4th millennium BC

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 |m  =4th millennium BC
 |ma =3rd millennium BC

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1 Events
2 Cultures
- 2.1 Environmental changes
3 Significant persons
4 Inventions, discoveries, introductions
5 Centuries
6 External references

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Events

Sumerian city of Ur in Mesopotamia (40th century BC); Sumerian hegemony in Mesopotamia, with the development of writing around the same time as the Indus Valley Civilization, base-60 mathematics, astronomy and astrology, civil law, complex hydrology, the sailboat, the wheel, and the potter's wheel, 4000–2000 BC.
Naqada culture on the Nile, 4000–3000 BC.
Epoch of the modern Hebrew Calendar occurred on 7 October 3761 BC.
Jewish chronology dates Creation to September 25 or March 29 3760 BC.
First to Fourth dynasty of Kish in Mesopotamia.
"Kurgan" cultures: Sredny Stog culture and Maykop culture, likely candidates for the Proto-Indo-Europeans, the latter also a candidate for the origin of the Bronze Age.
Ötzi the Iceman dies near the present-day border between Austria and Italy c. 3300 BC, only to be discovered in 1991 buried in a glacier of the Ötztal Alps. His cause of death is believed to be homicide.
New Stone Age people in Ireland build the 250,000 ton Newgrange solar observatory c. 3200 BC.
The Maya calendar dates the Creation of the Earth to August 11 or August 13, 3114 BC (establishing that date as day zero of the Long Count 13.0.0.0.0).
According to Hindu mythology, the Epoch of the Kali Yuga occurred at midnight (00:00) on 18 February 3102 BC, the traditional death of Krishna.
Crete: Rise of Minoan civilization.
Neolithic settlement built at Skara Brae in the Orkney Islands, Scotland.
3000 BC – Menes unifies Upper and Lower Egypt, and a new capital is erected at Memphis.
Discovery of silver.

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Cultures

Indian Subcontinent
- Mehrgarh III–VI
Mesopotamia in Asia
- Sumer
- Proto-Elamite
Neolithic Europe
Egypt in Africa
- Naqada culture on the Nile

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Environmental changes

Based on studies by glaciologist Lonnie Thompson (professor at Ohio State University and researcher with the Byrd Polar Research Center) [1] a number of indicators shows there were a global change in climate 5,200 years ago:

The climate was altered suddenly with severe impacts.
Plants buried in the Quelccaya ice cap in the Peruvian Andes demonstrate the climate had shifted suddenly and severely to capture the plants and preserve them until now.
A man trapped in an Alpine glacier ("Oetzi") is frozen until his discovery in 1991.
Tree rings from Ireland and England show this was their driest period.
Ice core records showing the ratio of two oxygen isotopes retrieved from the ice fields atop Africa’s Mount Kilimanjaro, a proxy for atmospheric temperature at the time snow fell.
Major changes in plant pollen uncovered from lakebed cores in South America.
Record lowest levels of methane retrieved from ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica.
Beginning of desertification of Sahara (35th century BC). The shift by the Sahara Desert from a habitable region to a barren desert.

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Significant persons

Ötzi the Iceman lived c.3300 BC.
predynastic pharaohs, Tiu, Thesh, Hsekiu, Wazner
Early Dynastic Period pharaohs, Ro, Serket, Narmer

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Inventions, discoveries, introductions

Beginnings of urbanisation in Mesopotamia with the Sumerians.
First cities in Egypt (35th century BC).
First writings in the cities of Uruk and Susa (cuneiform writings). Hieroglyphs in Egypt.
Kurgan culture of what is now southern Russia and Ukraine domesticates the horse and develops the chariot.
Potter's wheel used in Middle East.
Sails used in the Nile.
Construction in England of the Sweet Track, the World's first known engineered roadway.
Drainage and sewage system in India
Dams, canals, stone sculptures using inclined plane and lever in Sumer
Copper was in use, both as tools and weapons.
Bronze was in use, specifically by the Maykop culture.
Mastabas, the predecessors of the Egyptian pyramids
the earliest phase of the Stonehenge monument (a circular earth bank and ditch) dates to ca. 3100 BC.
The Céide Fields in Ireland, arguably the oldest field system in world, are developed.