Today's politicians argue that the more 'connected' societies are the less danger they pose to global stability. But is this a 'new' idea or one as old as history itself? Trade routes as far back as prehistory were responsible for the exchange of ideas as well as goods, leading to the rapid expansion of states and empires. 'Connectivity in Antiquity' brings together a team of influential scholars to examine the process of globalization in antiquity. The essays examine metallurgy, social evolution, economic growth and the impact of religious pilgrimage, and range across the eastern Mediterranean, Syria, the Transjordan, south Yemen, and Egypt. 'Connectivity in Antiquity' will be of value to all those interested in the relationship between antiquity and modern globalisation.

The year 2008 marks the 40th anniversary of Mabada Plains Project archaeological research in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. The Madaba Plains Project is one of the longest-lived, continuously running archaeological excavation projects in the Middle East. Spanning four decades, the project, with its beginnings at Tall Hisban in the late sixties, has engaged 1,500 participants, produced scores of publications and spawned a dozen other projects. Its legacy includes being one of the first major Near Eastern archaeology projects to adopt a multi-millennial, regional approach; to incorporate ethnoarchaeology and environmental studies; to construct data around a food-systems' approach; and to computerize procedures for archaeological data acquisition and analysis, thus helping advance both the theoretical underpinnings and the field methods of archaeology in the southern Levant and beyond. Madaba Plains Project directors, wishing to celebrate this major scientific and historical milestone, have produced this anniversary volume which: highlights the value of ongoing collaborative research across the region of central Jordan, attempting to explain life and survival from the Bronze ages through the Islamic and early modern periods and features the latest results from ongoing research; enlivens the discussion by hearing from major scholars in the field who, in the process of assessing the contributions of the project to the archaeology of the southern Levant, broaden the discussion in the context of ancient Near Eastern archaeological research; and, expands the horizons of the project's research by presenting the ever enlarging number and extent of projects conducted by dig directors once on staff with the Madaba Plains Project, thereby taking readers all over Jordan and beyond.

Today's political minds assure us that the more 'connected' societies are, the less danger they pose to global stablity--but is this a 'new' idea or one that is as old as history itself? Trade networks that began as far back as human prehistory were responsible for exchanges of ideas as well as goods and the 'ripple effects' of these networks were the expansionist compulsions of hstorical states and empires. These papers tell us that the civillizations of the ancient past may have had more in common with modern global enterprises than was ever before imagined. Two concepts that have great mmediacy and have now become the current watchwords for the media as well as for academia, globalization and long-term historical processes, are brought together in this interdisciplinary volume of papers based upon Manuel Castells' massive work "The Network Society.

This volume represents the final output of a long-standing collaboration by an international and cross-disciplinary team sponsored by the Center for Advanced Study at the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters. It aims to tell the history of human cultural production in the Eastern Mediterranean rather than the history of specific states or religions. Simultaneously, the volume argues that the agency of local communities is a key to understand the history of long-term change and cultural production in the Levant. It narrates the story of the crystallization of a type of sub-imperial power, illustrated by the canonical discourses associated with Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

"The MPP has left a huge footprint on the archaeology of Jordan and the Middle East in general. Without it, we would all be working in a different way and with a poorer set of theoretical models. This book justly celebrates those achievements and explains how they came about." - Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research The year 2008 marks the 40th anniversary of Madaba Plains Project archaeological research in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. The Madaba Plains Project is one of the longest-lived, continuously running archaeological excavation projects in the Middle East. Spanning four decades, the project, with its beginnings at Tall Hisban in the late sixties, has engaged 1,500 participants, produced scores of publications and spawned a dozen other projects. Its legacy includes being one of the first major Near Eastern archaeology projects to adopt a multi-millennial, regional approach; to incorporate ethnoarchaeology and environmental studies; to construct data around a food-systems approach; and to computerize procedures for archaeological data acquisition and analysis, thus helping advance both the theoretical underpinnings and the field methods of archaeology in the southern Levant and beyond. Madaba Plains Project directors, wishing to celebrate this major scientific and historical milestone, have produced this anniversary volume which: - highlights the value of ongoing collaborative research across the region of central Jordan, attempting to explain life and survival from the Bronze ages through the Islamic and early modern periods and features the latest results from ongoing research - enlivens the discussion by hearing from major scholars in the field who, in the process of assessing the contributions of the project to the archaeology of the southern Levant, broaden the discussion in the context of ancient Near Eastern archaeological research - expands the horizons of the project's research by presenting the ever enlarging number and extent of projects conducted by dig directors once on staff with the Madaba Plains Project, thereby taking readers all over Jordan and beyond.