How Did Early Humans Survive the Harsh Ice Age 20,000 Years Ago? — Here’s What Kept Them Alive

In recent history, one of the most severe winters and ice ages occurred during the peak of the Last Glacial Maximum, over 20,000 years ago. Just picture the early human experience at the time. The world is covered in ice, the food is scarce, the temperature is freezing almost all day long, and the environment is changing.

Yet, despite all of those challenges, our ancestors survived. So, how exactly have they done it? Because their success is not just about enduring the harsh seasons, but it is about adapting and changing the world in their own ways to meet their needs. Let’s find out how.

Building Shelter and Clothing to Stay Warm

One of the most important necessities of the ice age was to be able to maintain the right temperature for the human body to survive. Because if you are not aware, by this time, early humans had already lost their fur that would have kept them warm, millions of years ago.

So, to survive, humans have to create thicker clothing and shelter than they already have. It has to protect them from the cold winds, snowstorms, and heavy temperature drops at night. At first, they just used animal skins and hides as a cape-like clothing, but soon, they mastered tailoring it to individuals by improving their technology and skillset.

They learned how to create tools like needles for sewing and creating tightly-fitted clothes. Then, for shelter, the good old cave was still perfect, but if they could not find one nearby, while hunting and gathering resources, they built huts from animal bones, wood, hides, or even snow in some places. For the floor of those shelters, they likely covered them with grass or animal skins for added protection of their feet.

Additionally, during this age, humans can now create and use fire for various purposes. It not only helps keep them warm, but it is also useful in cooking and keeping predators away, like bigger cats, a pack of wolves, and other carnivorous animals. It also dried out their cold and possibly wet clothing. The control of fire meant humans were able to survive in different colder environments.

Read more: History.com

Hunting, Gathering, and Food Storage Strategies

How Did Early Humans Survive the Ice Age? – Food, Fire, and Shelter

During the ice age, finding food was a lot harder because the lower global temperatures and reduced moisture restricted plant growth and vegetation. In turn, animals that rely on these food sources went down in number, and some did not survive. Which meant that humans, who feed on both plant and animal meat had less overall provisions and dietary supply.

At the time, most of our ancestors were still hunter-gatherers. So, when there is a scarcity of food, they extend the location of their search or completely travel to a more abundant environment. Either way, they had to adapt.

This scenario led the humans to rely more on hunting bigger animals like mammoths, reindeer, and other creatures who are adapted to the ice age. Then those animals’ skins and bones were the very same ones they used to create their clothing, huts, sewing needles, and other helpful tools.

One more important skill that helped early humans to survive the harshness of the cold is the ability to preserve food. After gathering whatever edible materials that survived, like specific plants, nuts, roots, and animal meat, they preserved them by drying, burying, natural freezing, and smoking.

Tools, Innovation, and Social Cooperation

During this time, and even before it, cooperation was already important for the survival of human beings. We are hypersocial creatures for a reason, and that is primarily because we need others to survive. In an environment like the ice age, where food is scarce and one of the best options is to hunt bigger, stronger, or faster animals, working together increases the chance of survival.

Technological advancements and tool-making are among the factors that helped humans survive ice, cold, and changing environments. By this time, it is estimated that hominins had been using stone tools for at least 2.6 million years. Which meant that early humans 20,000 years ago already knew how to make sharp stones, knives, scrapers, and even projectiles, like a stone attached to a wood, or in other words, a spear.

We hunted mammoths with this refined technology and with a better strategy, communicating and working together as a group. With the innovative and cooperative nature of humans, adapting to the ice age, despite how harsh all the conditions are, became possible.

Read more: Bournemouth University

Migration, Mobility, and Choosing Where to Live

How We Survived the Ice Age

It is estimated that humans began farming over 10,000 years ago, but not during the peak of the ice age, around 20,000 years ago. It means that our ancestors at this time were still hunter-gatherers, and they were not tied to a certain place yet. This survival strategy probably helped them during the ice age, as they were mobile and could move.

If the environment they are staying in is scarce or too cold, the early humans migrated toward warmer zones, often following animal herds or their paths. They chose places with good shelter, like a rocky cave, and access to vegetation, water, and meat sources.

During the ice age, no matter how adept they are at hunting and gathering resources, if their environment is nearly depleted, humans have to migrate. This is also why they couldn’t start long-term farming and staying at one place until after the ice age, and the temperature began warming up.

Author's Final Thoughts

Imagining the life of a human being during the ice age made it feel almost impossible to survive in. However, our ancestors were not only intelligent and resourceful, but they were also very good at adapting and enduring to survive even when faced with challenging odds.

They managed through the smart use of clothing and shelter, control of fire, innovation of tools, strategic preservation of food, and cooperation with one another. Their survival during one of the harshest times on this planet, the Last Glacial Maximum, paved the way for the eventual rise of human civilization as we know it today.

Read next: Why Did Humans Start Creating Cave Art Over 40,000 Years Ago? — Here’s What Experts Say

References & Further Reading

Bocquet-Appel, J.-P. (2011). When the world’s population took off: The springboard of the Neolithic Demographic Transition. Science. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1208880

Dibble, H. L. (2017). How Did Hominins Adapt to Ice Age Europe without Fire? Journal of Paleolithic Archaeology. https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/692628

Fu, Q., Posth, C., Hajdinjak, M., et al. (2016). The genetic history of Ice Age Europe. Nature. https://www.nature.com/articles/nature17993

Straus, L. G., Eriksen, B. V., Erlandson, J. M., & Yesner, D. R. (Eds.). (1996). Humans at the End of the Ice Age: The Archaeology of the Pleistocene–Holocene Transition. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-1145-4