After more than a century of neglect, a profound revolution is occurring in the way archaeology interprets developments in the social history of early Islamic Syria. These changes and their fundamental implications for understanding an ever-growing body of archaeological evidence, are central to this book. It sets out to offer, in one accessible volume, an innovative interpretation from an archaeological perspective of social and economic developments in Syria shortly before and during the two centuries after the Islamic expansion (roughly the later 6th to the early 9th century AD). Drawing on a wide range of new evidence from recent archaeological work, some of it unpublished, the book challenges conventional explanations for social change before and after the Islamic expansion, and argues for considerable cultural and economic continuity.