Issues of formation and evolution of the early (archaic) state continue to remain among those problems which have not found generally accepted solutions yet. Contributors to The Early State, Its Alternatives and Analogues represent both traditional and non-traditional points of view on the evolution of statehood. However, the data presented in the volume seem to demonstrate in a fairly convincing manner a great diversity of pathways to statehood, as well as non-universality of transformation into states of complex and even supercomplex societies.