Clay Bowls and Woven Baskets
Women were not only the first basket-makers and potters. They were also the first spinners and weavers. They ground the first grain into flour with mortars and pestles of stone. Later they made simple mills for this purpose. In fact, women who lived before the dawn of history, began nearly all the household arts and crafts and in this way helped all the people who have lived since then.
Our earliest ancestors, like ourselves, found it necessary to carry things from place to place. But they lived long before the days of the railroad and the steamship. The first burdens were borne by the women. They followed the men who hunted, and carried the meat and the hides of the slain animals back to the camp. After the dog, the donkey, and the horse had been tamed, articles to be transported were packed upon their backs or dragged upon the ground behind them. Sleds were made in the northern lands. Canoes and boats were built by the dwellers by the rivers and the sea. Last of all, the wheeled cart was invented. All these things are older than history.
We often call our own time the age of invention. The steam engine, the telegraph, and the many uses of electricity are all modern. They have made wonderful changes in our ways of living. But these changes in our lives are not as remarkable as were those made in the lives of our earliest ancestors so long ago by such inventions as the fishhook and the bow and arrow, and such discoveries as how to make fire, how to make pottery, how to domesticate animals and plants, and how to smelt and work the metals.
Nowadays children have homes and are cared for by their parents. Among the very earliest men there was nothing like our homes or our families. Each person found his own food and took care of himself. Of course, mothers cared for their babies, but nobody took care of a child after he was large enough to find his own food. Then he had to shift for himself. When he wanted his breakfast or his dinner he dug roots or hunted for berries, nuts, or acorns. Sometimes he feasted upon birds' eggs or upon a rabbit or a squirrel which he had caught. The honey which he found in the nests of the wild bees was his only candy and he was apt to get well stung in taking it. He lived in constant fear of the wild animals around him and usually slept in a tree for safety. He spent his entire life in this way.
There are many things that people can do better by working together. It took many years for early men to learn to help one another. When they became cave dwellers and learned how to make fire, the first family group began to be formed. This group was called the clan. The clan simply means those who were kin to each other; that is, a number of men and women who believed that they were descended from a common ancestor. At first the common ancestor was a woman, the clan mother. In those days, relationship was always counted on the mother's side. When a man married he went to live with the clan of his wife. In the course of time groups of clans came to be called tribes.
