Ancient Lives

Ancient Lives is an engaging and accessible textbook that introduces complete beginners to the fascinating worlds of archaeology and prehistory through sites of key significance and the world’s first civilizations.

Opening with an introduction to the basic principles, methods, and theoretical approaches of archaeology, the book then provides a summary of world prehistory from a global perspective, exploring human origins and the reality of life in the prehistoric world. Later chapters explore the development of agriculture and animal domestication, and the emergence of cities and state‑level societies across the globe. The new edition updates and reflects the latest thinking through numerous updates of case studies, discoveries, and advances in methods and theory. In addition to comprehensive revisions throughout the book, new sections on the relevance of archaeology to contemporary society and issues are included.

Ancient Lives continues to be a comprehensive and essential introduction to archaeology and is an ideal textbook for students studying archaeology and prehistory for the first time.

Nadia Durrani is a best-selling archaeological writer. The former editor of Current World Archaeology magazine, she is also the long-standing co-author of Brian Fagan’s portfolio of textbooks. Her other books include Climate Chaos: Lessons on Survival from Our Ancestors (with Fagan), which won the 2023 COSMOS award for Italy’s best popular science book. She studied archaeology and anthropology at Cambridge University, has a PhD from University College London, and is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, UK.

Brian M. Fagan (1936–2025) was one of the world’s leading archaeological writers and an internationally recognized authority on world prehistory. In addition to writing textbooks, he wrote dozens of general books including The Adventure of Archaeology; A Little History of Archaeology; and The Great Warming: Climate Change and the Rise and Fall of Civilizations. He studied at Cambridge University and was Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, USA.