5
1
9781138722941
TO THE READER
Many people think of archaeology as a romantic subject, a glamorous pastime spent with pyramids, mysterious inscriptions, and buried treasure. This stereotype originated in the nineteenth century, when both archaeologists and the ancient civilizations they uncovered became legendary. Today, more than 150 years of archaeological investigations have turned archaeology into a meticulous discipline. But the excitement is still there, in the many diverse and highly detailed reconstructions of life in the past that come from scientific inquiry. Archaeologists have reconstructed the lifeways of the earliest humans, documented some of the earliest art in the world, outlined the processes of plant domestication, and even examined the garbage produced in modern urban America. In this book we describe how archaeologists make and study such finds to illuminate the human past.
In the Beginning introduces the history and methods of archaeology and its significance today. We discuss archaeological concepts and procedures and show how archaeologists describe cultures as part of time and space to interpret the prehistoric past. One objective in this book is to provide a comprehensive summary of the field for people who have little or no experience with it. A second objective is to alert you to a major crisis facing archaeology in our time. All archaeological sites are finite records of the past; once destroyed, they can never be replaced. But treasure hunting by individuals and a huge increase in the construction of buildings, roads, dams, and the like have destroyed thousands of archaeological sites all over the world. Without access to intact sites, wecannot possibly complete a picture of the human past. The crisis of site destruction is, in its way, as important as the ecological crisis we face. In the Beginning is meant to alert you to the need for living responsibly with your cultural heritage.
Archaeology has become a sophisticated "high-tech" discipline in recent years, and there are many more professional archaeologists working in the field than even a decade ago. The result has been not only a knowledge explosion but also the development of ever more sophisticated and fine-grained methods for studying the past. We cannot examine even a small fraction of these elaborate, often expensive, and invariably fascinating methods within the compass of this book. Nor do we delve deeply into the powerful statistical methods and computerized approaches that are commonplace in archaeology today. This book focuses on the basic principles of our discipline, on the fundamental tenets that are equally important whether one uses a trowel, a laser recording system, or a complicated computer graphics program in pursuit of the past.
The chapters close with summaries highlighting the major themes and concepts. Whenever practicable, drawings and photographs illustrate the subjects the text describes. We use specialized terminology as little as possible and define every new term when it first appears. In addition, a Glossary at the back of the book provides definitions of the words used in the book as well as of some words you may encounter in other reading.
We hope that you will pursue the topics that interest you in more advanced and specialized archaeology courses or in the many excellent books and articles listed in the Bibliography at the back of the book and in the Guide to Further Reading at the end of each chapter.
We have written this book from predominantly English-language sources for two main reasons. First, our reading in the vast archaeological literature has been necessarily selective and mostly in English. Second, for most of you, English is your native tongue. Although linguistic abilities and time have thus biased this volume toward the achievements and writings of English-speaking archaeologists, archaeology is indeed a global activity, conducted with great energy and intelligence by every nation and in every corner of the world.
May you enjoy the world of the past as much as we have! Good luck with your adventures in archaeology—and please be a careful steward of the past for future generations. To the Instructor
When I (BMF) started writing the first edition of In the Beginning, back in 1968, I had no idea that it would still be in print more than thirty years later and that I would one day be revising it for the tenth time! In the Beginning has become an integral part of my life, and I have been humbled to hear it referred to as a "venerable classic." "Classic" is flattering; perhaps "venerable" is a reflection of my advancing years...
For this eleventh, and for future, editions, I am delighted to welcome a valued colleague and friend as co-author, Christopher DeCorse of Syracuse University. Chris is a historical archaeologist with a broad practical experience in both teaching and field research. Like myself, he is an Africanist, which means that we share many common perspectives on archaeology. He has also worked in cultural resource management in North America, adding another dimension to his extensive background.
After three decades, any book like this is the work of far more than one person. Many instructors and students have written to me (BMF), or button-holed me at a meeting, to make suggestions or to offer criticism or even reprints of their own work. We are deeply grateful for their constant input and for both their critical and kind words. In the Beginning is truly a product of both authors and readers.
The eleventh edition of In the Beginning appears at a time when archaeology is in the midst of a major revolution, in large part driven by circumstances beyond archaeologists' control. Until very recently, archaeology was a purely academic discipline, little concerned with such issues as the destruction of sites, cultural heritage and conservation of the past, or global tourism. Archaeologists thought of themselves as objective scientists, studying the past for the benefit of all humankind. Now archaeology is rapidly becoming a profession, with a large population of archaeologists in government positions and working for private companies. The academic sector shrinks, while the professional one grows.
As a group, we archaeologists are increasingly concerned with the management and conservation of the rapidly vanishing archaeological record. Our daily activities encompass strategies to combat looting, measures to mitigate the destruction and potential ravages caused by thousands of tourists' feet at places like Egypt's pyramids, and, above all, finding ways to preserve our cultural heritage and to ensure the long-term survival of the archaeological record. This dramatic shift from the academic to the applied is not a mirage the size of a person's hand dimly visible on a theoretical horizon. It is a vast, numbing, and fast-moving reality that offers us extraordinary challenges in training the professional archaeologists of the twenty-first century.
The debate about the training of future professionals has only just begun, but it is a debate that concerns, for the most part, advanced undergraduate and graduate training. There is still a need for a sound basic grounding in archaeological methods and theoretical approaches, for courses and texts that introduce a beginning student to the fascination and intricacy of modern-day archaeology. This book is a predominantly academic introduction to archaeology, with a deliberately international flavor. We discuss stewardship, archaeological ethics, cultural resource management, and the vanishing archaeological record—all important aspects of archaeology. But our main focus is on the basic intellectual and practical principles that underpin archaeology everywhere, whether a painstaking excavation of an early hominid camp in Africa, or a once-thriving Mesopotamian city, or a Native American town, or a weeklong contract to investigate an urban lot in the heart of New York City.
Basic principles change little over the years: the importance of context, of time and space, of meticulous excavation methods and precise recording, the basics of artifact classification, zooarchaeology, and so on. But important trends have surfaced in recent years, some a direct result of the dominant role of cultural resource management in today's archaeology. They include:
We are at a fascinating point in archaeological method and theory, with archaeologists divided into a minority engaged in intensive theoretical debate and the remainder continuing to carry out empirical research, albeit in more sophisticated ways that have been commonplace for generations. Archaeologists are engaged in intense debates about the future of the discipline and about its role in the contemporary world, debates stimulated in part by the divisive and fractious times in which we live. What is happening in archaeology has already happened in many other sciences and is still taking hold in much of biology: the development of distinctive and scientific methods and theories that not only enrich our understanding of the past but also add to our understanding of ourselves. Inevitably, these developments have led to ever more intense specialization in ever more high-tech methods and increasingly esoteric research. This high degree of specialized research and the overspecialized archaeologists who accompany it are not necessarily a positive development.
Please encourage your students to think of archaeology as one enterprise, not as dozens of unrelated activities. Above all, encourage them to look at the broad picture as well as at the local one, for the greatest advances in archaeology, as in other sciences, have come not from slavish specialization but from inspirations born of broad vision. This is why this book unashamedly draws on examples from many parts of the world. It is myopic to teach archaeology from a narrow, say, British or North American, perspective, when our discipline encompasses so much more fascinating research into the brilliant diversity of our forebears. Changes in the Eleventh Edition
This eleventh edition of In the Beginning reflects not only our biases but also the teaching experience of hundreds of instructors over the years whose comments have been invaluable. Almost all of them have urged that we retain the basic format and global coverage of earlier editions. Despite attempts to telescope some chapters into others, the existing organization, honed as it has been over eleven editions, seems to work well for most users. We have, however, moved more archaeological theory to the front of the book, on the argument that this important topic should be discussed early on as background to later, more specific material. We still retain coverage of the nature of the archaeological record and other basic principles close to the front of the book so that they are covered before the chapters on recovering archaeological data.
A successful innovation in the tenth edition, unique in any method and theory text, is retained for this one: an introduction entitled What Happened in Prehistory?, designed to give the beginning reader a brief summary of world prehistory as a reference point for the examples that appear in the main text. There are many substantial changes in this edition. Ethics and stewardship, as well as cultural resource management, receive more extended coverage in Chapter 1. We have moved the discussion of archaeological theory into Chapter 3, which has been extensively rewritten. Relative and chronometric chronology form a single Chapter 7. Chapter 8, Finding and Assessing Archaeological Sites, has been revised to reflect the burgeoning concern with archaeological survey and ancient landscapes, with new examples. We have retained a popular new chapter from the previous edition, Chapter 12, Ancient Environments, which reflects the remarkable advances in paleoclimatology in recent years, especially in the study of short-term climatic shifts, such as the well-known El Ninos. Chapter 15, Settlement Archaeology, has been rewritten in response to an increasing interest in ancient landscapes. Chapter 16, Interactions: People of the Past, and Chapter 17, Archaeology of the Intangible, cover such current topics as gender, ethnicity, and the study of ancient religion. Part VII is devoted to cultural resource management as a stand-alone topic, a feature of this book since 1981. This sole chapter, 18, which has been substantially updated and expanded, deals with some of the most pressing issues that face modern archaeologists. Part VIII, Careers and Resources, consists of Chapter 19, Becoming an Archaeologist, another innovation in the tenth edition, which proved extremely popular with readers. This chapter contains some frank and hard-P, hitting advice about archaeology as a career. The text is followed by a Glossary and Bibliography.
It would have been easy to make this book a mere catalog of method and theory and to stretch it to a thousand pages, but, as the great archaeologist Sir Mortimer Wheeler once said (1954), "Dry archaeology is the driest dust that blows." We have done everything we can to make this book an interesting read, keeping jargon to a minimum. In the interest of brevity, we have had to cover some topics, such as population carrying capacity and sampling, in almost indecent haste. We have also omitted discussion of the more exotic experimental methodologies that now crowd the pages of archaeological literature and more advanced textbooks. Although valuable, many of them are not strictly relevant to the basic goals of archaeology outlined in these pages. We leave it to you to fill in details on topics that you think are inadequately covered here.
We urge you, however, to give full coverage to the growing crisis of the archaeological record. This subject demands full factual and moral coverage in all introductory courses, where many students arrive with the notion of finding buried treasure or collecting beautiful artifacts. Every course in archaeology must place responsibility for preserving the past emphatically in public, as well as professional, hands. It is for this reason that this book ends with a stark statement of basic archaeological ethics for everyone.
In the Beginning surveys the broad spectrum of archaeological method and theory. With the very first edition, it was decided not to espouse any one theory of archaeology and to provide global coverage of archaeology, to give each instructor a basis for amplifying the text with his or her own viewpoint and theoretical persuasion. This decision has been endorsed by many users and by my new co-author. A reviewer said some editions ago: "This is the fun with this book." Long may it continue to be so.
In the Beginning: An Introduction to Archaeology / Edition 14 available in Hardcover, Paperback, eBook
In the Beginning: An Introduction to Archaeology / Edition 14
by Brian M. Fagan, Nadia Durrani
Brian M. Fagan
- ISBN-10:
- 1138722944
- ISBN-13:
- 9781138722941
- Pub. Date:
- 05/27/2020
- Publisher:
- Taylor & Francis
- ISBN-10:
- 1138722944
- ISBN-13:
- 9781138722941
- Pub. Date:
- 05/27/2020
- Publisher:
- Taylor & Francis
In the Beginning: An Introduction to Archaeology / Edition 14
by Brian M. Fagan, Nadia Durrani
Brian M. Fagan
$280.0
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Overview
In the Beginning describes the basic methods and theoretical approaches of archaeology. This is a book about fundamental principles written in a clear, flowing style, with minimal use of technical jargon, which approaches archaeology from a global perspective.
Starting with a broad-based introduction to the field, this book surveys the highlights of archaeology’s colorful history, then covers the basics of preservation, dating the past, and the context of archaeological finds. Descriptions of field surveys, including the latest remote-sensing methods, excavation, and artifact analysis lead into the study of ancient environments, landscapes and settlement patterns, and the people of the past. Two chapters cover cultural resource management, public archaeology, and the important role of archaeology in contemporary society. There is also a chapter on archaeology as a potential career. In the Beginning takes the reader on an evenly balanced journey through today’s archaeology. This well-illustrated account, with its numerous boxes and sidebars, is laced with interesting, and sometimes entertaining, examples of archaeological research from all parts of the world.
This classic textbook of archaeological method and theory has been in print for nearly 50 years and is used in many countries around the world. It is aimed at introductory students in archaeology and anthropology taking survey courses on archaeology, as well as more advanced readers.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781138722941 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Taylor & Francis |
| Publication date: | 05/27/2020 |
| Edition description: | 14th ed. |
| Pages: | 500 |
| Product dimensions: | 8.25(w) x 11.00(h) x (d) |
About the Author
Brian M. Fagan is one of the world’s leading writers about archaeology and an internationally recognized authority on world prehistory. He studied archaeology and anthropology at Pembroke College, Cambridge University, and then spent seven years in sub-Saharan Africa. Now a distinguished professor emeritus, from 1967 to 2013 he was a professor of anthropology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Brian has written seven bestselling textbooks and numerous general books on archaeology, ancient climate change, and other topics.
Nadia Durrani has contributed to a wide range of archaeological publications and is the former editor of Britain’s two bestselling archaeological magazines, Current Archaeology and Current World Archaeology. Over the years, she has authored and edited countless articles and books, including co-authoring a portfolio of books with Brian. Her background is in Arabian archaeology, and following a degree in archaeology and anthropology from Cambridge University, she took a PhD in southwest Arabian archaeology from University College, London. Nadia remains actively involved in Arabian studies and is on the board of the International Association for the Study of Arabia. She is also a founding member of the Great War Archaeology Group and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.
Table of Contents
PART I BACKGROUND TO ARCHAEOLOGY; 1 Introducing Archaeology; 2 The Beginnings of Scientific Archaeology: Sixth Century B.C. to the 1950s; 3 The Many-Voiced Past: Archaeological Thought from the 1950s to Now; PART II THE BASICS; 4 Matrix and Preservation; 5 Doing Archaeological Research; 6 Culture, Data, and Context; 7 Dating the Past; PART III RECOVERING THE DATA; 8 They Sought It Here, They Sought It There: Finding the Past; 9 Excavation; PART IV ANALYZING THE PAST: ARTIFACTS AND TECHNOLOGY; 10 Classifying Artifacts; 11 Technologies of the Ancients; PART V STUDYING ENVIRONMENTS AND PEOPLE; 12 Ancient Environments; 13 Studying Subsistence; 14 The Living Past; 15 Landscape and Settlement; 16 Interactions: People of the Past; 17 Archaeology and the Intangible; PART VI MANAGING THE PAST; 18 Cultural Resource Management (CRM) and Public Archaeology; 19 Archaeology and Contemporary Society; PART VII CAREERS AND RESOURCES; 20 So You Want to Become an Archaeologist?; Useful Addresses; Glossary; Bibliography; IndexPreface
TO THE READER
Many people think of archaeology as a romantic subject, a glamorous pastime spent with pyramids, mysterious inscriptions, and buried treasure. This stereotype originated in the nineteenth century, when both archaeologists and the ancient civilizations they uncovered became legendary. Today, more than 150 years of archaeological investigations have turned archaeology into a meticulous discipline. But the excitement is still there, in the many diverse and highly detailed reconstructions of life in the past that come from scientific inquiry. Archaeologists have reconstructed the lifeways of the earliest humans, documented some of the earliest art in the world, outlined the processes of plant domestication, and even examined the garbage produced in modern urban America. In this book we describe how archaeologists make and study such finds to illuminate the human past.
In the Beginning introduces the history and methods of archaeology and its significance today. We discuss archaeological concepts and procedures and show how archaeologists describe cultures as part of time and space to interpret the prehistoric past. One objective in this book is to provide a comprehensive summary of the field for people who have little or no experience with it. A second objective is to alert you to a major crisis facing archaeology in our time. All archaeological sites are finite records of the past; once destroyed, they can never be replaced. But treasure hunting by individuals and a huge increase in the construction of buildings, roads, dams, and the like have destroyed thousands of archaeological sites all over the world. Without access to intact sites, wecannot possibly complete a picture of the human past. The crisis of site destruction is, in its way, as important as the ecological crisis we face. In the Beginning is meant to alert you to the need for living responsibly with your cultural heritage.
Archaeology has become a sophisticated "high-tech" discipline in recent years, and there are many more professional archaeologists working in the field than even a decade ago. The result has been not only a knowledge explosion but also the development of ever more sophisticated and fine-grained methods for studying the past. We cannot examine even a small fraction of these elaborate, often expensive, and invariably fascinating methods within the compass of this book. Nor do we delve deeply into the powerful statistical methods and computerized approaches that are commonplace in archaeology today. This book focuses on the basic principles of our discipline, on the fundamental tenets that are equally important whether one uses a trowel, a laser recording system, or a complicated computer graphics program in pursuit of the past.
The chapters close with summaries highlighting the major themes and concepts. Whenever practicable, drawings and photographs illustrate the subjects the text describes. We use specialized terminology as little as possible and define every new term when it first appears. In addition, a Glossary at the back of the book provides definitions of the words used in the book as well as of some words you may encounter in other reading.
We hope that you will pursue the topics that interest you in more advanced and specialized archaeology courses or in the many excellent books and articles listed in the Bibliography at the back of the book and in the Guide to Further Reading at the end of each chapter.
We have written this book from predominantly English-language sources for two main reasons. First, our reading in the vast archaeological literature has been necessarily selective and mostly in English. Second, for most of you, English is your native tongue. Although linguistic abilities and time have thus biased this volume toward the achievements and writings of English-speaking archaeologists, archaeology is indeed a global activity, conducted with great energy and intelligence by every nation and in every corner of the world.
May you enjoy the world of the past as much as we have! Good luck with your adventures in archaeology—and please be a careful steward of the past for future generations. To the Instructor
When I (BMF) started writing the first edition of In the Beginning, back in 1968, I had no idea that it would still be in print more than thirty years later and that I would one day be revising it for the tenth time! In the Beginning has become an integral part of my life, and I have been humbled to hear it referred to as a "venerable classic." "Classic" is flattering; perhaps "venerable" is a reflection of my advancing years...
For this eleventh, and for future, editions, I am delighted to welcome a valued colleague and friend as co-author, Christopher DeCorse of Syracuse University. Chris is a historical archaeologist with a broad practical experience in both teaching and field research. Like myself, he is an Africanist, which means that we share many common perspectives on archaeology. He has also worked in cultural resource management in North America, adding another dimension to his extensive background.
After three decades, any book like this is the work of far more than one person. Many instructors and students have written to me (BMF), or button-holed me at a meeting, to make suggestions or to offer criticism or even reprints of their own work. We are deeply grateful for their constant input and for both their critical and kind words. In the Beginning is truly a product of both authors and readers.
The eleventh edition of In the Beginning appears at a time when archaeology is in the midst of a major revolution, in large part driven by circumstances beyond archaeologists' control. Until very recently, archaeology was a purely academic discipline, little concerned with such issues as the destruction of sites, cultural heritage and conservation of the past, or global tourism. Archaeologists thought of themselves as objective scientists, studying the past for the benefit of all humankind. Now archaeology is rapidly becoming a profession, with a large population of archaeologists in government positions and working for private companies. The academic sector shrinks, while the professional one grows.
As a group, we archaeologists are increasingly concerned with the management and conservation of the rapidly vanishing archaeological record. Our daily activities encompass strategies to combat looting, measures to mitigate the destruction and potential ravages caused by thousands of tourists' feet at places like Egypt's pyramids, and, above all, finding ways to preserve our cultural heritage and to ensure the long-term survival of the archaeological record. This dramatic shift from the academic to the applied is not a mirage the size of a person's hand dimly visible on a theoretical horizon. It is a vast, numbing, and fast-moving reality that offers us extraordinary challenges in training the professional archaeologists of the twenty-first century.
The debate about the training of future professionals has only just begun, but it is a debate that concerns, for the most part, advanced undergraduate and graduate training. There is still a need for a sound basic grounding in archaeological methods and theoretical approaches, for courses and texts that introduce a beginning student to the fascination and intricacy of modern-day archaeology. This book is a predominantly academic introduction to archaeology, with a deliberately international flavor. We discuss stewardship, archaeological ethics, cultural resource management, and the vanishing archaeological record—all important aspects of archaeology. But our main focus is on the basic intellectual and practical principles that underpin archaeology everywhere, whether a painstaking excavation of an early hominid camp in Africa, or a once-thriving Mesopotamian city, or a Native American town, or a weeklong contract to investigate an urban lot in the heart of New York City.
Basic principles change little over the years: the importance of context, of time and space, of meticulous excavation methods and precise recording, the basics of artifact classification, zooarchaeology, and so on. But important trends have surfaced in recent years, some a direct result of the dominant role of cultural resource management in today's archaeology. They include:
- An increasing emphasis on field survey and high-technology methods for locating, surveying, and mapping sites.
- A major stress on "nonintrusive" archaeology, nondestructive ways of recording sites and their features.
- A remarkable proliferation of highly specialized, often high-technology methods, some of which have become subspecialties in their own right. Archaeology today is far more specialized than even a generation ago.
- A realization that there are many ways of thinking about the past, of which the archaeological perspective is one.
- A long, and often passionate, debate not only about the morality of archaeology and about the ways in which we practice North American archaeology but also about the relationships between archaeologists everywhere and indigenous peoples. This debate includes the important issue of burials and skeletal material.
- A new generation of archaeological theory that emphasizes the archaeology of people rather than more general processes of culture change. This new emphasis is reflected in research into gender, ethnicity, and inequality, and also in the slow acceptance of "cognitive archaeology," sometimes called the "archaeology of mind," as a major theoretical trend.
We are at a fascinating point in archaeological method and theory, with archaeologists divided into a minority engaged in intensive theoretical debate and the remainder continuing to carry out empirical research, albeit in more sophisticated ways that have been commonplace for generations. Archaeologists are engaged in intense debates about the future of the discipline and about its role in the contemporary world, debates stimulated in part by the divisive and fractious times in which we live. What is happening in archaeology has already happened in many other sciences and is still taking hold in much of biology: the development of distinctive and scientific methods and theories that not only enrich our understanding of the past but also add to our understanding of ourselves. Inevitably, these developments have led to ever more intense specialization in ever more high-tech methods and increasingly esoteric research. This high degree of specialized research and the overspecialized archaeologists who accompany it are not necessarily a positive development.
Please encourage your students to think of archaeology as one enterprise, not as dozens of unrelated activities. Above all, encourage them to look at the broad picture as well as at the local one, for the greatest advances in archaeology, as in other sciences, have come not from slavish specialization but from inspirations born of broad vision. This is why this book unashamedly draws on examples from many parts of the world. It is myopic to teach archaeology from a narrow, say, British or North American, perspective, when our discipline encompasses so much more fascinating research into the brilliant diversity of our forebears. Changes in the Eleventh Edition
This eleventh edition of In the Beginning reflects not only our biases but also the teaching experience of hundreds of instructors over the years whose comments have been invaluable. Almost all of them have urged that we retain the basic format and global coverage of earlier editions. Despite attempts to telescope some chapters into others, the existing organization, honed as it has been over eleven editions, seems to work well for most users. We have, however, moved more archaeological theory to the front of the book, on the argument that this important topic should be discussed early on as background to later, more specific material. We still retain coverage of the nature of the archaeological record and other basic principles close to the front of the book so that they are covered before the chapters on recovering archaeological data.
A successful innovation in the tenth edition, unique in any method and theory text, is retained for this one: an introduction entitled What Happened in Prehistory?, designed to give the beginning reader a brief summary of world prehistory as a reference point for the examples that appear in the main text. There are many substantial changes in this edition. Ethics and stewardship, as well as cultural resource management, receive more extended coverage in Chapter 1. We have moved the discussion of archaeological theory into Chapter 3, which has been extensively rewritten. Relative and chronometric chronology form a single Chapter 7. Chapter 8, Finding and Assessing Archaeological Sites, has been revised to reflect the burgeoning concern with archaeological survey and ancient landscapes, with new examples. We have retained a popular new chapter from the previous edition, Chapter 12, Ancient Environments, which reflects the remarkable advances in paleoclimatology in recent years, especially in the study of short-term climatic shifts, such as the well-known El Ninos. Chapter 15, Settlement Archaeology, has been rewritten in response to an increasing interest in ancient landscapes. Chapter 16, Interactions: People of the Past, and Chapter 17, Archaeology of the Intangible, cover such current topics as gender, ethnicity, and the study of ancient religion. Part VII is devoted to cultural resource management as a stand-alone topic, a feature of this book since 1981. This sole chapter, 18, which has been substantially updated and expanded, deals with some of the most pressing issues that face modern archaeologists. Part VIII, Careers and Resources, consists of Chapter 19, Becoming an Archaeologist, another innovation in the tenth edition, which proved extremely popular with readers. This chapter contains some frank and hard-P, hitting advice about archaeology as a career. The text is followed by a Glossary and Bibliography.
It would have been easy to make this book a mere catalog of method and theory and to stretch it to a thousand pages, but, as the great archaeologist Sir Mortimer Wheeler once said (1954), "Dry archaeology is the driest dust that blows." We have done everything we can to make this book an interesting read, keeping jargon to a minimum. In the interest of brevity, we have had to cover some topics, such as population carrying capacity and sampling, in almost indecent haste. We have also omitted discussion of the more exotic experimental methodologies that now crowd the pages of archaeological literature and more advanced textbooks. Although valuable, many of them are not strictly relevant to the basic goals of archaeology outlined in these pages. We leave it to you to fill in details on topics that you think are inadequately covered here.
We urge you, however, to give full coverage to the growing crisis of the archaeological record. This subject demands full factual and moral coverage in all introductory courses, where many students arrive with the notion of finding buried treasure or collecting beautiful artifacts. Every course in archaeology must place responsibility for preserving the past emphatically in public, as well as professional, hands. It is for this reason that this book ends with a stark statement of basic archaeological ethics for everyone.
In the Beginning surveys the broad spectrum of archaeological method and theory. With the very first edition, it was decided not to espouse any one theory of archaeology and to provide global coverage of archaeology, to give each instructor a basis for amplifying the text with his or her own viewpoint and theoretical persuasion. This decision has been endorsed by many users and by my new co-author. A reviewer said some editions ago: "This is the fun with this book." Long may it continue to be so.
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