直立人和尼安德塔人在現代人類——智人出現後從非洲移居至歐洲。最早的歐洲人骨骼發現於格魯吉亞達馬尼斯，距今180萬年。最早的生物學上的現代歐洲人出現於公元前3 5000年。公元前7千年在巴爾幹已有定居點的痕跡。中歐在公元前6千年，北歐部分地區在公元前5千至4千年到達新石器時代。公元前5508-2750年的庫庫特尼-特裏波裏文化是歐洲最早的大規模文明，也是世界最早的文明之一。
從新石器時代開始，意大利卡莫尼卡河𠔌就開始有了卡慕尼文明，留下了歐洲最多的超過35萬幅的壁畫。
歐洲的銅器時代，也叫青銅時代，是一段變化和混亂交錯的時期。最重要的事件是中亞民族大舉遷徙和入侵歐洲。主流學者認為他們是原始印歐人，但是也有幾種有爭議的其他看法。其他現象包括巨石崇拜的轉播發展，經濟上首次出現明顯的階級差別，以及與此相關的在巴爾幹地區的第一個已知的君主製政權。歐洲第一個著名的有文字記載的文明是剋裏特島上的米諾斯文明，以及隨後的希臘鄰近地區的邁錫尼文明，始於公元前2千年早期。
雖然早在公元前1100年愛琴海地區的人就懂得使用鐵器，但是直到公元前800年該技術還沒有傳播到中歐，除了石器時代的陶器群文化進化而來的哈爾施塔特文化之外。很可能是這項技術的優越性使得印歐人不久之後明顯在意大利和伊比利亞站穩了腳跟，足跡深入這兩個半島(羅馬建立於公元前753年)。
Homo erectus and Neanderthals migrated from Africa to Europe before the emergence of modern humans. The bones of the earliest Europeans are found in Dmanisi, Georgia, dated at 1.8 million years ago.
The earliest appearance of anatomically modern people in Europe has been dated to 35,000 BCE. Some locally developed transitional cultures (Szletian in Central Europe and Chatelperronian in the Southwest) use clearly Upper Paleolithic technologies at very early dates and there are doubts about who were their carriers: H. sapiens, Neanderthal or the intermarried population.
Nevertheless, the definitive advance of these technologies is made by the Aurignacian culture. The origins of this culture can be located in what is now Bulgaria (proto-Aurignacian) and Hungary (first full Aurignacian). By 35,000 B.C., the Aurignacian culture and its technology had extended through most of Europe. The last Neanderthals seem to have been forced to retreat during this process to the southern half of the Iberian Peninsula.
Around 24,000 BP two new technologies/cultures appeared in the southwestern region of Europe: Solutrean and Gravettian. The Gravettian technology/culture has been theorized to have come with migrations of people from the Middle East, Anatolia, and the Balkans
Around 19,000 BP, Europe witnesses the appearance of a new culture, known as Magdalenian, possibly rooted in the old Aurignacian one. This culture soon supersedes the Solutrean area and also the Gravetian of Central Europe. However, in Mediterranean Iberia, Italy and Eastern Europe, epi-Gravettian cultures continue evolving locally.
Around 12,500 BP, the Würm Glacial age ends. Slowly, through the following millennia, temperatures and sea levels rise, changing the environment of prehistoric people. Nevertheless, Magdalenian culture persists until circa 10,000 BP, when it quickly evolves into two microlithist cultures: Azilian, in Spain and southern France, and Sauveterrian, in northern France and Central Europe.
Evidence of permanent settlement dates from the 7th millennium BCE in the Balkans. The Neolithic reached Central Europe in the 6th millennium BCE and parts of Northern Europe in the 5th and 4th millennium BCE. The Cucuteni-Trypillian culture 5508-2750 BCE was the first big civilization in Europe and among the earliest in the world.
Starting from Neolithic we have the civilization of the Camunni in Valle Camonica, Italy, that left to us more than 350,000 petroglyphs, the biggest site in Europe.
Also known as the Copper Age, European Chalcolithic is a time of changes and confusion. The most relevant fact is the infiltration and invasion of large parts of the territory by people originating from Central Asia, considered by mainstream scholars to be the original Indo-Europeans, although there are again several theories in dispute. Other phenomena are the expansion of Megalithism and the appearance of the first significant economic stratification and, related to this, the first known monarchies in the Balkan region. The first well-known literate civilization in Europe was that of the Minoans of the island of Crete and later the Mycenaens in the adjacent parts of Greece, starting at the beginning of the 2nd millennium BCE.
Though the use of iron was known to the Aegean peoples about 1100 BCE, it didn't reach Central Europe until 800 BCE, giving way to the Hallstatt culture, an Iron Age evolution of the culture of the Urn Fields. Probably as by-product of this technological peculiarity of the Indo-Europeans, soon after, they clearly consolidated their positions in Italy and Iberia, penetrating deep inside those peninsulas (Rome founded in 753 BCE).