Barry Cunliffe is Professor of European Archaeology at the University of Oxford. The author of over 40 books, including The Ancient Celts, published by Oxford University Press, he has served as President of the Council for British Archaeology and the Society of Antiquaries, and is currently a member of the Ancient Monuments Board of English Heritage.

• List of Colour Plates ; List of Maps ; Acknowledgements ; Introduction ; 1. The Peopling of Europe, 700,000-400,000 Years before the Present ; 2. The Upper Paleolithic Revolution ; 3. The Mesolithic Age ; 4. The First Farmers ; 5. The Transformation of Early Agrarian Europe: The Later Neolithic and Copper Ages, 4500-2500 BC ; 6. The Palace Civilizations of Minoan Crete and Mycenaean Greece, 2000-1200 BC ; 7. The Emergence of Elites: Earlier Bronze Age Europe, 2500-1300 BC ; 8. The Collapse of Aegean Civilization at the End of the Late Bronze Age ; 9. Reformation in Barbarian Europe, 1300-600 BC ; 10. Iron Age Societies in Western Europe and Beyond: 800-140 BC ; 11. Thracians, Scythians, and Dacians, 800 BC-AD 300 ; 12. The Impact of Rome on Barbarian Society, 140 BC-AD300 ; 13. Barbarian Europe, AD 300-700 ; Further Reading ; Chronological Tables ; Acknowledgement of Sources ; Index

takes the reader on a fascinating journey through the development of Western culture -- a definitive study.