Liu Bin is Professor and Director of Zhejiang Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology. He has joined or directed excavations at the Fanshan, Yaoshan, Huiguanshan, and Nanhebang sites, and the Liangzhu City since 1985. His main research interests include the prehistory of the Lower Yangtze River and the archaeology of jade.

Qin Ling is Associate Professor of Neolithic Archaeology and Archaeobotany at the School of Archaeology and Museology, Peking University, Beijing. Her research interests include scientific research on Neolithic jades in Eastern China, early agricultural developments in the Lower Yangtze River and Southwest China, and comparative perspective on civilisational discourses across East Asia.

Zhuang Yijie is Associate Professor in Chinese Archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London. He applies geoarchaeological approaches to reconstruct ecologies of early agriculture and long-term land use changes in East, South and Southeast Asia. He is also interested in the comparison of diverse trajectories to social complexity in these regions.

Figures; Contributors; Acknowledgments; Preface; Chapter One: Situating the Liangzhu Culture in Late Neolithic China: An Introduction; Chapter Two: The Liangzhu City: New Discoveries and Research; Chapter Three: Power and Belief: Reading the Liangzhu Jade and Society; Chapter Four: A Controlled Fine Craft: Jade Production Techniques in the Liangzhu Culture; Chapter Five: From the 'Songze Style' to the 'Liangzhu Mode'; Chapter Six: Shamanistic, Historic and Virtuous Jade: Continuity and Change in Early Chinese Jade Traditions; Glossary; List of Historical Records; Bibliography; Index