1: Did It Exist at All?: The First Buenos Aires (1536-1541). The Beginning. Things Were Not That Easy. New Questions That Archaeology Brought Forth. 2: A Long Road to Becoming a City. Foundation and Early Times (1580-1620). The Colonial Village: As in a Humble Europe but Not Quite the Same (1620-1810). A Paris in the Americas (1810-1880). 3: Archaeology in the Downtown. The Coni Press (Perú 680): Changes in a Lot at the Urban Border. 1865, An Urban Project: The Tunnel for the Tercero del Sur (Defensa 751). The Elía House: Changes in Typology and Topography. (Balcarce 531). The Peña House: From Aristocracy to Conventillos (San Lorenzo 392). Archaeology in a Conventillo and Everyday Life of the Lower Social Class (Defensa 774). The Huergo Stores: A Grand Family Project in an Ever Changing City (Balcarce 433). In the Central Area: The House of María Josefa Ezcurra (Alsina 455). Five Houses on Old Victoria Street. Ashes to Ashes: The Barriles House in the Lezama Park. How a House Changed Throughout Time (Chile 830). From a Suburban Household to Residence of a Governor: The Caserón de Rosas. Tradition and Prestige of Spain in the Americas: The Cabildo. A Secret Project: Eighteenth-Century Tunnels under Buenos Aires. The Jesuits' Residency for Men in San Telmo. Archaeology in Public Spaces: Parks and Plazas in the City. 4: `To Be or Not to Be (European-like)': The Archaeology of Ethnicity and Gender. The Indian Presence. The African Presence. The Presence of Children. The Presence of Women. 5: All Other Things from a City: The Nonarchitectural Evidence. The Faunistic and Malacological Evidence. The Ceramic Evidence. The Evidence of Material Culture. The Botanical and Chemical Evidence. 6: An Archaeological Overview of Downtown Buenos Aires. The Settlement Pattern.Parcels and Architecture. Change and Continuity. References. Glossary. Index.

A discussion of the historical archaeology of one of the largest cities in the world following four centuries of marginal positioning in regard to empires, trade routes, and the production and accumulation of wealth. The author describes how Buenos Aires came to achieve its current status as a major urban metropolis through an analysis of settlement patterns, architecture, the lifestyle of its residents, and the access to commodities of different social groups.