From Gathering to Growing Food Class 6 Important Questions and Answers
Class 6 History Chapter 2 From Gathering to Growing Food Important Questions and answers cover all the topics and help students to understand the concepts better. Students can solve these for practice. They may come across some of these questions in the final exam.
Students can clear their doubts from the chapter by solving these CBSE Class 6 History Important Questions and prepare well for the board exams. The links to download the PDF version of these questions are given in a link to this article.
Class 6 History Chapter 2 From Gathering to Growing Food Important Questions
1. Fill in the blanks.
(i) Millets have been found at _______.
(ii) People in Burzahom lived in ______ houses.
(iii) Chirand is a site in _______.
(iv) _______ and meat comes from animals that are reared.
(v) _______ is one of the earliest villages.
Answer:
(i) Hallur
(ii) Pit
(iii) Bihar
(iv) Milk
(v) Mehrgarh
2. Write True/False against each of the following statement:
(i) Jadeite, found in Daojali Hading, may have been brought from China.
(ii) Young women are respected for their wisdom and experience.
(iii) Mehrgarh site is in Pakistan.
(iv) Bolan Pass is one of the most important routes into India.
(v) Gufkral site is in Kashmir.
Answer:
(i) True
(ii) False
(iii) True
(iv) False
(v) True
Answer the following questions
1. Name the place where Millet was grown in Neolithic Age.
Answer: Paiyampalli and Hallur
2. Name two sites found in Andhra Pradesh.
Answer: Hallur and Paiyampalli
3. Name two sites found in Kashmir.
Answer: Gufkral and Burzahom
4. Why grains had to be stored?
Answer: Grain had to be stored for both food and seed.
5. What is ‘jadeite,’?
Answer: Jadeite is a stone that may have been brought from China.
6. What ‘Fossil Wood’ refers to?
Answer: Fossil wood refers to ancient wood that has hardened into stone.
7. Which two Neolithic tools are used to grind grain even today?
Answer: Mortars and pestles are used for grinding grain.
8. Which was the first animal to be tamed?
Answer: The first animal to be tamed was the wild ancestor of the dog.
9. Which were the earliest plants to be domesticated?
Answer: Some of the earliest plants to be domesticated were wheat and barley.
10. Which were the earliest animals to be domesticated?
Answer: The earliest domesticated animals include sheep and goat.
11. What do you understands by the term ‘Tribes’.
Answer: Many of these farmers and herders live in groups called tribes.
12. Which historical events took place about 12,000 years ago?
Answer: Beginnings of domestication took place about 12,000 years ago.
13. Which historical events took place about 8,000 years ago?
Answer: Beginning of settlement at Mehrgarh took place about 8000 years ago.
14. In what ways grain was used by the early people?
Answer: Grain was used by early people as seed, as food, as gifts and stored as food.
15. Why were people buried with animals, like goats?
Answer: The dead person was buried with goats, which were probably meant to serve as food in the next world.
16. Where people stored the grains?
Answer: They began making large clay pots, or wove baskets, or dug pits into the ground to store grains.
17. Write one of the distinctive features of a village.
Answer: One of the distinctive features of a village is that most people who live there are engaged in food production.
18. Where is Daojali Hading?
Answer: This is a site on the hills near the Brahmaputra Valley, close to routes leading into China and Myanmar.
19. Explain the term ‘Domestication’.
Answer: It is the name given to the process in which people grow plants and look after animals.
20. Why people began using pots?
Answer: People began using pots for cooking food, especially grains like rice, wheat and lentils that now became an important part of the diet.
21. Write about the houses in Mehrgarh.
Answer: Finds at Mehrgarh includes remains of square or rectangular houses. Each house had four or more compartments, some of which may have been used for storage.
22. Write about the cultural traditions of the tribal community.
Answer: Tribes have rich and unique cultural traditions, including their own language, music, stories and paintings. They also have their own gods and goddesses.
23. Why farmers grow some crops in some areas and not in other areas?
Answer: Farmers grow some crops in some areas and not in other areas because different plants grow in different conditions — rice, for example, requires more water than wheat and barley.
24. Describe the pit houses found at Burzahom.
Answer: In Burzahom (in present-day Kashmir) people built pit-houses, which were dug into the ground, with steps leading into them. These may have provided shelter in cold weather.
25. Name some important sites where archaeologists have found evidence of farmers and herders.
Answer: These are found all over the subcontinent. Some of the most important ones are in the north-west, in present-day Kashmir, and in east and south India.
26. Why do people who grow crops have to stay in the same place for a long time?
Answer: When people began growing plants, it meant that they had to stay in the same place for a long time looking after the plants, watering, weeding, driving away animals and birds — till the grain ripened.
27. What do you know about the ‘burials’ found at Mehrgarh?
Answer: When people die, their relatives and friends generally pay respect to them. People look after them, perhaps in the belief that there is some form of life after death. Burial is one such arrangement. Several burial sites have been found at Mehrgarh. In one instance, the dead person was buried with goats, which were probably meant to serve as food in the next world.
28. Why do archaeologists think that many people who lived in Mehrgarh were hunters to start with and that herding became more important later?
Answer: Archaeologists who excavated the site found evidence of many kinds of animal bones from the earliest levels. These included bones of wild animals such as the deer and pig. In later levels, they found more bones of sheep and goat, and in still later levels, cattle bones are most common, suggesting that this was the animal that was generally kept by the people.
29. How do scientists find out whether the discovered sites were settlements of farmers and herders?
Answer: Scientists study evidence of plants and animal bones. One of the most exciting finds includes remains of burnt grain. (These may have been burnt accidentally or on purpose). Scientists can identify these grains, and so we know that a number of crops were grown in different parts of the subcontinent. They can also identify the bones of different animals.
30. Enumerate upon the archaeological findings at Mehrgarh.
Answer: The archaeological findings at Mehrgarh are:
- Archaeologists who excavated the site found evidence of many kinds of animal bones from the earliest levels. These included bones of wild animals such as the deer and pig.
- In later levels, they found more bones of sheep and goat.
- In still later levels, cattle bones are most common.
31. Describe tools used by farmers and herders.
Answer: Stone tools have been found from many sites as well. Many of these are different from the earlier Palaeolithic tools and that is why they are called Neolithic. These include tools that were polished to give a fine cutting edge, and mortars and pestles used for grinding grain and other plant produce. Mortars and pestles are used for grinding grain even today, several thousand years later.
32. How did people become herders?
Answer: In the following way people became herders.
- Women, men and children could also attract and then tame animals by leaving food for them near their shelters.
- Later, people encouraged animals that were relatively gentle to come near the camps where they lived.
- These animals such as sheep, goat, cattle and also the pig lived in herds, and most of them ate grass.
33. List three ways in which the lives of farmers and herders would have been different from that of hunter-gatherers?
Answer:
| farmers and herders | hunter-gatherers |
| They had to live at same place for longer period of time. | They kept travelling from place to place. |
| They grow crops and domesticated animals. | They depended on animals for meat and used to gather food from the forest. |
| They settled in hut and pit houses. | They did not have a settled life. |
34. How did people become farmers?
Answer: In the following way people became farmers.
- The climate of the world was changing, and so were plants and animals that people used as food.
- Men, women and children probably observed several things: the places where edible plants were found, how seeds broke off stalks, fell on the ground, and new plants sprouted from them.
- Perhaps they began looking after plants — protecting them from birds and animals so that they could grow and the seeds could ripen.
35. What were the different activities performed by people in tribal societies?
Answer: Members of a tribe follow occupations such as hunting, gathering, farming, herding and fishing. Usually, women do most of the agricultural work, including preparing the ground, sowing seeds, looking after the growing plants and harvesting grain. Children often look after plants, driving away animals and birds that might eat them. Women also thresh, husk, and grind grain. Men usually lead large herds of animals in search of pasture. Children often look after small flocks. The cleaning of animals and milking, is done by both men and women. Both women and men make pots, baskets, tools and huts. They also take part in singing, dancing and decorating their huts.
Practice Worksheet
1. Why do we describe the people who lived in the subcontinent as early as two million years ago as hunter-gatherers?
2. Why did the hunter-gatherers move from place to place? Give reasons. In what ways are these similar to/different from the reasons for which we travel today?
3. How do we know about hunter-gatherers?
4. What are the Sites?
5. Explain about Palaeolithic.
6. What is Domestication?
7. Which were the ways in which Grains were used?
8. Apart from food, what are the other things that could have been obtained from animals? What are animals used for today?
9. Hunter-gatherers chose to live in caves and rock shelters because ————————
10. Why do people who grow crops have to stay in the same place for a long time?
11. Why do archaeologists think that many people who lived in Mehrgarh were hunters to start with and that herding became more important later?
12. List three ways in which hunter-gatherers used fire. Would you use fire for any of these purposes today?
13. List three ways in which the lives of farmers and herders would have been different from that of hunter-gatherers.
14. Early man who lived on the banks of the rivers went in search of water during the rainy season. True or False?
15. Give some examples of Habitation Sites.
16. Give reasons why people chose to live in a natural cave?
17. Mention briefly about the paintings found from Madhya Pradesh and Southern Uttar Pradesh.
18. What are microliths?
19. Write a short note on Mehrgarh.