This book is an account of the rise and development of human culture, told in terms of its discovery. This book describes how tools were used, techniques of hunting and gathering food, migration over continents, strange and beautiful cave paintings, and the developments from agriculture to the written word. The book discusses important finds bearing on the earliest human ancestors, such as extraordinarily complete fossils found from the area west of Lake Turkana during the 1980s. It contains hundreds of photographs, drawings, and paintings in colour and black-and-white that bring archaeology to life for students. This new edition provides new interpretations of Neanderthals; an altered picture of the emergence of modern humans in the Middle East and Africa; reviews of the recent theories based on examination of DNA and results of new dating methods such as ESR (electronic spin resonance); and new discoveries and dates for the Americas, Australia, Europe and China.