The Holocene, or Recent, Epoch includes the time since the end of the last Ice Age, approximately 10,000 year ago. It was during this time that Homo sapiens completed world-wide radiation and became technologically advanced.

The beginning of the Holocene saw a warming trend and the receding of the Wisconsinan Ice at the end of the Pleistocene. Many of the larger animals associated with the ice ages, such as mammoths and mastodons, did not survive into Recent times. It is probable that a combination of climatic change and human predation resulted in the extinction of these species.

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