<HTML>Elites control power, this power has been seen through ethnographic studies to exist in material remains. Hunter-gatherer groups, also through enthographic analyses, do not display the same kinds of material remains.
For elites to rise on a permanent basis within groups formerly hunter-gatherers, an entire mindset change needs to occur; the entire social dynamics of a group needs to undergo alteration before they accept a stratified society.
There's a story I was once told, a true story. A family of hunter-gatherers were sitting under a tree in Africa, watching a black farmer plant his crops. The farmer worked all day. The San found this amusing and said why is he working the entire day when for a few hours a day of hunting and gathering he can have all the food he needs to survive.
The entire ideology of the two opposing groups are different and what particuarly interests me is the changes within the hunter-gatherer ideology which must have occurred and how that changing ideology can be reflected and deduced from the material remains.
Do you have a copy of Robert Wenke's "Patterns in Prehistory"?
Cheers,
Mike.</HTML>
