This book presents a narrative synthesis of the demography and social history of the European Palaeolithic population. It represents decades of study and knowledge of the evolution and lifestyle of prehistoric societies, by the author, brought together and summarised in a single volume. The first part of the work is a compendium outlining and considering the state of the art of palaeodemography and its characterisation and theoretical underpinning. In my opinion, this provides a necessary prequel to the main body of the volume that allows readers to understand the author's vision and approach to the subject, as well as introducing concepts and establishing definitions, which will be referred to later in the book.
Thus, a complete and very cohesive multidisciplinary base is provided, addressing all of the disciplines that contribute to palaeodemography, such as archaeology, palaeoanthropology, palaeogenetics or cultural anthropology. Palaeodemography, then, is constituted as an interdisciplinary science with its own evolution since its historiographic origins. French is always very conscious of previous studies and their foundations. The intention of the author is to create an objective discourse while acknowledging the existence of the linguistic, social and historical constructs inherent in the discipline, and dealing frankly with their validity throughout the volume.
Through the second part of the work, an extensive history of Palaeolithic people is developed and presented in a comprehensive and well-constructed account covering thousands of years. The author's vision of Palaeolithic people as historical subjects interconnected with their environment, their material culture and with other social groups is noteworthy and generates a more complete characterisation of social groups rather than isolated individuals. In this way, French's analysis recognises the different cultural, environmental and geographical agents that directly shaped the development and evolution of people and groups in this vast chronological and cultural space.
The structure of the volume presents the broadest overview of palaeodemography, providing a very clear representation of previous and established research, a review of the state of the art and studies and research currently being undertaken, and an incisive vision of the problems, challenges for the future and of what still remains to be done. One aspect of this is broadening the demographics that research attends to. The author redresses this balance with continuous allusion, throughout the volume, to the active role of women and children in prehistoric societies. No doubt in part reflecting recent awareness of the absence of women and children in historical and archaeological narratives, the author's research and approaches shift these two social groups from the position of mere spectators of the past to active agents at the centre of the development, evolution and identity of prehistoric groups.
The volume is clearly scientific and academic in character, with an extensive bibliography and numerous case studies. As such, the book is not a fast and easy read—that is not the aim, and readers should be prepared for weighty academic content. That said, the volume is a compendium and, as such, cannot go into too much detail on specific cases. It is not intended to justify, debate or present new evidence but, rather, to provide a theoretical framework of reference, which will challenge the reader to think critically and reconsider their understanding of Palaeolithic society. The graphics, especially in the maps and analytical figures, would have benefitted from printing in colour, which would have made it easier to distinguish the values and legends. This slowed reading progress a little, but this is a factor of production and does not reflect badly on the content of the work itself.
The author follows a chronocultural classification established for the more detailed analysis of the evolutionary stages of the Palaeolithic population. The interpretation afforded to each period as a particular moment or chapter within the evolutionary line may be somewhat generalist; however, this bracketing is understandable in order to organise the volume and provide a manageable structure for the reader. Some periods are better represented than others—this is the case for the Gravettian period. Despite this occasionally differential treatment, however, there are no gaps in the chronology.
The volume presents a true summary of the Palaeolithic. In my humble opinion, this monograph will be a valuable reference work for any palaeodemographic study, both as an introduction to the theoretical underpinning of the discipline and for more specific or in-depth consultation. The relevant bibliography also makes the volume a good starting point for more specialised research. My sincere congratulations to the author for the years of hard work that have produced this final result.
