This book provides an introduction to one of the most fascinating and well-known centers of ancient civilization.

• Explores the rise of civilization in the Central Andes from the time of the region's earliest inhabitants to the emergence of the Inca state many thousands of years later.
• Comprised of 13 newly commissioned chapters written by leading archaeologists representing current thinking in the field.
• Presents the central debates in contemporary Inca and Andean archaeology.
• Progresses chronologically and culturally to reveal the processes by which multiple Andean societies became increasingly complex.

Helaine Silverman is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her books include Ancient Nasca Settlement and Society (2002), The Place and Space of Death (edited with David B. Small, 2002), Andean Archaeology I: Variations in Sociopolitical Organization and Andean Archaeology II: Art, Landscape, and Society (both edited with William H. Isbell, 2002), and The Nasca (with Donald A. Proulx, Blackwell, 2002).