Rousseau wrote in his works "Discourse On Inequality" and "The Social Contract" that mankind was good in a prehistoric when people lived in the wilderness and they were in a state of nature where they were hunters and gatherers. Then they were corrupted by society once they started to live together in cities. I suspect that this is because society makes people more materialistic and they start to envy each other. I also suspect that this is why he said in the "Social Contract", "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains. One man thinks himself the master of others, but remains more of a slave than they are." I think that this may be because some people are trapped by their materialistic desires for money and power.
The assumption is prehistoric times mankind had an egaleterian society is flawed. We do not know enough about prehistoric society to know this. Based on what we know about sociology we can assume that there would have been leadership amongst these groups and various role that would have determined that status of the members of such a society. Also, we do not know whether or not prehistoric humans were materialistic. The notion of the noble savage is false because it has been shown in Native Austrialian societies that they are not always morally sound. For example, some of the Native Austrialian practiced infanticide. I added a link below to an article on the history of infanticide and I credit this source for last sentence.
Here is the link to an article on the history of infanticide.
http://www.deathreference.com/Ho-Ka/Infanticide.html
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