The past decade has seen significant advances in our understanding of human evolution. Discoveries have presented extensive new evidence of fossil hominids, whilst developments in dating techniques and the geological sciences have yielded a wealth of information permitting the reconstruction of the environment, ecology and behaviour of past hominid communities. This book provides a comprehensive survey of current evidence, ideas and interpretation of human evolution. It includes a thorough, fully illustrated account of the fossil record with its geological and archaeological contexts, reviewing competing theories and interpretations. Full details are presented of the evidence for human evolution, and the influence of theory and concepts in palaeoanthropology is discussed. The book highlights areas of controversy and includes recent discoveries and debates about such major topics as early hominid interrelationships, diversity in early Homo, the pace of change in H. erectus and the origin of modern humans. The author manages to avoid oversimplified generalizations, without becoming too bogged down in the minutiae of fossil morphology.
While emphasizing the fossil evidence, he also reviews the early archaeological record and reconstructions of hominid ecology and behaviour, providing an overview of current human evolutionary studies and an indication of likely developments over the next decade. This book should be of interest to advanced undergraduates and postgraduates studying human evolution as part of an anthropology or biology course.