We're talking a long time ago

The Headline

this beautiful Bronze Age cup.

 this "dazzling cup" is about 3500 years old.

."...[T]he dazzling Ringlemere Cup....was discovered on 4 November 2001. This golden vessel was made between 1700–1500 BC, and was found by metal-detectorist Cliff Bradshaw in the fields of Ringlemere Farm in the south of England...."

End quote. 

Now, what jumps to mind is: what kind of cup has a conical bottom? That means if you set it down, the liquid is spilled.

And then I realized: these people didn't SIT DOWN. Because they didn't sit down, there was no need to set down a cup.

Their center of gravity, to refer to the maps of Jan Cox, was the physical, roughly, their pelvis. (This incidentally, reflects the fact their minds were MORE active than our own: they were smarter than we are, to generalize. But that is a different topic, and or, set of encyclopedias, and not our current topic.).

They were walking, running, riding, MOVING. Or by being still enough to invent, discover, astronomy, physics, useful gods, commas. None of this required the necessity of putting aside small amounts of liquid to be later recovered. Living in the present means consuming in the present.