Archaeological culture · c. 10,000–2000 BCE (with earlier roots)
Hoabinhian
The Hoabinhian is a stone-tool tradition of hunter-gatherers across mainland Southeast Asia, named after Hòa Bình province in Vietnam. Its typical tools are river pebbles and cobbles flaked mostly on one side.
People lived in caves and rock shelters, hunting, fishing and gathering forest plants and shellfish. The tradition began in the late Ice Age and lasted into the Holocene, until farming communities with pottery and polished stone spread through the region.
See Hoabinhian on the map in 10,000 BCE
- On the map
- 10,000–2000 BCE
How we know
These hunter-gatherers left no writing; their sites are dated by radiocarbon on charcoal and shells in caves and rock shelters.
Sites
- Spirit Cave c. 12,000–7,000 radiocarbon years ago (very roughly 10,000–5500 BCE)