A first study from an archaeological perspective of the elaborate systems of Polynesian chiefdoms presents an original account of the processes of cultural change and evolution over three millennia.

In How Chiefs Became Kings, Patrick Vinton Kirch addresses a central problem in anthropological archaeology: the emergence of “archaic states” whose distinctive feature was divine kingship. Kirch takes as his focus the Hawaiian archipelago, commonly regarded as the archetype of a complex chiefdom. Integrating anthropology, linguistics, archaeology, traditional history, and theory, and drawing on significant contributions from his own four decades of research, Kirch argues that Hawaiian polities had become states before the time of Captain Cook’s voyage (1778-1779). The status of most archaic states is inferred from the archaeological record. But Kirch shows that because Hawai`i’s kingdoms were established relatively recently, they could be observed and recorded by Cook and other European voyagers. Substantive and provocative, this book makes a major contribution to the literature of precontact Hawai`i and illuminates Hawai`i’s importance in the global theory and literature about divine kingship, archaic states, and sociopolitical evolution.

Providing a synthesis of archaeological and historical anthropological knowledge of the indigenous cultures of the Pacific islands, this text focuses on human ecology and island adaptations.

These eleven case studies of different chiefdoms examine how ruling elites retain and legitimize their power.

Drawing on archaeological and ethnohistorical sources, this book redefines the study of primary states by arguing for the inclusion of Polynesia, which witnessed the development of primary states in both Hawaii and Tonga.

From 1200 BCE to 900 CE, the world witnessed the rise of powerful new states and empires, as well as networks of cross-cultural exchange and conquest. Considering the formation and expansion of these large-scale entities, this fourth volume of the Cambridge World History series outlines key economic, political, social, cultural, and intellectual developments that occurred across the globe in this period. Leading scholars examine critical transformations in science and technology, economic systems, attitudes towards gender and family, social hierarchies, education, art, and slavery. The second part of the volume focuses on broader processes of change within western and central Eurasia, the Mediterranean, South Asia, Africa, East Asia, Europe, the Americas and Oceania, as well as offering regional studies highlighting specific topics, from trade along the Silk Roads and across the Sahara, to Chaco culture in the US southwest, to Confucianism and the state in East Asia.