Organized into six thematic sections, this book gives short biographies and assessments of the achievements of 70 of the worlds greatest practitioners, written by a 40-strong team of contributors, themselves all eminent archaeologists and authors.

Searching for the past -- The antiquity of humankind. William Stukeley 1687-1765 : Blending romance and science ; Christian Jurgensen Thomsen 1788-1865 & Jens Jacob Asmussen Worsaae 1821-85 : Three age system ; Jacques Boucher de Perthes 1788-1868 : Humanity's high antiquity ; Gabriel de Mortillet 1821-98 : Classifying human cultural evolution ; Oscar Montelius 1843-1921 : Developing accurate chronologies ; Sanz de Sautuola 1831-88 & Henri Breuil 1877-1961 : Finding the earliest art -- Discoverers of ancient civilizations. Johann Joachim Winckelmann 1717-68 : Father of classical archaeology ; Giovanni Battista Belzoni 1778-1823 : Exploring ancient Egypt ; Karl Richard Lepsius 1810-84 : Documenting the pharaohs ; Auguste Mariette 1821-81 : Protecting Egypt's heritage ; John Lloyd Stephens 1805-52 & Frederick Catherwood 1799-1854 : Revealing Maya civilization ; Austen Henry Layard 1817-94 : Nimrud, Nineveh and Babylon ; Heinrich Schliemann 1822-90 & Sophia Schliemann 1852-1932 : Searching for Homer's world ; Alfred Maudslay 1850-1931 : Exploring Maya cities ; Robert Koldewey 1855-1925 : Nebuchadnezzar's Babylon ; Arthur Evans 1851-1941 : Excavator of Minoan Knossos ; Max Uhle 1856-1944 : Explorer of the Peruvian past ; Aurel Stein 1862-1943 : Archaeology and adventure in Central Asia ; Gertrude Bell 1868-1926 : Desert traveller in Arabia and Iraq ; Howard Carter 1874-1939 : Finding Tutankhamun ; John Marshall 1876-1958 : Indus civilization revealed ; Alfonso Caso 1896-1970 & Ignacio Bernal 1910-92 : Unearthing precolumbian Mexico ; Matthew Stirling 1896-1975 : Discoverer of the Olmecs ; Gertrude Caton-Thompson 1888-1985 : Great Zimbabwe and the African past.

The art of excavation. Giuseppe Fiorelli 1823-96 & Amedeo Maiuri 1886-1963 : Excavating and preserving Pompeii ; Augustus Lane Fox Pitt Rivers 1827-1900 : Pioneer of archaeological excavation ; William Matthew Flinders Petrie 1853-1942 : Excavating and dating ancient Egypt ; Wilhelm Dorpfeld 1853-1940 : Scientific excavation at Troy ; Leonard Woolley 1880-1960 : Excavator of Ur ; Alfred Kidder 1885-1963 : the American Southwest ; Mortimer Wheeler 1890-1976 & Philip Barker 1920-2001 : Maestros of archaeological excavation ; William Foxwell Albright 1891-1971 : Father of "biblical archaeology" ; Spyridon Marinatos 1901-74 : Santorini : Akrotiri from beneath the ashes ; Michael Katzev 1930-2001 & Richard Steffy 1924-2007 : Underwater archaeology as science ; Ole Crumlin-Pedersen 1935-2011 : Recreating Viking ships -- Decipherers of ancient scripts. Jean-Francois Champollion 1790-1832 : Breaking the hieroglyphic code ; Henry Creswicke Rawlinson 1810-95 : Deciphering cuneiform ; Michael Ventris 1922-56 : Reading linear B tablets as Greek ; Erick Thompson 1898-1975, Tatiana Proskouriakoff 1909-85 & Yuri Knorosov 1922-99 : Decoding Maya hieroglyphs.

Discovering world prehistory. Julio Tello 1880-1947 : Father of Peruvian archaeology ; Dorothy Garrod 1892-1968 : Mount Carmel and Cro-Magnons ; Li Chi 1896-1979 & Pei Wenzhong 1904-82 : the First Chinese dynasties and early humans in East Asia ; Alexey Okladnikov 1908-81 & Sergey Semenov 1898-1978 : Early technology and Neanderthals in Russia ; Louis Leakey 1903-72 & Mary Leakey 1913-96 : Human origins in Africa ; Kathleen Kenyon 1906-78 : Excavating Jericho ; Grahame Clark 1907-95 : European and world prehistory ; Robert Braidwood 1907-2003 : early farming n the Near East ; Hanna Marie Wormington 1914-94 & Cynthia Irwin-Williams 1936-90 : female Pioneers in North American archaeology ; James B. Griffin 1905-97 : Archaeology of eastern North America ; Jesse Jennings 1909-97 : Archaeology of the desert West ; Gordon Willey 1913-2002 : the Consummate American archaeologist ; J. Desmond Clark 1916-2002 : the Broad canvas of African prehistory ; Roger Green 1932-2009 : studying the early Polynesians -- Thinking about the past. Vere Gordon Childe 1892-1957 : Revolutions in prehistory ; Glyn Daniel 1914-86 & Stuart Piggott 1910-96 : Ancient Europeans, megaliths and the wider audience ; Andre Leroi-Gourhan 1911-86 : How humans make their worlds ; David Clarke 1937-76 & Lewis Binford 1931-2011 : Poneers of the "new archaeology" ; Bruce Trigger 1937-2006 : Archaeology, anthropology and human society ; William T. Sanders 1926-2008 : Culture and environment in Mesoamerica.