And in the dawn of recorded history – about 3000 B.C. – the civilisations of the Nile valley, the Indus valley and Mesopotamia are riddled with ideas of gods, demons and sorcerers. Some time in this fourth millennium B.C.,
the human race took its most tremendous leap forward so far – a leap so remarkable that one is tempted to credit the imaginative speculation of Arthur C. Clarke in his 2001 that more intelligent beings from outer space have periodically taken a hand in mankind's development.
The Stone Age lasted until sometime between 4000 and 3000 B.C., and man used stone knives, flint spearheads, stone or wooden ploughs. And then man discovered the use of metals. We do not know how it happened.
Perhaps someone threw a piece of copper ore into a fire and discovered that a bright, hard metal had flowed out of it. The edges of the metal could be made far sharper than the edges of flint and were better for skinning animals. At about the same time, some unknown genius
– perhaps the legendary Tubal Cain – discovered the many uses of the wheel, both for transport and for making pots.
Colin Wilson
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