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A FASCINATING INVESTIGATION INTO THE HISTORY OF CITIES: WHY DID THEY OCCUR, HOW HAVE THEY EVOLVED, WHY DO SO MANY OF US CHOOSE TO LIVE IN THEM AND HOW DO THEY AFFECT US? ‘Monica Smith is the person best qualified to write a book about the big problems raised by the increasing concentration of the human population into cities. She also has a gift for vivid writing that will make the science of cities come to life for the broad public. I expect that CITIES will be a great read and will sell well.’ Jared Diamond, author of Collapse Over half of the world’s population lives in an urban area and cities around the globe are getting bigger and bigger. Love them or hate them, more and more of ...
For the past million years, individuals have engaged in multitasking as they interact with the surrounding environment and with each other for the acquisition of daily necessities such as food and goods. Although culture is often perceived as a collective process, it is individual people who use language, experience illness, expend energy, perceive landscapes, and create memories. These processes were sustained at the individual and household level from the time of the earliest social groups to the beginnings of settled agricultural communities and the eventual development of complex societies in the form of chiefdoms, states, and empires. Even after the advent of ÒcivilizationÓ about 6,00...
Part of a resurgence in the comparative study of ancient societies, this book presents a variety of methods and approaches to comparative analysis through the examination of wide-ranging case studies. Each chapter is a comparative study, and the diverse topics and regions covered in the book contribute to the growing understanding of variation and change in ancient complex societies. The authors explore themes ranging from urbanization and settlement patterns, to the political strategies of kings and chiefs, to the economic choices of individuals and households. The case studies cover an array of geographical settings, from the Andes to Southeast Asia. The authors are leading archaeologists whose research on early empires, states, and chiefdoms is at the cutting edge of scientific archaeology.
Lana feels that her crown is threatened. The root to all her problems stem from Gethambe's love interest, Ashley. Trying desperately to savor her position as the true Queen of Achaemenid, she commits the ultimate sin and puts the lives of Ashley and her daughter in danger.Feeling guilty about how things ended with Lana, Gethambe attempts to find her to right his wrongs. Not realizing that Ashley is missing, his focus becomes bonding them as sister wives. His hope is for everyone to live together in perfect harmony. Little does he know, he's already too late.When Ashely awakens, she finds that she is no longer sharing a bed with her husband. It doesn't take long for her to realize that she is...
Using case studies from around the globe—including Mesoamerica, North and South America, Africa, China, and the Greco-Roman world—and across multiple time periods, the authors in this volume make the case that abundance provides an essential explanatory perspective on ancient peoples’ choices and activities. Economists frequently focus on scarcity as a driving principle in the development of social and economic hierarchies, yet focusing on plenitude enables the understanding of a range of cohesive behaviors that were equally important for the development of social complexity. Our earliest human ancestors were highly mobile hunter-gatherers who sought out places that provided ample food...
A groundbreaking history of early America that shows how Boston built and sustained an independent city-state in New England before being folded into the United States In the vaunted annals of America’s founding, Boston has long been held up as an exemplary “city upon a hill” and the “cradle of liberty” for an independent United States. Wresting this revered metropolis from these misleading, tired clichés, The City-State of Boston highlights Boston’s overlooked past as an autonomous city-state, and in doing so, offers a pathbreaking and brilliant new history of early America. Following Boston’s development over three centuries, Mark Peterson discusses how this self-governing Atlantic trading center began as a refuge from Britain’s Stuart monarchs and how—through its bargain with the slave trade and ratification of the Constitution—it would tragically lose integrity and autonomy as it became incorporated into the greater United States. The City-State of Boston peels away layers of myth to offer a startlingly fresh understanding of this iconic urban center.
This book synthesises the archaeology of South Asia from the Neolithic period (c.6500 BCE) to the third century BCE.
This study of early cities in Mesoamerica will contribute significantly to the world-wide discourse on early cities and urbanism.
This second edition covers recent developments around the world with contributors from 33 different countries. It widens the handbook’s scope by including ecological design; consideration of cultural dimensions of the use and conservation of urban nature; the roles of government and civil society; and the continuing issues of equity and fairness in access to urban greenspaces. New features include an emphasis on the biophilic design of homes and workplaces, demonstrating the value of nature, in order to counter the still prevalent attitude among many developers that nature is a constraint rather than a value. The volume explores great practical achievements that have occurred since the fir...
Maps have always been a fundamental tool in archaeological practice, and their prominence and variety have increased along with a growing range of digital technologies used to collect, visualise, query and analyse spatial data. However, unlike in other disciplines, the development of archaeological cartographical critique has been surprisingly slow; a missed opportunity given that archaeology, with its vast and multifaceted experience with space and maps, can significantly contribute to the field of critical mapping. Re-mapping Archaeology thinks through cartographic challenges in archaeology and critiques the existing mapping traditions used in the social sciences and humanities, especially since the 1990s. It provides a unique archaeological perspective on cartographic theory and innovatively pulls together a wide range of mapping practices applicable to archaeology and other disciplines. This volume will be suitable for undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as for established researchers in archaeology, geography, anthropology, history, landscape studies, ethnology and sociology.