TechnologyEurope

The wheel

3,501 BCE

Appears almost at once from the Carpathians to Mesopotamia

In depth

The hard part is not the wheel but the axle: the hole must sit exactly at the centre and fit snugly without binding. Perhaps that is why the wheel came so late, and never in the Americas, where it existed as a toy but lacked draught animals to harness. Finds from Poland, Slovenia and Mesopotamia are so close in date that no one knows where it began.

For children

The wheel was not invented for transport — the first we know of is the potter's turning disc. But once someone put two wheels under a box and harnessed an ox in front, a single family could move what ten people had to carry.

Connects to

The horse tamed on the steppe3,701 BCE
The first cities3,501 BCE
Bronze and the wheel3,301 BCE

Part of Terra Saga — the story of Earth on a timeline. terrasaga.org