My Science School

Akbar was a great patron of artists and intellectuals. His passion for knowledge attracted many great minds to his court. The best of these courtiers were known as the nine ‘jewels’ of King Akbar or ‘Navratnas’. Abul-Fazel was Akbar’s chief advisor and author of Akbarnama, Faizi was a poet laureate, Miyan Tansen was a legendary musician, Birbal was known for great wit, Raja Todar Mal was Akbar’s finance minister, Raja Man Singh was Akbar’s trusted general and Commander-in-chief, Abdul Rahim Khan-l-Khana was a poet and the son of Akbar’s trusted mentor, Bairam Khan. The mystic Fakir Aziao-Din and Mullah Do Piaza were both advisors to the Emperor. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Babylonians lived in Mesopotamia, the land between the two rivers, Euphrates and Tigris in Iraq. They followed the advanced cultures of the Sumerians and the Assyrians. In 1700 BC, King Hammurabi passed strict laws here and ruled his kingdom with a strong hand. Around 1100 years later, King Nebuchadnezzar II made the capital city of Babylon as one of the most powerful trade centres. It lay on both sides of Euphrates, had buildings with up to four storeys, and was surrounded by an 18 km long thick wall. The Tower of Babel, which he built, is mentioned even in the Old Testament of the Bible.

 

Individual settlements became cities when humans were able to produce more food than needed. The population also increased, so more artisans were needed. With the construction of palaces for rulers and huge temples, the cities became important centres in which writers, officers, soldiers, and priests lived and had a lot of influence on people. The oldest cities whose remains have been found are Jericho in Palestine (around 9000 BC) and Catal Huyuk in Turkey (around 6000 BC). 

Advanced civilizations are societies that started thinking about a lot of other things than just simply gathering food very early in time. They had cities, an administration, and a division of work among the people. Advanced civilizations developed the calendar and laid the foundation for many sciences. A total of 25 advanced civilizations include those of the Sumerians, Babylonians, and Assyrians in Mesopotamia—what we today know as Iraq—Egypt, Persia, China, the Indus valley civilization, several cultures on the American continent, and the Minoan in Europe. 

In the Stone Age, humans chipped off splinters from Flintstones with a hard stone and shaped them to make hand axes, spears, and arrow tips or sickles. They then observed that metal ran out of a greenish-blue stone in fire, which led to the creation of copper. In the Near East, copper and zinc were melted since the 4th century BC to make hard bronze, which became the most important material for tools, weapons, and jewellery. Bronze became known in Europe later. The Bronze Age was followed by the Iron Age. Although iron was more difficult to make, it was harder than bronze. 

Humans had been observing how new plants grew from seeds for long time. They used this knowledge about 10,000 years ago and sowed seeds of plants which they could get with difficulty. Simple cultivation devices were made from wood and stone. When the crops became bigger, humans settled down near the fields and created reserves. Instead of looking for food, they now improved the tools and the weapons. As a result handicraft was born, which changed their life style. This period is known as the ‘Neolithic Revolution’. 

        Dog was the first animal to be domesticated by humans 15,000 years. Humans fed the dog’s wolf ancestors and in return they protected them from dangerous animals. Over a period of time these animals were domesticated and became good companions. About 10,000 years ago humans started domesticating other wild animals too—sheep and goat in the Middle East; cow, pig, horse, and poultry in Europe; and lama and turkey in America. The domesticated animals provided meat, milk, skin, and wool.

 

They collected plants, honey, and bird’s eggs, or went for hunting. They drove away the smaller animals living in pits with the help of fires and torches. Neanderthals even hunted for large animals. They made groups of ten or more and killed mammoths, rhinos, or bison from the nearest point with spears. The parts of the animals, which they did not eat, were utilized in other ways. Nothing went unused. Weapons, tools, and jewellery were made from bones, tendons became ropes, and skin and hide were used to make clothes and tents. Even today there are races that live as hunters and collectors, such as the Bushmen, also known as San, in Namibia and Botswana in southern Africa. 

Fires in the steppes or bushes scared humans earlier. Gradually, they learnt to appreciate the power of fire. It gave them light and warmth and kept away wild animals. They could harden the tips of wooden spears and cook meat in it. About 700,000 years ago, humans started to protect themselves from a fire started accidentally by lightning. Soon they learnt to produce fire, by striking Flintstone and pyrite with each other or by rubbing lumbers. The spark was used to ignite tinder fungus, a kind of mushroom. The discovery of fire is one of the most important achievements of humans. Without it we could not have developed to the stage where we are today. 

The Homo Habilis or the ‘skilful’ humans developed about 2.5 million years ago. They produced stone tools, lived in small groups, and moved from one place to another like nomads, when food became scarce. After mastering the fire, humans wandered to the cooler Europe and Asia. Humans learnt to cultivate the land and keep the cattle and pets. The Stone Age ended when humans learnt to obtain metals from the ores.

 

Our universe was born with the Big Bang and with it time was also born. No one can explain exactly what it is. Albert Einstein, the famous physicist, tried it once and said that time is a ‘measure to arrange things one after the other’. We have defined equal sections from the second to the year to understand when an event occurred in the past. For 5000 years, people have been trying to invent all possible instruments for measuring time such as sundials, water clocks, and pendulum clocks. Since 1949 we have the precise atomic clock, which becomes slow by one second in 30 billion years. 

During the Stone Age, humans observed how the equinoxes (21 March and 22 September) repeated year after year. Later, many races oriented themselves to the lunar year. After twelve full moons - 354 days—the year was complete and hence the lunar calendar was eleven days short of the solar calendar. The first solar calendar was created by the Egyptians. Although the start of the year did not get displaced by eleven days as in the lunar calendar, it got displaced by about a month every 120 years. To balance this anomaly, Julius Caesar introduced a leap year after every four years. This calendar was improved by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582. 

Most cultures start the calculation of their time with an event that was important for them. For the Christians this was the birth of Jesus Christ. The year of birth of Christ is also known as ‘turn of the eras’ because there is a belief among the Christians that with the birth of Jesus Christ a ‘new time’ started. The counting of years was started again from one after this time. Everything that happened earlier was specified as ‘before Christ’ or ‘BC’. The Islamic calendar starts when the Prophet Mohammed left Mecca in AD 622. In addition, one year of the Islamic calendar is shorter than that of the Christian calendar since it ends after nine new moons. On July 20, 2012, the calendar of the Muslims will show September 1, 1433, and hence the first day of the fasting month of Ramadan. 

Mainly the archaeologists or the historians are the people who make an attempt to find out about our past as much as they can. The historians frequently refer to various sources of history. These sources can be clay tablets, grave inscriptions, or simple letters. Sometimes they have to decode the script, such as the hieroglyphs, which was discovered in the Egyptian pyramids. Archaeologists, on the other hand dig places where they can find evidence of past human activity such as bones from the Stone Age or remains of buildings or vessels that fell down in wells. 

           Past helps us in understanding our present world in a much better way. If we know how our ancestors lived or why the wars were waged, we can understand the today’s world better and get ideas for a fairer future. What appears to us as wrong today could have been right earlier. It is also interesting to know how inventions in the past improved the life of humans. Some major inventions that changed the way we live are: metal processing that was invented around 5000 BC and the invention of the calendar, without which we cannot determine when the important events happened in the past.