hello. sorry, but this post has been removed for exactly the reason you allude to ("I know this question ridiculously non-specific and there are hundreds of answers"): "throughout history" trivia-type questions are not permitted here because they tend to attract mountains of unsubstantiated trivia rather than indepth responses, and because any given historian rarely has expertise spanning all cultures across all time. Here's the rule:
Do repost if you can narrow it down to a particular type of technology, and/or region/culture and preferably time period. Or you might try x-posting to /r/AskAnthropology, which might be a better fit for this question anyway, and has less restrictive rules.