Renowned archaeologist David Wengrow creates here a vivid new account of the "birth of civilization" in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, bringing together within a unified history the first two nations where people created cities, kingdoms, and monumental temples to the gods. But civilization, Wengrow argues, is not exclusively about large-scale settlements and endeavors. Just as important are the ordinary but fundamental practices of everyday life, such as cooking, running a home, and cleaning the body. Tracing the development of such practices, from prehistoric times to the age of the pyramids, Wengrow reveals unsuspected connections between distant regions and provides new insights into the workings of societies we have come to regard as remote from our own. The book obliges us to recognize that civilizations are not formed in isolation, but through the mixing and borrowing of culture between different societies. It concludes by drawing telling parallels between the ancient Near East and more contemporary attempts to reshape the world according to an ideal image. CONTENTS: Chronology chart Introduction: A Clash of Civilizations? PART I The Cauldron of Civilization Camouflaged Borrowings On the Trail of Blue-Haired Gods Neolithic Worlds The (First) Global Village Origin of Cities From the Ganges to the Danube: the Bronze Age Cosmology and Commerce The Labours of Kingship PART II Forgetting the Old Regime Enlightenment from a Dark Source Ruined Regimes: Egypt at the Revolution Conclusion: What Makes Civilization?