Preface to the paperback edition
Prologue: Yali's question: The regionally differing courses of history
From Eden to Cajamarca. Up to the starting line: What happened on all the continents before 11,000 B.C.?
A natural experiment of history: How geography molded societies on Polynesian islands
Collision at Cajamarca: Why the Inca emperor Atahuallpa did not capture King Charles I of Spain
The rise and spread of food production. Farmer power: The roots of guns, germs, and steel
History's haves and have-nots: Geographic differences in the onset of food production
To farm or not to farm: Causes of the spread of food production
How to make an almond: The unconscious development of ancient crops
Apples or Indians: Why did peoples of some regions fail to domesticate plants?
Zebras, unhappy marriages, and the Anna Karenina principle: Why were most big wild mammal species never domesticated?
Spacious skies and tilted axes: Why did food production spread at different rates on different continents?
From food to guns, germs, and steel. Lethal gift of livestock: The evolution of germs
Blueprints and borrowed letters: The evolution of writing
Necessity's mother: The evolution of technology
From egalitarianism to kleptocracy: The evolution of government and religion
Around the world in five chapters. Yali's people: The histories of Australia and New Guinea
How China became Chinese: The history of East Asia
Speedboat to Polynesia: The history of Austronesian expansion
Hemispheres colliding: The histories of Eurasia and the Americas compared
How Africa became black: The history of Africa
The future of human history as a science
2003 afterword: Guns, germs, and steel today.