5,000-year-old Neolithic art found in Orkney dig

[Lugal Zaggesi]

10. Certainly some areas were, and are, very inhospitable

But to travel far from your birthplace was probably very, very dangerous for most of History (and prehistory). You're always going through "somebody else's" land, and you have to carry all your offense/defense. Even if you aren't killed on the Journey, trying to start over someplace else is usually frowned upon by the people already living there. Maybe one or two travelers would be welcomed, but a whole Tribe ? That's fightin' talk.

Even the cities of Mesopotamia were no picnic. Sure, they had writing and metallurgy, but also Kings and Priests who were small in number - most people are probably farming half-naked most of their life (and I heard early farmers had lots of malnutrition - farming supported bigger populations, but hunting/gathering had a much better, healthier diet. Cro-Magnons actually had bigger brains than modern Humans). And wars were very frequent in Sumeria (and all of Mesopotamia, later), hence the big walls around every city, and the local god called upon to "defend" them (or help them conquer the blasphemers down the river).

History is written mainly by a very small slice of "elites" (this Great King won this Huge War) - hence events like discovering the "Iceman", a rather regular guy from 3300 BC, is so interesting:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96tzi

And it's kind of amazing that there are still Eskimos in the world.

I forgot to mention - people living in Orkney in 3000 BC probably had NO CLUE that there were such things as cities like Uruk 4000 miles to the southeast. They were probably lucky if they had any contact with people living 200 miles away.