Archaeology began with a strong bias toward exploring the lives of the ruling class in ancient civilizations. Archaeologists are aware of this bias and try to compensate for it and work around it.
Many of them continue to assume, however, that the evolution of a society from "chiefdoms" to "states" involves the development of an elite social class. The site at Çatalhöyük, in Turkey, one of the earliest cities ever found, has proven to be a challenge precisely because there are no elite markers. The whole site is like one enormous apartment building, with the houses right up against each other and doors only in the roofs. The houses are all modest, a pattern that is also seen in some early sites on the Pacific coast of South America.
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