Early European history is a hobby of mine, and the period from 9000 BCE to about 1000 BCE is one of my favorite periods to learn about. Cunliffe's Europe Between The Oceans offers a good introduction to Europe and the Mediterranean regions of Africa and Asia Minor, not so much in the historical sense of studying individuals and particular events, but on a grander scale. The role of geography and climate, the mass movements of people and goods, and adaptations of cultures as they learned from others are the themes here. I especially liked the many maps showing pretty much every aspect of Cunliffe's discussion, especially distribution of archaeological finds, etc.

So what did I get out of this? First, that Europe was much more connected earlier than I thought. The record clearly indicates that people traveled and that goods were traded from the very start and that this flow affected nearly every culture and group. Also, people seem to have many of the same motivators today that they had then - exploration, prestige and influence over others, the desire to improve their situation for example. and how population and food production drove much of the push into new territories and much of the technological innovation.

All in all, this is a pretty good book. It's at what I consider an introductory level - which means that it's well outside my areas of expertise and I was still able to follow just fine. I did get a little mixed up with the dating terminology and some of the cultural names, but Cunliffe was able to keep me straight. I'd recommend it to anyone wanting to get a sense of the state of the art in European archaeological thinking. ( )