Thursday, September 29, 2011

Fossils from Two Millions Years Ago.

Scientist have found two million year old bones and possibly skin of early human ancestors which are Australopithecus Sediba. The ancient fossils were discovered in Malapa a part of South Africa in 2008. Science is getting deeper in the studies of how we humans have evolved of a specie of Australopithecus. According to the science research scientist say that this specie has made tools and used the tools those ones that they have made. research shows that the Australopithecus Sediba possessed very unusual characteristics of primitive and derived which is in other words human like traits. For an example the Sediba had ankles and was standing up right as well as humans but it had thin apelike heels. also the Sediba could climb up trees a great deal, and as well stand up right as humans do. However, sediba fossils are about 300,000 years younger than an upper jaw, discovered by anthropologist William Kimbel, which is possibly that it belonged to a another specie that came after the Australopithecus, which was called Homo Habilis. This specie has been considered as the first human kind.

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Huge Gladiator School Found Buried in Austria

With radar equipment that penetrates the earth to produce 3-dimensional images of buried objects archeologists discovered a gladiator school at the site near Danube river close to Vienna, Austria. This finding is an addition to evidence historians already had about Roman Empire's gladiator schools. The finding is a proof of how the cultures of empire's urban centers were all linked together because the found in Vienna is very similar to the finds from the Rome and other cities of the Roman empire. The gladiator school, called Carnuntum gladiator school. covers 19.000 square meters and was probably built around A.D. 150, during emperor Marcus Aurelius. It consists of central courtyard, tiny dormitory rooms, large room with heated floor, and the training complex with mini amphitheater(probably for the slave traders to watch gladiators, who usually were slaves, in order to check their fighting abilities), walled field (probably for housing wild animals). Even though the school hasn't been excavated archeologists are sure that the find id indeed a gladiator school because it resembles other uncovered gladiator schools of Roman empire.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

How Do Historians Study the Past

Historians are people who study history which is a science about the past. Historians use two types of sources which are primary and secondary sources. Primary sources are scripts or articles which were written in that very time when the historical event has been happening which the article tells about. Secondary sources are as well scripts document now a day’s CD's, ads, and blogs. These two categories have to more categorize which are written and non-written sources. When we say written sources, most of us will think just only of books but there is much more then books like: speeches, posters, newspaper articles, government papers, songs, poems, etc. What falls under the non-written sources? Good question. Under non-written sources fall such as: tombs, graveyards churches, archeological places, temples, etc. Anyway, historians will always ask 5 very important questions which will evaluate the sources, the 3 main types of evaluation are: is the source accurate, is the source valid and is the source reliable. These are the 3 most important evaluations of a historical source. As I have said historians will always question the five very important questions in order to evaluate the source: who was the writer? What kind of source is it? Where was the source produced? When was the source produces? Why was the source produced? These are the five main questions which a historian will always ask order to evaluate the source by the three categorize of evaluation.

Monday, September 19, 2011

When and Why did People Settle in Certain Areas?

In the past people have been settling in places where there was good climate and good topographic conditions. In the early history there were no countries, therefore people were free to move everywhere. People in the past were mostly living of farming and planting crops, so they choose a land with good, fertile soil and fresh green grass for sheep, cows, and other farming animals to graze. Good soil was also needed in order to grow crop plants such as wheat, sunflower, barley, corn etc. Since the soil is the most fertile in the flatland and plains, people mostly tended to settle in these type of areas. The people in mountains and high lands usually made terraces or cascades for planting.
I have learned that there are 3 categories of movement. Which are: temporary(for example: you go from home to school every day so you are daily having this kind of movement). The second kind is periodic movement, when you move to a new place but you stay only for a shorter period of time(for example: you go to the sea side for the whole summer holiday but afterwards you come back to your home). The third movement is called migration; this type of movement is migrating or moving from your home land to a new area where you will stay to live,(for example, people of northern India moved to Europe thousands years ago to find better life for themselves). People even today migrate, but mostly because of religious or political reasons. And in the future who knows? We might migrate to the Moon.

Thursday, September 1, 2011

What is History and Why do we Study it?

History is a type of science which is based on the past and studying it. History is based on the major important events/people/ideas through out it. History can change evidence or interpretations or theories. My opinion is that, for me history is interesting, especially because we get to learn something about how did we evolve, our humanity. History is also there for us so we can learn from the past in other words not to repeat the same mistakes, but this is not very true we all make same mistakes. We also study history to learn more about our selves,culture,identifying accestors, where we came from. Also we study history so we understand other culture, people and that there is less conflict and more peace in the world. Also to have more open mindness and more tolerance.