What is the three-age system in archaeology?

The three-age system is a methodological concept that divides human prehistory into three chronological periods based on successive artifact materials: the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age. Developed initially by C. J. Thomsen between 1816 and 1825, it provided a way to order late prehistory and early history in Europe, the Near East, and the Mediterranean. However, the scheme has limited utility outside these regions and is not universally applicable across the globe.

What we know

• The three-age system organizes human prehistory into the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age, sometimes with an added Copper Age. [1, 2]
• C. J. Thomsen developed the categorization method between 1816 and 1825 while chronologically classifying an archaeological exhibition collection. [2]
• John Lubbock partitioned the Stone Age into the Palaeolithic and Neolithic periods in 1865. [2]
• The three-age schema has little or no utility for establishing chronological frameworks in sub-Saharan Africa, the Americas, and much of Asia. [2]

Still open

• Whether iron metallurgy was developed independently in sub-Saharan Africa from Eurasia as early as 2000 BC remains a subject of belief among some archaeologists.

Where to go next

• whoWho was C. J. Thomsen?
• compared withHow does the Bronze Age differ from the Stone Age?
• a case in pointWhat tools defined the Stone Age?
• what caused itWhy is a five-period system used in the archaeology of the Americas?
• what followedHow did the invention of writing change prehistory into history?
• an unexpected connectionWhy did ethnologists adopt an archaeological classification scheme?British researchers working in ethnology adopted Thomsen's archaeological artifact chronology to establish race sequences for Britain's past based on cranial types.

Sources

• [1]Three-age system (Wikidata Q475234) · CC0 1.0
• [2]Three-age system · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [3]Prehistory · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [4]Bronze Age · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [5]Iron Age · CC BY-SA 4.0