As a historian, I have an acute interest in the past.  The 
reconstruction of past events is accomplished mainly through surviving 
literary evidence such as primary and secondary source documents.  But for 
the anthropologist, surviving sources are somewhat more obscure in what 
messages they willingly or unwillingly reveal to us about what life was like 
in the distant past.  World history books begin with the emergence of the 
Egyptians and their ideographic writing system approximately 5000 years 
ago.  These books also expound upon the contributions of the Sumerians as 
having the first "writing" about 3000 years ago and the Phoenicians and 
their development of the first alphabet ca 1200 BC.  Unfortunately, the 
restrictions posed by the written word omit an enormous number of years 
that humans, or anthropods, have walked this earth.  Anthropology, the study 
of man, takes into account all surviving artifacts of the past and tries to 
make sense out of them.  This field of study is able to transcend time.  In 
addition, its importance even during the historianŐs realm of literate 
history of civilizations is profound (as illustrated by the documentary video 
Skeletons of Spitalfields presented in class).  As history and anthropology 
both strive as disciplines to achieve status as "sciences," the final 
achievement will be based on a series of successes compiled over many 
years.