Chiefdoms

What many anthropologists regard as the major step in political development occurred when, for the first time in history, previously autonomous villages gave up their individual sovereignties and were brought together into a multi-village political unit - the chiefdom. Though long neglected as a major stage in history, in recent years the chiefdom has been the focus of increased atttention. As its importance has been more fully recognized, it has become the object of serious scholarly analysis and intepretation. In this volume specialists in political evolution draw on data from ethnography,…