An archaeologist examines humanity’s last major source of food from the wild, and how it enabled and shaped the growth of civilization.

In this history of fishing—not as sport but as sustenance—archaeologist and best-selling author Brian Fagan argues that fishing was an indispensable and often overlooked element in the growth of civilization. It sustainably provided enough food to allow cities, nations, and empires to grow, but it did so with a different emphasis. Where agriculture encouraged stability, fishing demanded movement. It frequently required a search for new and better fishing grounds; its technologies, centered on boats, facilitated movement and discovery; and fish themselves, when dried and salted, were the ideal food—lightweight, nutritious, and long-lasting—for traders, travelers, and conquering armies. This history of the long interaction of humans and seafood tours archaeological sites worldwide to show readers how fishing fed human settlement, rising social complexity, the development of cities, and ultimately the modern world.

“A tour-de-force . . . Achieves its goal of putting fishing on par with hunter-gathering and agriculture in the history of human civilization.” —Leon Vlieger, Natural History Book Service

“A valuable book as well as an interesting one . . . Fagan succeeds in providing an admirable primer for the enthusiast and a welcome tool for the historian.” —Economist

“A unique panoramic survey of the field.” —Laurence A. Marschall, Natural History

“Gently scholarly, elegant . . . A compelling picture of how fishing was so integral in each society’s development. A multilayered, nuanced tour of “fishing societies throughout the world” and across millennia.” —Kirkus Reviews