What Does Paleolithic Mean?

The word Paleolithic is derived from two Greek words, namely the word palaeos, which means old, and the word lithos, which means stone. In other words, the word Palaeolithic is defined as the oldest part of the Stone Age. It dates back to the time when tools made of stone where used for the first time by hominids. An alternative spelling of the word Paleolithic is the word Palaeolithic.

The Paleolithic period covers the time period between approximately 12, 000 years before the birth of Jesus Christ and extends up to about three-and-a-half million years ago. It ended at the end of the Pleistocene period. It is further subdivided into three periods, namely the Lower Paleolithic period, the Middle Paleolithic period and the Upper Paleolithic period.

The word Paleolithic literally means Old Stone Age. It was succeeded by the Mesolithic Age or the Middle Stone Age. During the Paleolithic Age, a large part of the northern part of Europe was still covered with ice. Sites of this period are extremely rare now, but can still be found in the north-eastern part of England.

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