Basic Biographical Information
Timothy Earle (Fig. 1) is an anthropological archaeologist whose interests center on the political economies of intermediate societies (chiefdoms) and archaic states. Earle received a B.A. from Harvard College (1969) and a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan (1973). He was Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles, from 1973 to 1995 and Director of UCLA’s Institute of Archaeology from 1987 to 1992. He spent a year at the University of Cambridge (1986–1987). In 1995, he joined Northwestern University as Chair of the Department of Anthropology and became Professor Emeritus in 2011. He was elected to the Executive Board of the Society for Economic Anthropology (2002–), the Editorial Board of the Society for Evolutionary Anthropology (2007–2011), and the Executive Committee of the Human Relations Area File (2008–2011). He served as President of the Archaeology Division of the American Anthropological Association (1993–1997). In...
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Brumfiel, E. & T. K. Earle. (ed.) 1987. Specialization, exchange and complex societies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Costin, C. & T. Earle. 1989. Status distinction and legitimation of power as reflected in changing patterns of consumption in late prehispanic Peru. American Antiquity 54: 691-714.
D'Altroy, T. & T. K. Earle. 1985. Staple finance, wealth finance, and storage in the Inka political economy. Current Anthropology 26(2): 187-206.
Earle, T. K. 1978. Economic and social organization of a complex chiefdom (University of Michigan Anthropological Papers 63). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan.
- 2004. Culture matters: the Neolithic transition and emergence of hierarchy in Thy, Denmark. American Anthropologist 106: 111-125.
Earle, T. K. & A. L. Christenson. (ed.) 1980. Modeling change in prehistoric subsistence economies. New York: Academic Press.
Earle, T. & J. E. Ericson. 1977. Exchange systems in prehistory. New York: Academic Press.
Earle, T. & K. Kristiansen. (ed.) 2010. Organizing Bronze Age societies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Ericson, J. E. & T. K. Earle. (ed.) 1982. Contexts for prehistoric exchange. New York: Academic Press.
Johnson, A. & T. Earle. 1987. The evolution of human societies. Stanford: Stanford University Press (2nd edn. 2000).
Further Reading
D’Altroy, T. & C. Hastorf. (ed.) 2001. Empire and domestic economy. New York: Plenum Press.
DeMarrais, E., L. J. Castillo & T. Earle. 1996. Ideology, materialization, and power strategies. Current Anthropology 37(1): 15-31.
Earle, T. 1991. Chiefdoms: power, economy, ideology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- 1997. How chiefs come to power. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
- 2002. Bronze Age economics. Boulder: Westview Press.
Earle, T. K., T. D'Altroy, C. Hastorf, C. Scott, C. Costin, G. Russell & E. Sandefur. 1987. Archaeological field research in the Upper Mantaro, Peru, 1982-83: investigations of Inka expansion and exchange (Monograph XXVIII). Los Angeles: Institute of Archaeology, University of California.
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DeMarrais, E. (2014). Earle, Timothy. In: Smith, C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0465-2_1289
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