Clive Gamble

In this worldwide survey, Clive Gamble explores the evolution of the human imagination, without which we would not have become a global species. He sets out to determine the cognitive and social basis for our imaginative capacity and traces the evidence back into deep human history. He argues that it was the imaginative ability to 'go beyond' and to create societies where people lived apart yet stayed in touch that made us such effective world settlers. To make his case Gamble brings together information from a wide range of disciplines: psychology, cognitive science, archaeology, palaeoanthropology, archaeogenetics, geography, quaternary science and anthropology. He presents a novel deep history that combines the archaeological evidence for fossil hominins with the selective forces of Pleistocene climate change, engages with the archaeogeneticists' models for population dispersal and displacement, and ends with the Europeans' rediscovery of the deep history settlement of the Earth.

In this worldwide survey, Clive Gamble explores the evolution of the human imagination, without which we would not have become a global species. He sets out to determine the cognitive and social basis for our imaginative capacity and traces the evidence back into deep human history. He argues that it was the imaginative ability to 'go beyond' and to create societies where people lived apart yet stayed in touch that made us such effective world settlers. To make his case Gamble brings together information from a wide range of disciplines: psychology, cognitive science, archaeology, palaeoanthropology, archaeogenetics, geography, quaternary science and anthropology. He presents a novel deep history that combines the archaeological evidence for fossil hominins with the selective forces of Pleistocene climate change, engages with the archaeogeneticists' models for population dispersal and displacement, and ends with the Europeans' rediscovery of the deep history settlement of the Earth.

Clive Gamble's book reinterprets three million years of archaeology to show how the earliest humans of the African savannah spread out to other continents, along the Old World track, and eventually colonized the world.

One afternoon in late April 1859 two geologically minded businessmen, John Evans and Joseph Prestwich, found and photographed the proof for great human antiquity. Their evidence -- small, hand-held stone tools found in the gravel quarries of the Somme among the bones of ancient animals -- shattered the timescale of Genesis and kicked open the door for a time revolution in human history. In the space of a calendar year, and at a furious pace, the relationship between humans and time was forever changed. This interpretation of deep human history was shaped by the optimistic decade of the 1850s, the Victorian Heyday in the age of equipoise. Proving great human antiquity depended on matching the principles of geology with the personal values of scientific zeal and perseverance; qualities which time-revolutionaries such as Evans and Prestwich had in abundance. Their revolution was driven by a small group of weekend scientists rather than some great purpose, and it proved effective because of its bonds of friendship stiffened by scientific curiosity and business acumen. Clive Gamble explores the personalities of these time revolutionaries and their scientific co-collaborators and adjudicators -- Darwin, Falconer, Lyell, Huxley, and the French antiquary Boucher de Perthes -- as well as their sisters, wives, and nieces Grace McCall, Civil Prestwich, and Fanny Evans. As with all scientific discoveries getting there was often circuitous and messy; the revolutionaries changed their minds and disagreed with those who should have been allies. Gamble's chronological narrative reveals each step from discovery to presentation, reception, consolidation, and widespread acceptance, and considers the impact of their work on the scientific advances of the next 160 years and on our fascination with the shaping power of time.

When and how did the brains of our hominin ancestors become human minds? When and why did our capacity for language or art, music and dance evolve? It is the contention of this pathbreaking and provocative book that it was the need for early humans to live in ever-larger social groups, and to maintain social relations over ever-greater distances – the ability to ‘think big’ – that drove the enlargement of the human brain and the development of the human mind. This ‘social brain hypothesis’, put forward by evolutionary psychologists such as Robin Dunbar, one of the authors of this book, can be tested against archaeological and fossil evidence, as archaeologists Clive Gamble and John Gowlett show in the second part of Thinking Big. Along the way, the three authors touch on subjects as diverse and diverting as the switch from finger-tip grooming to vocal grooming or the crucial importance of making fire for the lengthening of the social day. As this remarkable book shows, it seems we still inhabit social worlds that originated deep in our evolutionary past – by the fireside, in the hunt and on the grasslands of Africa.

The study of European prehistory has been revolutionized in recent years by the rapid growth rate of archeological discovery, advances in dating methods and the application of scientific techniques to archaeological material and new archaeological aims and frameworks of interpretation. Whereas previous work concentrated on the recovery and description of material remains, the main focus is now on the reconstruction of prehistoric societies and the explanation of their development. This volume provides that elementary and comprehensive synthesis of the new discoveries and the new interpretations of European prehistory. After and introductory chapter on the geographical setting and the development of prehistoric studies in Europe, the text is divided chronologically into nine chapters. Each one describes, with numerous maps, plans and drawings, the relevant archaeological data, and proceeds to a discussion of the societies they represent. Particular attention is paid to the major themes of recent prehistoric research, especially subsistence economy, trade, settlement, technology and social organization.

Die Entdeckung der Gemeinsamkeit Dieses bemerkenswerte Buch, das die Evolution und die Archäologie des menschlichen Sozialverhaltens zusammenführt, spannt den Bogen von den sozialen Gruppen der Steinzeit bis zu den modernen digitalen Netzwerken – und zeigt, dass wir heute in sozialen Welten leben, die sich tief in unserer evolutionären Vergangenheit entwickelt haben. Sie werden in diesem Jahr kein wichtigeres Buch lesen. Es könnte uns ein bisschen weiser in unserer Selbsteinschätzung machen. Minerva Ein wunderbares Kompendium von Geschichte, Theorien und faszinierenden Experimenten, das Sie durchweg fesseln wird. BBC Focus In einem Stil geschrieben, der in so bewundernswerter Weise wissenschaftliches Fachvokabular und Soziologenjargon vermeidet, dass man nicht mehr als ein normales menschliches Gehirn braucht, um es zu lesen und zu verstehen … eine sehr wertvolle Zusammenfassung unseres gegenwärtigenWissens über die Evolution des Menschen und den möglichen Ursprung und die Entwicklung [solcher] menschlicher Eigenschaften und Fähigkeiten … Evolution, Denken, Kultur ist wie der Urknall: wahrscheinlich noch nicht die ganze Antwort, aber zweifellos schon die Erklärung einer großen Zahl beobachtbarer Phänomene, und für die Debatte und Weiterentwicklung unserer Vorstellungen über die Ursprünge und die Evolution der menschlichen Kognition wird es auf Jahrzehnte hinaus als führendes Modell dienen. Society of Antiquaries Newsletter Ein dramatischer Schlag gegen den “Steine und Knochen”-Ansatz der Archäologie. New Scientist Zugleich ein Triumph der Zusammenarbeit und eine packende Detektivgeschichte. New Statesman _____ Wann und wie entwickelte sich das Gehirn unserer frühen Vorfahren zu einem menschlichen Gehirn? Wann und wie entstand in der Evolution unsere Fähigkeit, zu sprechen und Kunstwerke zu schaffen, zu musizieren und zu tanzen? Die Größe der sozialen Gruppen, in denen Menschen heute leben – Angehörige, Freunde, Bekannte –, beträgt ungefähr 150 Personen. Diese „Dunbar-Zahl“ liegt etwa dreifach höher als bei Menschenaffen und unseren ältesten Vorfahren. Wie die Autoren dieses bahnbrechenden Buches darlegen, waren die frühen Menschen im Kampf ums Überleben gezwungen, sich zu immer größeren Gruppen zusammenzuschließen und zwischenmenschliche Beziehungen über weite Distanzen aufrechtzuerhalten. Sie mussten „im Großen denken“, und dies wiederum trieb sowohl das Wachstum des menschlichen Gehirns als auch die Entstehung des menschlichen Geistes voran. Aus dem gegenseitigen Kraulen der Menschenaffen erwuchs die für Menschen kennzeichnende sprachliche Zuwendung. Musik und Tanz verstärkten die Bindungen zwischen ihnen. Und die Beherrschung des Feuers verlängerte den Tag für zwischenmenschliche Aktivitäten. Heute beherrschen soziale Netzwerke die Welt. Doch erstaunlicherweise entspricht die Zahl unserer Facebook- oder Twitter-Kontakte im Mittel der Dunbar-Zahl. Offenbar leben wir immer noch in einer sozialen Welt, die ihre Wurzeln tief in unserer Evolutionsvergangenheit hat – am Lagerfeuer, auf der Jagd und in den Graslandschaften Afrikas.

The study of European prehistory has been revolutionized in recent years by the rapid growth rate of archeological discovery, advances in dating methods and the application of scientific techniques to archaeological material and new archaeological aims and frameworks of interpretation. Whereas previous work concentrated on the recovery and description of material remains, the main focus is now on the reconstruction of prehistoric societies and the explanation of their development. This volume provides that elementary and comprehensive synthesis of the new discoveries and the new interpretations of European prehistory. After and introductory chapter on the geographical setting and the development of prehistoric studies in Europe, the text is divided chronologically into nine chapters. Each one describes, with numerous maps, plans and drawings, the relevant archaeological data, and proceeds to a discussion of the societies they represent. Particular attention is paid to the major themes of recent prehistoric research, especially subsistence economy, trade, settlement, technology and social organization.

In this study Clive Gamble presents and questions two of the most famous descriptions of change in prehistory. The first is the 'human revolution', when evidence for art, music, religion and language first appears. The second is the economic and social revolution of the Neolithic period. Gamble identifies the historical agendas behind 'origins research' and presents a bold alternative to these established frameworks, relating the study of change to the material basis of human identity. He examines, through artefact proxies, how changing identities can be understood using embodied material metaphors and in two major case-studies charts the prehistory of innovations, asking, did agriculture really change the social world? This is an important and challenging book that will be essential reading for every student and scholar of prehistory.

In this study Clive Gamble presents and questions two of the most famous descriptions of change in prehistory. The first is the 'human revolution', when evidence for art, music, religion and language first appears. The second is the economic and social revolution of the Neolithic period. Gamble identifies the historical agendas behind 'origins research' and presents a bold alternative to these established frameworks, relating the study of change to the material basis of human identity. He examines, through artefact proxies, how changing identities can be understood using embodied material metaphors and in two major case-studies charts the prehistory of innovations, asking, did agriculture really change the social world? This is an important and challenging book that will be essential reading for every student and scholar of prehistory.

Pictorial reconstructions of ancient human ancestors have twin purposes: to make sense of shared ancestry and to bring prehistory to life. Stephanie Moser analyzes the close relationship between representations of the past and theories about human evolution, showing how this relationship existed even before a scientific understanding of human origins developed. How did mythological, religious, and historically inspired visions of the past, in existence for centuries, shape this understanding? Moser treats images as primary documents, and her book is lavishly illustrated with engravings, paintings, photographs, and reconstructions. In surveying the iconography of prehistory, Moser explores visions of human creation from their origins in classical, early Christian, and medieval periods through traditions of representation initiated in the Renaissance. She looks closely at the first scientific reconstructions of the nineteenth century, which dramatized and made comprehensible the Darwinian theory of human descent from apes. She considers, as well, the impact of reconstructions on popular literature in Europe and North America, showing that early visualizations of prehistory retained a firm hold on the imagination—a hold that archaeologists and anthropologists have found difficult to shake.