Achieving Equality: Why There Was Not as Much Inequality in Prehistoric Europe as We Imagine

Abstract

Archaeologists have long investigated the rise of inequality in prehistoric Europe. This paper argues that images of steadily increasing inequality are usually based on cherry-picking particular outstanding cases and a selective interpretation of the results. Illustrated through a large-scale qualitative assessment of the Central Mediterranean, this paper makes two arguments. First, a broad review of evidence suggests that social inequality was not a major organising principle of most prehistoric societies. Instead, throughout prehistory, inequality formed part of a heterogeneous, heterarchical social order. Secondly, this was not simply due to historical chance or stagnation. As an outline “people’s history of prehistoric Europe” suggests, many of the archaeologically most visible developments in every period were actively aimed at undermining, encapsulating or directing the potential development of hierarchy. In this sense, Europe’s long prehistory of limited and ambiguous hierarchy do not represent a failure of social evolution but a widespread story of success at developing tactics for achieving maintaining equality.