Trevor Watkins is an emeritus professor at the University of Edinburgh where he taught prehistoric archaeology of the east Mediterranean and southwest Asia for many years. He led excavations in Cyprus, Syria, Iraq and Turkey. For many years, his research has been focused on the Neolithic period in southwest Asia, between twelve and eight thousand years ago. In recent years, he has been concentrating on relating the results of recent archaeological research to the latest theoretical work by leading researchers in cognitive archaeology and the field of cultural evolutionary theory. If evolution takes place over time, then archaeologists should be able to document and calibrate the process with material evidence.

Introduction

1 A Concentration of Opportunity

2 Changing Subsistence Strategies: Foraging to Farming

3 Changing Subsistence Strategies: Hunting and Herding

4 Early Epipalaeolithic - The Transformation Begins

5 Complex Hunter-Harvesters in the Levant and beyond

6 Early Pre-Pottery Neolithic - Transforming Their World

7 Late Pre-Pottery Neolithic - Climax

8 Further Transformation: Dispersal and Expansion

9 The Evolutionary Framework for the Story

10 The Epipalaeolithic-Neolithic Transformation: The Pivot of Cultural Evolution

11 The Problem of Neolithic Religion

12 The Triple A: Aggregation, Acceleration, Anthropocene