Anatomically modern humans in the context of "Khoisan"

The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coinciding with the appearance of behavioral modernity in humans. It is followed by the Mesolithic.

Anatomically modern humans (i.e. Homo sapiens) are believed to have emerged in Africa around 300,000 years ago. It has been argued by some that their ways of life changed relatively little from that of archaic humans of the Middle Paleolithic, until about 50,000 years ago, when there was a marked increase in the diversity of artefacts found associated with modern human remains. This period coincides with the most common date assigned to expansion of modern humans from Africa throughout Asia and Eurasia, which may have contributed to the extinction of the Neanderthals.

Anatomically modern humans first arrived on the Indian subcontinent between 73,000 and 55,000 years ago. The earliest known human remains in South Asia date to 30,000 years ago. Sedentariness began in South Asia around 7000 BCE; by 4500 BCE, settled life had spread, and gradually evolved into the Indus Valley Civilisation, one of three early cradles of civilisation in the Old World, which flourished between 2500 BCE and 1900 BCE in present-day Pakistan and north-western India. Early in the second millennium BCE, persistent drought caused the population of the Indus Valley to scatter from large urban centres to villages. Indo-Aryan tribes moved into the Punjab from Central Asia in several waves of migration. The Vedic Period of the Vedic people in northern India (1500–500 BCE) was marked by the composition of their extensive collections of hymns (Vedas). The social structure was loosely stratified via the varna system, incorporated into the highly evolved present-day Jāti system. The pastoral and nomadic Indo-Aryans spread from the Punjab into the Gangetic plain. Around 600 BCE a second urbanization occured resulting in a new interregional culture; then, smaller janapadas (realms) were consolidated into mahajanapadas (great states). This period saw the rise of new ascetic movements and religious concepts, including the rise of Jainism and Buddhism. The latter was synthesized with the preexisting religious cultures of the subcontinent, giving rise to Hinduism.

Chandragupta Maurya overthrew the Nanda Empire and established the first great empire in ancient India, the Maurya Empire. India's Mauryan king Ashoka is widely recognised for the violent Kalinga War and his historical acceptance of Buddhism and his attempts to spread nonviolence and peace across his empire. This period marks the rapid dissemination of Śramaṇic religions.

Archaic humans emerged out of Africa between 0.5 and 1.8 million years ago. This was followed by the emergence of modern humans (Homo sapiens) in East Africa around 300,000–250,000 years ago. In the 4th millennium BC written history arose in Ancient Egypt, and later in Nubia's Kush, the Horn of Africa's Dʿmt, and Ifrikiya's Carthage. Between around 3000 BCE and 500 CE, the Bantu expansion swept from north-western Central Africa (modern day Cameroon) across much of Central, Eastern, and Southern Africa, displacing or absorbing groups such as the Khoisan and Pygmies. The oral word is revered in most African cultures, and history has generally been passed down through oral tradition. This has led anthropologists to term them "oral civilisations".

There were many kingdoms and empires all over the continent that rose and fell. Most states were created through conquest or the borrowing and assimilation of ideas and institutions, while others developed largely in isolation. Some African empires and kingdoms include:

Human taxonomy is the classification of the human species within zoological taxonomy. The systematic genus, Homo, is designed to include both anatomically modern humans and extinct varieties of archaic humans. Current humans are classified as subspecies to Homo sapiens, differentiated, according to some, from the direct ancestor, Homo sapiens idaltu (with some other research instead classifying idaltu and current humans as belonging to the same subspecies).

Since the introduction of systematic names in the 18th century, knowledge of human evolution has increased significantly, and a number of intermediate taxa have been proposed in the 20th and early 21st centuries. The most widely accepted taxonomy grouping takes the genus Homo as originating between two and three million years ago, divided into at least two species, archaic Homo erectus and modern Homo sapiens, with about a dozen further suggestions for species without universal recognition.

Nudity is the state of being in which a human is without clothing. While estimates vary, for the first 90,000 years of pre-history, anatomically modern humans were naked, having lost their body hair, living in hospitable climates, and not having developed the crafts needed to make clothing.

As humans became behaviorally modern, body adornments such as jewelry, tattoos, body paint and scarification became part of non-verbal communications, indicating a person's social and individual characteristics. Indigenous peoples in warm climates used clothing for decorative, symbolic or ceremonial purposes but were often nude, having neither the need to protect the body from the elements nor any conception of nakedness being shameful. In many societies, both ancient and contemporary, children might be naked until the beginning of puberty and women often do not cover their breasts due to the association with nursing babies more than with sexuality.

Prehistoric religion is the religious practice of prehistoric cultures. Prehistory, the period before written records, accounts for the bulk of human experience; over 99% of it occurred during the Paleolithic period alone. Prehistoric cultures spanned the globe and existed for over two and a half million years; their religious practices were many and varied, and studying them is difficult due to the lack of written records detailing the details of their faiths.

The cognitive capacity for religion likely first emerged in Homo sapiens sapiens, or anatomically modern humans, although some scholars posit the existence of Neanderthal religion, and sparse evidence exists for earlier ritual practice. Excluding sparse and controversial evidence in the Middle Paleolithic (300,000–50,000 years ago), religion emerged with certainty in the Upper Paleolithic around 50,000 years ago. Upper Paleolithic religion was possibly shamanic, centered on the phenomenon of special spiritual leaders entering trance states to receive esoteric knowledge. These practices are extrapolated from the rich and complex body of art left by Paleolithic artists, particularly the elaborate cave art and enigmatic Venus figurines they produced.