Food and feasting are increasingly recognized as having played a prominent rolein the emergence of social hierarchies and the negotiation of power. Given thecul... » 

Food and feasting are increasingly recognized as having played a prominent rolein the emergence of social hierarchies and the negotiation of power. Given theculinary nature of feasts the archaeological visibility of such events isincreased by the use of containers for both food preparation and consumption.The papers in this volume examine the commensal politics of early states andempires and offer a comparative perspective on how food and feasting havefigured in the political calculus of archaic states in both the Old and NewWorlds. The contributors provide important new insights into the strategies ofearly statecraft and the role of pots as political tools by focusing onquestions such as What was the nature of the relationship between foodpower status and identity in the context of early states? Was feasting auniversally important element in the construction of state power? How doarchaeologically discernible patterns of state feasting compare crossculturally and through time? «