ABSTRACT
The four chapters in this section illustrate the use of general principles to reconstruct hominid social systems based on analyses of primate behavioural ecology and phylogeny, and their impact on anatomy and social behaviour. For the most part, the evidential control on predictions of hominid social systems comes from fossil anatomy, although there is some reference to the psychology of manipulative behaviour as reflected in ancient artefacts, and to the ethnography of modern foragers.
