the north to semi-arid in the southern steppe.

Subsistence and Settlement

By the mid–third millennium BCE:

• Forest–steppe communities practiced mixed farming, cultivating barley, wheat, and millet, and raising cattle, sheep/goats, and horses.

• Steppe herders relied on mobile pastoralism, moving seasonally with herds and supplementing diets with hunting and fishing.

• Northern forest zones supported fishing, fur trapping, and limited slash-and-burn horticulture.

• Settlements ranged from semi-permanent villages on river terraces to seasonal encampments following grazing patterns.

Technological and Cultural Developments

• Metallurgy progressed from copper to bronze, producing socketed spearheads, axes, and ornaments.

• Stone and bone tools remained common, especially in the north.

• Burial traditions included kurgans (earthen mounds) with timber or stone chambers, often containing weapons, horse gear, and prestige goods.

• The Catacomb culture and later Srubnaya (Timber-Grave) culture dominated large areas of the steppe and forest–steppe, associated with early chariot and wagon use.

• Anthropomorphic stelae carved in stone marked elite burials and territorial claims.

Trade and Interregional Networks

East Europe was a key corridor between Europe and Central Asia:

• Amber, furs, and forest products moved south toward the Black Sea and beyond.

• Tin, copper, and finished bronze goods entered from the Caucasus and Carpathian regions.

• River systems linked to the Baltic and the Volga–Ural routes, connecting to the steppe nomadic cultures and Central Asian metallurgical centers.

Cultural and Symbolic Expressions

Art and ornament favored geometric patterns, solar motifs, and animal representations, often linked to steppe cosmologies. Horse burials and the inclusion of riding or chariot equipment reflected the growing symbolic and practical importance of equestrianism.

Environmental Adaptation and Resilience

Mobile pastoralism was the key adaptation to the variable climate of the steppe. Mixed economies in forest–steppe regions allowed resilience through diversification—grains, herds, wild foods, and fishing. Seasonal migration routes optimized pasture use while maintaining ties to permanent resource areas.

Transition to the Early First Millennium BCE

By 910 BCE, East Europe was a dynamic meeting ground of agriculturalists, herders, and long-distance traders. Its open steppe corridors, fertile river valleys, and role in trans-Eurasian exchange positioned it for major cultural shifts with the rise of early Iron Age steppe confederations.

Middle Africa (2,637 – 910 BCE) Bronze and Early Iron — Bantu Dispersals and Metallurgy

Geographic and Environmental Context

The broad equatorial–central belt of Africa including:

• Chad and Lake Chad Basin,

• the Central African Republic (Ubangi–Sangha region),

• Cameroon (highlands, Adamawa Plateau, coastal plains),

• Equatorial Guinea (islands and coast),

• São Tomé e Príncipe,

• Gabon,

• the Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville),

• the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Congo Basin, Kasai, Katanga, Ituri),

• Angola.

Anchors: Lake Chad, Chari–Logone delta, Adamawa Plateau, Sangha–Ubangi junction, Cameroon Highlands, São Tomé e Príncipe volcanic isles, Congo River mainstem, Kasai–Katanga copperbelt, Ituri rainforest, Angolan escarpment.

• Congo Basin, Kasai–Katanga copperbelt, Angola highlands.

Climate & Environmental Shifts

• Rainfall fluctuated; lakes shrank periodically.

Subsistence & Settlement

• Farming villages expanded; yams, millet, oil palm staples.

• Bantu herding communities with cattle/pigs spread through forests and savannas.

Technology & Material Culture

• Iron smelting appeared by 1st millennium BCE (Nsukka/Cameroon).

• Copper mining in Katanga belt.

Movement & Interaction Corridors

• Congo River canoe routes moved iron, beads, food.

• Lake Chad Basin tied into Saharan trade.

Cultural & Symbolic Expressions

• Ancestral veneration; iron incorporated into ritual.

• Rock art in Angola depicts cattle, hunters.

Environmental Adaptation & Resilience

• Agro-pastoral–iron complex buffered instability.

Transition

By 910 BCE, Bantu-speaking iron-farmers occupied much of Middle Africa.

Lothal, before the arrival of Harappan people in about 2400 BCE, had been a small village next to the river providing access to the mainland from the Gulf of Khambhat.

The indigenous peoples maintained a prosperous economy, attested by the discovery of copper objects, beads, and semiprecious stones.

Ceramic wares were of fine clay and smooth, micaceous red surface.

They had improved a new technique of firing pottery under partly oxidizing and reducing conditions—designated black-and-red ware, to the micaceous Red Ware.

Harappans had been attracted to Lothal for its sheltered harbor, rich cotton and rice-growing environment and bead-making industry.

The beads and gems of Lothal are in great demand in the west.

The settlers live peacefully with the Red Ware people, who adopt their lifestyle—evidenced from the flourishing trade and changing working techniques—and Harappans began producing the indigenous ceramic goods, adopting the manner from the natives.

Harappans based around Lothal and from Sindh, after a flood destroys village foundations and settlements around 2350 BCE, take this opportunity to expand their settlement and create a planned township on the lines of greater cities in the Indus valley.

Lothal planners, to protect the area from consistent floods, divide the town into blocks of one-to-two-meter-high (three to six feet) platforms of sun-dried bricks, each serving twenty to thirty houses of thick mud and brick walls.

The city is divided into a lower town and a citadel, or acropolis, where the town’s rulers live.

The acropolis has paved baths, underground and surface drains built of kiln-fired bricks, and a potable water well.

The lower town is subdivided into two sectors—the north-south arterial street is the main commercial area—flanked by shops of rich and ordinary merchants and artisans.

The residential area is located to either side of the marketplace.

The lower town would also be periodically enlarged during Lothal's years of prosperity.

Lothal's dock—the world's earliest known—connects the city to a course of the Sabarmati river on the trade route between Harappan cities in Sindh and the peninsula of Saurashtra.

(The surrounding Kutch desert of today is at this time a part of the Arabian Sea.)

The people of the Indus Valley have domesticated chickens from Indian jungle fowl, and use the water buffalo and zebu cattle as draft animals.

Indus farmers use plows, design effective irrigation systems, and construct large granaries.

They grow such plants as cotton, sesame, tea, and sugarcane.

(Different species of sugarcane likely originated in different locations, with S. barberi originating in India and S. edule and S. officinarum coming from New Guinea.)

East Europe (909 BCE – 819 CE) Early Iron and Antiquity — Scythian–Sarmatian Steppe, Greek Ports, Balts & Finno-Ugric Forests, and Early Slavs

Geographic and Environmental Context

East Europe includes Belarus, Ukraine, and European Russia west of the Urals (including the forest, forest-steppe, and steppe zones and the Russian republics west of the Urals).

• Anchors: Scythian Pontic steppe (Lower Dnieper–Don), Taurica/Crimea Greek ports (Olbia, Chersonesus, Bosporus), Sarmatian Lower Volga–Don, Balts on the Upper Dvina–Neman, Finno-Ugric Volga–Oka forests, and the forest-steppe of Kyiv–Chernihiv.

Climate & Environmental Shifts

• First-millennium variability; steppe aridity pulses alternated with good pasture years; rivers remained trade arteries.

Societies & Political Developments

• Scythians (7th–3rd c. BCE) dominated Pontic steppe; later Sarmatians (3rd c. BCE–3rd c. CE) advanced from the east.

• Greek colonies flourished along the Black Sea coast, brokering grain, slaves, and crafts.

• Forest zone: Balts consolidated; Finno-Ugric groups (Merya, Muroma, Mari ancestors) sustained fishing–hunting and garden plots.

• Przeworsk–Zarubintsy and later Chernyakhiv cultural spheres in the forest-steppe bridged steppe and Carpathians.

• Gothic and Hunnic incursions (3rd–5th c. CE) reshaped steppe polities; Avars skirted the Carpathians; Khazars(7th–10th c.) organized lower Volga–Don tribute (Saltovo–Mayaki culture).

• Volga Bulgars formed on the middle Volga (7th–10th c.); Early Slavs (Prague–Korchak, Pen’kovka) spread through Dnieper–Bug–Pripet basins (5th–7th c.), foreshadowing Rus’.

Economy & Trade

• Steppe exported horses, hides, slaves; imported Greek wine/oil, metal goods; Greek ports shipped grain from forest-steppe.

• Forest traded furs, wax, honey via Dvina–Volga–Dnieper; Khazar and Bulgar routes taxed Volga traffic to the Caspian.

Technology & Material Culture

• Iron weaponry; saddles and stirrups (late); composite bows; Greek ceramics/coins; hillfort gorodishcha with ramparts; black-burnished and wheel-made wares in late centuries.

Belief & Symbolism

• Sky-god/Tengri and ancestor cults among steppe riders; Greek polytheism then Christianity in ports; Zoroastrian, Jewish, Christian, Muslim minorities under Khazars; forest animisms persisted.

• Kurgan art (animal style), Greek funerary stelae, and forest-zone ritual pits coexisted.

Environmental Adaptation & Resilience

• Pastoral nomadism tracked pasture cycles; mixed farming in forest-steppe stabilised grain; river/port networks re-routed trade during wars.

Legacy & Transition

By 819 CE, East Europe was a braided frontier: Scythian–Sarmatian legacies, Greek–Khazar–Bulgar economic lattices, Balto-Finnic forests, and Early Slavs in the Dnieper–Pripet. The political and economic scaffolding for Kyivan Rus’ (emerging in the 9th century) and later medieval polities was in place.

Southeast Europe (909 BCE – 819 CE): Iron Kingdoms, Roman Frontiers, and Byzantine Beginnings

Regional Overview

Between the Adriatic and the Black Sea, Southeast Europe stood for a millennium as the hinge between the Mediterranean world and the steppe.
Its twin landscapes—the eastern Danubian–Thracian plains and the western Adriatic–Illyrian mountains—produced parallel yet intertwined histories.
Both absorbed Hellenic colonization, entered the Roman orbit, and later weathered the migrations that forged medieval Europe.
The region’s story from the early Iron Age to late Antiquity is thus one of fusion and frontier, where Greek, Roman, Thracian, Illyrian, and Slavic worlds met and reshaped one another.

Geography and Environment

The region divides naturally:

• Eastern Southeast Europe embraces the Lower Danube, Thracian plain, and Black Sea coast, enclosed by the Balkan and Carpathian arcs. Fertile lowlands sustained dense agrarian settlement, while the Danube served as both artery and barrier.

• Western Southeast Europe rises into karstic uplands and Adriatic coasts, with sheltered island chains and mountain basins suited to mixed farming and seaborne trade.

Climatic variation—humid along the coasts, continental inland—produced complementary economies: grain, salt, and metals from the east; timber, livestock, and maritime goods from the west.
Seasonal river floods and Adriatic storms shaped transport calendars; alpine passes and sea lanes linked every valley to the wider Mediterranean.

Societies and Political Developments

Greek Colonies and Indigenous Kingdoms

From the 8th to 5th centuries BCE, Greek settlers established poleis along both coasts: Apollonia and Dyrrhachium on the Adriatic; Odessos, Mesambria, and Histria on the Black Sea.
Behind them, Illyrian, Thracian, and Geto-Dacian tribes forged early kingdoms—the Odrysian realm in Thrace, the Ardiaean and Dardanian dominions in the west.
These polities traded metals, grain, and slaves for imported wine, oil, and ceramics, mediating between the Mediterranean and the interior.

Rome and the Imperial Frontier

Between the 2nd century BCE and the 1st century CE, Rome absorbed the entire peninsula: Macedonia, Illyricum, Dalmatia, Moesia, Thrace, and briefly Dacia north of the Danube.
Roman roads—the Via Egnatia, Via Militaris, and Sava-Drava corridors—stitched the provinces together.
Urban centers such as Salona, Skupi, Nicomedia, and Serdica reflected Roman law and architecture, while legionary camps and bridgeheads (Apollodorus’ bridge at Drobeta) turned the Danube into the empire’s longest fortified line.
Mining in Dacia, shipyards on the Adriatic, and grain estates in Moesia underpinned prosperity until the 3rd-century crises.

Migrations and the Byzantine Transition

From the 3rd to 7th centuries CE, the frontier dissolved under waves of Goths, Huns, Avars, and Slavs.
Cities were sacked, repopulated, and repurposed as Byzantine forts.
The Eastern Roman Empire, centered on Constantinople, re-emerged as the stabilizing power, holding Thrace and the coastal Adriatic while fostering Christianization.
By the late 7th century, the First Bulgarian Empire rose in Moesia and Thrace; Croatian and Serbian principalities took form in the western mountains, bridging the late antique and medieval orders.

Economy and Exchange

Agriculture remained the foundation:

• The Thracian plain and Wallachian lowlands exported grain and livestock along the Danube.

• The Adriatic coasts specialized in wine, oil, salted fish, and amphora industries.

• Mining of gold, silver, and iron in Dacia and the western ranges enriched both local chieftains and Roman prefects.

Trade routes—riverine, overland, and maritime—made the region a corridor between the Aegean, the Pannonian plain, and the steppe.
After Rome’s decline, Byzantine and Bulgar administrations preserved key arteries, ensuring continuity of commerce despite political fragmentation.

Technology and Material Culture

Iron metallurgy and Roman engineering reshaped daily life.
Stone bridges, aqueducts, and bath complexes signaled urban sophistication; rural estates used the iron plow to expand cultivation.
Local craftsmanship persisted: Thracian and Illyrian metalwork, Dacian goldsmithing, and later Slavic wood and textile arts.
Christian churches and monasteries, often rising atop pagan sanctuaries, announced new spiritual geographies while reusing classical masonry.

Belief and Symbolism

Religious life reflected the region’s pluralism:

• Indigenous cults—Zalmoxis, the Thracian Horseman—coexisted with Greek polytheism and Roman state worship.

• Christianity spread from urban bishoprics by the 4th century CE, producing early saints and councils.

• Slavic and Bulgar paganisms, with sky- and ancestor-deities, persisted until conversion in the 8th–9th centuries.
  Thus the region became a spiritual palimpsest, each new faith overlaying rather than erasing the old.

Adaptation and Resilience

Southeast Europe’s resilience lay in its geographical layering: river corridors, mountain refuges, and island coasts offered fallback zones in war or climate stress.
Agro-pastoral economies allowed mobility; fortified towns and hillforts provided refuge during invasions.
Byzantine fiscal systems and Bulgar tribute networks recycled Roman infrastructures, ensuring survival of settlement and trade patterns despite continual upheaval.

Regional Synthesis and Long-Term Significance

By 819 CE, Southeast Europe had completed its ancient cycle.
In the east, Byzantine Thrace and the Bulgar kingdom defined a Christian–steppe frontier along the Danube.
In the west, Slavic kingdoms grew amid the ruins of Roman Dalmatia, while the Adriatic cities preserved classical urbanism under imperial and papal influence.
Greek colonies, Roman provinces, and barbarian migrations had fused into a single cultural continuum—one that naturally divides into eastern (Danubian–Thracian) and western (Adriatic–Illyrian) spheres yet remains bound by geography, trade, and faith.

This equilibrium of coast and hinterland, empire and tribe, set the pattern for the medieval Balkans: a region perpetually contested but never peripheral, mediating between the Mediterranean world and the steppes beyond.

Eastern Southeast Europe (909 BCE – 819 CE) Early Iron & Antiquity — Greek Poleis, Thracians & Dacians, Rome & Byzantium, Migrations and Bulgars

Geographic and Environmental Context

Eastern Southeast Europe includes Turkey-in-Europe (Thrace); Greece’s Thrace; Bulgaria (except its southwest); Romania & Moldova; northeastern Serbia; northeastern Croatia; extreme northeastern Bosnia & Herzegovina.

• Anchors: Greek Black Sea poleis (Histria, Tomis/Constanța, Callatis/Mangalia, Odessos/Varna, Mesambria/Nessebar, Apollonia/Sozopol), Thrace (Odrysian kingdom), Moesia (Danube limes), Dacia(Transylvania & Wallachia), Lower Danube legionary line, Carpathian–Balkan passes.

Climate & Environmental Shifts

• First-millennium variability; fertile Thracian and Wallachian plains supported dense settlement; Danube avulsions required continual river management.

Societies & Political Developments

• Greek colonies flourished (7th–5th c. BCE) along the western Black Sea.

• Thracian Odrysian kingdom (5th–4th c. BCE) and Geto-Dacians north of the Danube rose to prominence.

• Rome annexed Moesia and Thrace; Dacia (106–271 CE) north of the Danube briefly Romanized with cities, mines, roads; Danube limes fortified.

• Migrations: Goths (3rd–4th c.), Huns (5th c.), Avars and Slavs (6th–7th c.) reconfigured the region;

• First Bulgarian Empire (from 681 CE) entrenched in Moesia/Thrace; Byzantium held Thrace and coastal cities.

Economy & Trade

• Grain, wine, salt, and livestock moved along the Danube; Black Sea ports exported to the Aegean–Mediterranean; mining (gold/silver in Dacia, iron in Thrace).

• Roman urbanism (roads, bridges e.g., Apollodorus’ bridge near Drobeta) integrated the frontier.

Technology & Material Culture

• Iron plowshares; Roman engineering; Thracian/Dacian metalwork; Byzantine fortifications.

• Urban mosaics, inscriptions, temples; later churches and monasteries.

Belief & Symbolism

• Thracian and Dacian cults (horseman, Zalmoxis); Greek polytheism; Roman state cults → Christianity (by late Roman/Byzantine era).

• Early Slavic and Bulgar paganisms persisted into 8th–9th c., gradually Christianizing.

Environmental Adaptation & Resilience

• Riverine transport and oasis agriculture stabilized supply; fortified towns and hillforts provided refuge; steppe pastoralism remained flexible under aridity pulses.

Legacy & Transition

By 819 CE, Eastern Southeast Europe was a braided frontier of Byzantine Thrace, Bulgar power, Slavic communities, and legacy Roman–Greek Black Sea cities. The Lower Danube’s fortified line, Thracian plain granaries, and coastal emporia formed the scaffolding for the medieval dynamics to come.