Chiefdoms

Cambridge University Press

1991

xii, 341 p.

School of American Research advanced seminar

9780521448963

The evolution of chiefdoms / Timothy Earle -- Chiefdoms, states, and systems of social evolution / Kristian Kristiansen -- The pattern of change in British prehistory / Richard Bradley -- Property rights and evolution of chiefdoms / Timothy Earle -- Lords of the waste : predation, pastoral production, and the process of stratification among the Eastern Twaregs / Candelario Sáenz -- Chiefship and competitive involution : the Marquesas Islands of eastern Polynesia / Patrick Kirch -- Trajectories towards social complexity in the later prehistory of the Mediterranean / Antonio Gilman -- Chiefdoms to city-states : the Greek experience / Yale Ferguson -- Contrasting patterns of Mississippian development / Vincas Steponaitis -- Demography, surplus, and inequality : early political formations in highland Mesoamerica / Gary Feinman -- Pre-Hispanic chiefdom trajectories in Mesoamerica, Central America, and northern South America / Robert Drennan.

The study of chiefdoms has moved from a preoccupation with their formal characteristics to a concern with their dynamics as political institutions. The contributors to this volume are interested in how ruling elites retain power through control over production and exchange, and then legitimize that control through an elaborate ideology. These case studies look at particular chiefdoms, originating in specific historical conditions. Despite obvious differences between the chiefdoms, certain common underlying processes are revealed." "The collection recognizes how complex and interdependent are the sources of power in society, as well as the forces of instability that constantly threaten to tear the society apart. Chiefdoms offers a rich and varied interpretation of sociopolitical power.

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