UNESCO is an international organisation founded in 1945 by one hundred and forty three nations with the aim of identifying and protecting those historical, artistic and natural sites under threat of destruction or radical transformation that possess the requisites and values of a historical location belonging to the heritage of humankind. From 1972, the year that World Heritage was created, until the birth of the new millennium about six hundred site have been examined and declared world heritage sites, these include natural sanctuaries, manmade landscapes, entire urban centres, archaeological sites and single monuments. In this book, Skira and UNESCO begin a collection of three volumes devoted to the illustration and listing of these locations with the aim of making these places a more permanent part of our common heritage shared by contemporary culture. The first volume, devoted to archaeological sites and urban centres, illustrates forty-six emblematic examples of geographic, cultural and historical locations with a clear and well-documented explicative text further enhanced with in-depth information and a significant collection of images and informative captions. To complete the picture the appendix of the volume contains the charter of the World Heritage and a complete list with pertinent motives of all the archaeological sites and urban centres examined by this international organisation. Through this book and its rich and fascinating photographic documentation, very diverse and distant places, both in time and space, are brought together in a clear, fascinating overview of the intertwining of human culture and history: the true heritage of every nation and every individual.