The volume is the result of the Ninth Annual University of Chicago Oriental Institute PostDoc Seminar, held on March 16-17, 2013. Twenty scholars specialized in the Old and New World from all over Europe and the US came together to find new approaches in the study of households in complex societies. The papers in this volume present case studies from the Near East, Egypt and Nubia, the Classical World, and Mesoamerica, including three comparative responses from the perspective of the different disciplines. By combining the archaeology record, scientific data and written documents the papers...