Ban Chiang

BELOW This tiny infant was buried with 20 pots, 2,154 shell beads, and a copper axe. Note, too, the bivalve shells, which we think symbolised rebirth. The big bangle is made of marble.

Rise of the elites

... you can peer down into a deep square where Bronze Age burials are left in the ground following an earlier Thai excavation. Your eyes alight on the grave of a man accompanied by a remarkable number of pottery vessels and a socketed copper-base axe.