Historical
Stage
Period
Main Discoveries and Technical Developments
Prehistory
2.5 million
years ago 1,200 B.C.
• Carved stone technology (to create spears, bows and
arrows).
• Power and control over the fire (allow the cooking of food
and light).
• Development of agriculture and animal farming.
• Houses made out of stone, wood, straw or timber.
• Metal utensils in the kitchen (for cooking).
• Rudimentary looms and basketry.
Antiquity
776 B.C. - 476
A.D.
• Architectural constructions.
• Improvements in agriculture and aqueducts.
• Maritime and terrestrial transport.
• Roman society was divided into social classes
(Patricians, Plebeians, Slaves).
Middle Ages
5th - 15th
century
• Construction of temples, monasteries and castles.
• Development of the printing press, the windmill, the
astrolabe, the compass for navigation and the compasses
for navigation and drawing.
• Use of natural resources such as gas and oil.
• Creation of the silk spinning machines with pedal coils,
the rudder, the spinning wheel, the pyrotechnics, the paper
money, the mechanical clock, the seismograph, the fishing
poles, the umbrella, and hanging bridges.
• Iron plow and machines for the harvest.
• Discovery that water mills could generate energy for their
iron and steel furnaces.
• Gunpowder and the cannon.
Renaissance
14th - 17th
century
• New trade routes.
• Maritime Travel.
• The discovery of new areas.
• Emergence of a new social class: the bourgeoisie.
Modern Age
15th - 18th
century
• Steam engine designed by Thomas Newcome (1712).
• Propulsion of ships, trains, mechanism of different
machines, etc.
• Mechanization of textile industries.
• Construction of iron machines.
• International business.
• Textile and steel industry.
Contemporary
Age
1945 - present
• Taylorism.
• Capitalism.
• Trade union movements.
XX and XXI
Centuries
1901 - 2001
• Scientific and technological progress.
• Military industry.
• Advancement of experimental sciences, mainly Physics.
• Progress in new technologies, materials, and the
computer field.
• Rails, ships, cars and aviation.
• Telecommunications, especially the Internet.
• Globalization.
• Consumerism.
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