The findings can explain differences in hierarchy across the Stone Age world. For example, Peru was the site of multiple early states, which evolved in long, fertile agricultural valleys.

We, the public, can share information like never before and critique the people who sit at the top of a long-standing hierarchy of credibility. Politicians have fewer stones under which to hide ...

Ancient people living in villages near Rome drained the marshes, constructed stone buildings and established marketplaces ... Battling at the Bottom Hierarchy was a fixture of life in the Roman Empire ...

“It was part of a tightly controlled ritual, likely reserved for a select few, reinforcing the social hierarchy ... Chavín culture built monumental stone temples, intricate drainage systems ...