8th millennium BC

Millennia:	9th millennium BC 8th millennium BC 7th millennium BC
Centuries:	80th century BC 79th century BC 78th century BC 77th century BC 76th century BC 75th century BC 74th century BC 73rd century BC 72nd century BC 71st century BC

The Stone Age This box:
↑ before Homo (Pliocene)
Paleolithic Lower Paleolithic Early Stone Age Homo Control of fire Stone tools Middle Paleolithic Middle Stone Age Homo neanderthalensis Homo sapiens Recent African origin of modern humans Upper Paleolithic Late Stone Age Behavioral modernity, Atlatl, Origin of the domestic dog Mesolithic Microliths, Bow, Canoe Natufian Khiamian Tahunian Heavy Neolithic Shepherd Neolithic Trihedral Neolithic Pre-Pottery Neolithic Neolithic Neolithic Revolution, Domestication Pottery Neolithic Pottery
↓ Chalcolithic

Holocene Epoch This box:

↑
Holocene
Preboreal (10.3–9 ka) Boreal (9–7.5 ka) Atlantic (7.5–5 ka) Subboreal (5–2.5 ka) Subatlantic (2.5 ka–present)

In the 8th millennium BC, agriculture became widely practised in the Fertile Crescent and Anatolia.

Pottery became widespread (with independent development in Central America) and animal husbandry (pastoralism) spread to Africa and Eurasia. World population was approximately 5 million.