You may select any topic that deals with Old World Prehistory, even if that subject is not covered in class.  Select a topic that will be fun and interesting to research.

Your topic should be sufficiently specific so that you can write an in-depth paper on that subject. 

In addition, your topic should require that you consult archaeological references primarily (as opposed to historic or ethnographic or other sources).

Listed below are ideas to get you started.  You may also consult the textbook for ideas.  If your major is not anthropology, you might try to incorporate your major subject into the paper topic.  Some of the ideas listed below are a bit broad and will need to be narrowed.

Lower Paleolithic Period Topics

• Oldowan stone tool technology
• Acheulian stone tool technology
• evidence of early human home bases
• evidence of the development of fire
• artifacts from Olduvai Gorge site, Tanzania
• artifacts from Gona site, Ethiopia
• artifacts from Aramis site, Ethiopia
  
• archaeological research contributions of Louis and Mary Leakey
• archaeological research contributions of Raymond Dart
  

• Mousterian stone tool technology
• Levallois stone tool technology
• Aterian stone tool technology
• evidence of early big-game hunting subsistence
• evidence of early dwelling structures
• early human burial practices
• evidence of ritualistic cannibalism
• early human cult activity
• archaeological research at Drachenlock, Germany
  
• archaeological research at Krapina, Croatia
• Lewis Binford's hypothesis about cultural differences between male:female neandertals
  

• blade stone tool technology
• early human burial practices
• cave art (a.k.a., parietal art)
• cave art at Lascaux, France
• cave art at Chauvet, France
  
• cave art at Altamira, Spain
  
• early human religion

• microblade stone tool technology
• bow and arrow technology

• early ceramic technology
• development of sea and ocean vessels
• archaeology and prehistory of            early city (Jericho, Catal Huyuk, tel Mureybit, etc.)
• origins of sedentism:  theories, evidence, trajectories
• evidence of  early                exchange networks (obsidian, tin, gold, silk, etc.)

• theories of the origins of domestication and food production
  
• domestication of                plant or animal (dog, sheep, wheat, barley, etc.) in                    hearth(s)
• early food production in                     hearth (Near East, Lower Nile, southeast Asia, etc.)
• consequences of food production
• archaeological evidence of domestication and/or food production

• theories of the origins of civilizations
• theories of the collapse of civilizations
• consequences of increased complexity
• archaeological evidence of complexity
• types of early civilizations

• technological advances of the                civilization (ex. engineering in ancient Egypt)
• a particular technology of the                 civilization (ex. development of the plow in the Near East)
• monumental public architecture of the                civilization (ex. Celtic monoliths and henges)
• a particular component of the material culture of the                   civilization (ex. Harrapan square seals)
• subsistence strategies of the                 civilization (ex. early rice agriculture in the Angkor mandala)
• social organization of the                civilization (ex. the development of the Indian caste system)
• political organization of the                 civilization (ex. the Karanga kingdom of southern Africa)
• belief systems/religions of the                civilization (ex. Phoenician human sacrifice rituals)
• origin of the                  civilization
• collapse of the                 civilization

• cannibalistic trends of early humans
• early hominid tool use
• tracing the roots of prehistoric six-string music
• early human religion of the Upper Paleolithic period
• the consequences of food production
• archaeological evidence of phallic worship in the Old World
  
• Easter Island megaliths
• tumuli of sub-Saharan Africa
• comparison of mythologies of the ancient Near East
• Black origins of dynastic Egypt
• Akhenaten and the cult of Aten in Egypt
  
• origins of Egyptian religion and the Egyptian pantheon
• Egyptian mummies and mummification
• Egyptian pyramids
• ancient Egyptian burial practices
• interpretation of cave art of Paleolithic Europe
• cave paintings at Chauvet and Lascaux, France
• Gaelic poetry
• religion of the Celts
• Celtic henges on the British Isles
• Bronze Age and Iron Age weaponry in temperate Europe
  
• history of scholarship on Stonehenge
• construction of Stonehenge
• the Druids
• Etruscan influences on Rome
• Viking raiders:  evidence and aftermath
• the Silk Road
• Chinese royal burial tombs
• distinctive features of ancient China
• religious thought in ancient China