> - ideas about egalitarianism moved from native americans to the french
Humankind touches on this same topic too. Basically, it wasn't until we settled down in one place that humans were able to create massive inequality. In order to protect those levels of inequality, the powerful elite created concepts like property ownership, the divine right of kings, etc.
Egalitarianism had to be essentially rediscovered after it was lost during the transition to agrarianism. Non-agrarian cultures are naturally fairly high in equality.
- history is not a linear progression and narrative, sometimes things happen in leaps and also can go "backward"
- farming was something that was dabbled in for a millenia before fully committing to it
- the idea of "egalitarianism" is quite vague and can be understood in many ways
- ideas about egalitarianism moved from native americans to the french .. not they other way around
- lots of very interesting stories about how our ancestors were not stupid
- lots of questions about how archeology has been interpreted and how a lot of the evidence does not support the mainstream narrative
- gives examples of societies where "leadership/politics" was actively avoided
- has a nice background on different ingredients of statehood and how they manifested in history
I have a feeling this might be the seminal book for having a fresh analysis and reassessment of lot of what is called "prehistory".
Very highly recommended from my side. I will re-read it a few times probably and gift it to a few friends.