Meaning & use
Neolithic
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Meanings
adjectivebefore a nountechnical
Belonging to the late Stone Age, when people settled in villages, farmed crops, kept animals and made polished stone tools.
Grammar: Almost always sits before a noun: Neolithic tools, Neolithic farmers.
Patterns
- a Neolithic site
- Neolithic times
Archaeologists uncovered a Neolithic village beside the river.
Neolithic farmers grew wheat and barley and kept sheep.
Stonehenge was begun in Neolithic times.
nounsingulartechnical
The period of prehistory when farming and settled life began, usually written with a capital N and preceded by the.
Grammar: Used with the: the Neolithic came after the Mesolithic.
Patterns
- in the Neolithic
- the Neolithic period
Pottery became widespread during the Neolithic.
Farming spread across Europe in the Neolithic.
Many burial mounds in this region date from the Neolithic.
Common combinations
- Neolithic period
- The Neolithic period saw the first permanent villages.
- Neolithic tools
- The museum displays polished Neolithic tools made from flint.
- Neolithic settlement
- A Neolithic settlement was found beneath the field.
- Neolithic revolution
- The Neolithic revolution changed how humans got their food.
- Neolithic burial
- A Neolithic burial chamber stands on the hill.
Synonyms and how they differ
- New Stone Age
- New Stone Age is a plain-English name for the same period, while Neolithic is the term used by specialists.
- prehistoric
- Prehistoric covers all time before writing, so it is much broader than Neolithic.
- ancient
- Ancient can refer to any distant past, including written history, while Neolithic points to one defined prehistoric phase.
Opposites
Word family
- Paleolithic adjective
- relating to the Old Stone Age before farming
- Mesolithic adjective
- relating to the Middle Stone Age between the other two
- Neolithic noun
- the period itself
- lithic adjective
- relating to stone
Commonly confused: Neolithic or Paleolithic?
Neolithic vs Paleolithic
Paleolithic is the earlier Old Stone Age of hunter-gatherers, whereas the Neolithic is the later period when farming began.
Practice
The excavation revealed ____ farmers who grew grain and made polished stone tools.
Choose one answer.
Neolithic fits the combination of farming and polished stone tools. Paleolithic people were hunter-gatherers, and the other periods are far later.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “Neolithic”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.