68 - COPPENS (Yves), preface by

COPPENS (Yves), preface by The Dawn of Humanity. Paris, Pour la Science - Diffusion Librairie Belin, “Bibliothèque Pour la Science” series, 1983. In-4, publisher’s full-color illustrated hardcover, 208 pp. ISBN 2-902918-30-5. French edition of this important collective synthesis devoted to the origins and evolution of humankind, bringing together some twenty articles written by approximately thirty researchers of various nationalities. Foreword by Yves Coppens, then a professor at the Collège de France and director of the Center for Anthropological Research at the Musée de l’Homme. The foreword appears on pages 11–13. The book traces the evolution of humanity from the earliest higher primates of the Fayoum to the first organized societies of the Near East, covering a period ranging approximately from thirty million years to 10,000 years ago. It successively addresses paleoanthropology, human evolution, prehistoric techniques, archaeology, and the emergence of the first complex forms of social organization. The book features a wealth of scientific illustrations, including photographs, drawings, maps, diagrams, reconstructions, and reproductions in both black-and-white and color. It notably includes significant developments in the study of stone tool industries and the microscopic analysis of wear patterns on prehistoric tools—a particularly innovative field of research at the time. This is a copy of the 1983 edition, which is indeed the one cataloged by the Bibliothèque nationale de France; some commercial listings incorrectly list 1985 for the same ISBN. Condition: good copy. Hardcover slightly scuffed at the caps and corners, with a few minor signs of wear; interior clean and fresh overall.