Volume 1 covers the basics necessary for any construction activity in foundation engineering. This systematic introduction to the assessment of soil and rock properties provides an insight into the requirements of Eurocode 7, Parts 1 and 3. It also gives details of geotechnical laboratory and field tests and the associated equipment, concise treatments of relevant solutions provided by the theories of elasticity and plasticity and numerical methods applied to solve problems of geotechnical design. The problems of earthquakes are also explained with regard to Eurocode 8.