This collective work unfolds the origins, richness and dynamics of human ingenuity. It is an enduring journey, a journey through space and time, richly illustrated, spanning 2.5 million years. This journey continues to the present day, making archaeology a science that contributes to our understanding of the present.

A team of 24 distinguished researchers offers a scholarly and up-to-date coverage of the world’s prehistory. In its pages the impressive diversity of human civilization is revealed, from the manufacture of the first ‘simple’ tools of the Lower Palaeolithic to the emergence of the first states with complex, hierarchical organization and impressive artifacts and architecture.

In the first part (chapters 2-5) the study focuses on human origins and developments up to the end of the last glacial period – a period known as the Palaeolithic. The second and longer part (chapters 6-19) covers the post-glacial period, the Holocene, from 11,600 years ago to recent times.

Chris Scarre is Professor of Archaeology at Durham University.

Sultana-Maria Valamoti is Professor of Prehistoric Archaeology at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and director of the Plant Cult laboratory at the KEDEK-AUTh.