Any attempt to understand present-day European societies and a possible "European identity" must include an historical perspective. Many of the phenomena on the road from the Stone Age to urbanization and the "Cities of tomorrow" affecting Europe anditsdevelopment between c. 3000 and 500 BC appeared first in southeastern Mediterranean Europe (in the Aegean area), influenced by the cultures in the Eastern Mediterranean such as Anatolia, Egypt and the Levant. These seven papers from a session ofthe European Association of Archaeologists in Lisbon in 2000 focus on how these impulses were transmitted, what forms of interaction led to their spread and acceptance, and why certain societies did not accept them.