This volume, with essays by leading archaeologists and prehistorians, considers how prehistoric humans attempted to recognise, understand and conceptualise death.

This magnificent book showcases more than 250 of the finest examples of traditional jewelry from the Pacific. Myriad designs and materials, including jade, whale teeth and bone, shark teeth, tapa, shells, and plant fibers, are woven together in a skillful combination of color and craftsmanship. Apart from their beauty, these personal items also convey information about power, status, and community. Their significance, the ceremonies in which they are worn, and the messages they convey are explored in an illuminating introductory essay. Drawing on the extensive collections of the Auckland Museum, the jewelry shown here represents a vast geographical area: Micronesia, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, Fiji, Samoa, Tonga, Hawaii, Niue, the Marquesas, the Cook Islands, and New Zealand. The amazing variety of styles and materials reflects the lifestyles, preoccupations, and imperatives of a people surrounded by the largest ocean on the planet.

This volume accompanies a major international loan exhibition featuring more than three hundred works of art, many rarely or never before seen in the United States. It traces the development of gold working and other luxury arts in the Americas from antiquity until the arrival of Europeans in the early sixteenth century. Presenting spectacular works from recent excavations in Peru, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Mexico, this exhibition focuses on specific places and times—crucibles of innovation—where artistic exchange, rivalry, and creativity led to the production of some of the greatest works of art known from the ancient Americas. The book and exhibition explore not only artistic practices but also the historical, cultural, social, and political conditions in which luxury arts were produced and circulated, alongside their religious meanings and ritual functions. Golden Kingdoms creates new understandings of ancient American art through a thematic exploration of indigenous ideas of value and luxury. Central to the book is the idea of the exchange of materials and ideas across regions and across time: works of great value would often be transported over long distances, or passed down over generations, in both cases attracting new audiences and inspiring new artists. The idea of exchange is at the intellectual heart of this volume, researched and written by twenty scholars based in the United States and Latin America.

This introduction to Maya art is based on study of one of the most important collections in the United States, assembled by Robert Woods Bliss between 1935 and 1962. The catalogue, written by leading Maya scholars, contains detailed analyses of specific works of art along with thematic essays situating them within the context of Maya culture.

What purpose did the Neolithic Hongshan Culture have for their iconic artifacts called the Pig Dragon, the C Dragon, and the Hooked Cloud Shape Ornaments? Why would they invest precious nephrite jade material and man hours to produce them? Seeking answers to these questions, this paper traces the path of their possible dispersion, marked by their distinctive stone tools.