[3] Interest in the field of study began in the late 1850s and early 1860s, with a shift in interest caused by the discoveries made by Boucher de Perthes, after Joseph Prestwich, Hugh Falconer, and John Evans had visited Boucher de Perthes's site in the Somme valley themselves.
Two such archaeologists who had been attracted to join archaeological societies by palaeoarchaeology were Augustus Pitt Rivers and Edward Burnett Tylor.
Evans, Pitt Rivers, and John Lubbock all promoted interest in the field.
In 1868, for example, they together organised, in conjunction with the annual general meeting in Norwich of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, the Third International Congress of Prehistoric Archaeology.
In addition, paleoarchaeologists often deal with remains that lie somewhere between their primate ancestors and modern humans.