Includes bibliographical references.

Part One. The past is a foreign country : getting from here to there -- Introduction: Questions of time and ethics -- Getting started in archaeology -- Putting the picture together -- Part Two. Human evolution -- Introduction: Our place in nature -- Early hominins -- From Homo erectus to Neanderthals -- The origin of modern humans -- The peopling of Australia and the New World -- Part Three. Perspectives on agriculture -- Introduction: Definitions of agriculture -- Towers, villages, and longhouses -- Mounds and maize -- A feast of diversity -- Part Four. The development of social complexity -- Introduction: Defining social complexity -- Complexity without the state -- Cities, pyramids, and palaces : early states of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Aegean -- Locating the source of authority : early states in Asia -- From city to empire : social complexity in Mesoamerica -- Bringing the four parts together : states and empire in the Andes -- Epilogue.