Prelude: Computing from Ancient Times to the Modern Era - The Technical and Social History of Software Engineering - page 13

Table 1.1 Evolution of Mathematics, Calculating Devices, and Software
Table 1.1 illustrates the fact that the human use of mathematics is ancient and
can be traced almost as far back as speech. The reason for this is that mathematical
knowledge became a critical factor when human beings started to live in villages
and trade with others.
Those who hunt and gather wild plants have little need for math and only rudi-
mentary needs for sophisticated communications of any kind. But the advent of
agriculture, living in communities, and trade with other communities brought the
needs for weights, measures, awareness of seasonal changes, and at least basic
arithmetic such as addition and subtraction.