Today, ideas of our prehistoric origins are more likely based on ocean core samples, radio-carbon dating, and archeological artifacts. But as Barry Cunliffe reminds us in Britain Begins, an archaeologist writing of the past must be constantly aware that the past is, in truth, unknowable. Like the myth-making Celts, we too create stories about our origins, based on what we know today.Cunliffe here offers readers a vision of both worlds, looking at new myths and old, as he tells the fascinating story of the origins of the British and the Irish, from around 10,000 BC to the eve of the Norman Conquest. Using the most up-to-date archaeological evidence together with new work on DNA and other scientific techniques which help us to trace the origins and movements of these early settlers, Cunliffe offers a rich narrative account of the first islanders--who they were, where they came from, and how they interacted with one another. Underlying this narrative is the story of the sea, and Cunliffe paints a fascinating picture of early ships and sails and of the surprising sophistication of early navigation. The story told by the archaeological evidence is enhanced by historical texts, such as Julius Caesar's well-known if rather murky vision of Britain. Equally interesting, Cunliffe looks at the ideas of Britain's origins formed by our long-ago ancestors themselves, when they used what scraps there were, gleaned from Biblical and classical texts, to create a largely mythological origin for the British.

    Take an adventurous trek to these wilds of South America and the great civilizations of the ancients. In 24 eye-opening lectures, you'll take an in-depth look at the emerging finds and archaeological knowledge of more than 12 seminal civilizations, giving you rich insight into the creative vision and monumental achievements of these wellsprings of human life. The ancient South Americans show us striking models of how societies can function and organize themselves. The technologies and social structures seen here were wholly invented, using no preexisting models, as these dynamic peoples struggled to tame their environment and carve out societies and empires. Recently unearthed marvels include elaborately prepared and adorned mummies that predate Egypt's by 2000 years; imposing palaces, solar observatories, and dramatically decorated pyramids; stunning art objects in gold, turquoise, lapis lazuli, and ceramic; and evidence of huge urban civilizations in the Amazon. In their amazing sophistication and scale, the sites reveal some of the most remarkable ancient artifacts found anywhere in the world. The breathtaking valleys, mountains, and deserts you will study in this course reveal wonders that rival anything we know of the ancient world. Travel with us to a lost and splendorous past - a fountainhead of civilization that speaks unforgettably of human striving, vision, and the indomitable will to endure.Listening Length: 11 hours and 54 minutes

    Assuming no knowledge on the part of the reader, it shows how to interpret the information on the inscriptions in a step-by-step journey through the script and language of ancient Egypt.We enter the world of the ancient Egyptians and explore their views on life and death, Egypt and the outside world, humanity and the divine. The book draws on texts found on some thirty artifacts ranging from coffins to stelae to obelisks found in museums in Egypt, America, and Europe, and selected across two thousand years. The texts are then explained clearly, and are supported by full translations, photographs, and line drawings.

    Anthropology, archaeology, art and architecture are all ways of making, and all are dedicated to exploring the conditions and potentials of human life. In this exciting book, Tim Ingold ties the four disciplines together in a way that has never been attempted before. In a radical departure from conventional studies that treat art and architecture as compendia of objects for analysis, Ingold proposes an anthropology and archaeology not of but with art and architecture. He advocates a way of thinking through making in which sentient practitioners and active materials continually answer to, or 'correspond', with one another in the generation of form.Making offers a series of profound reflections on what it means to create things, on materials and form, the meaning of design, landscape perception, animate life, personal knowledge and the work of the hand. It draws on examples and experiments ranging from prehistoric stone tool-making to the building of medieval cathedrals, from round mounds to monuments, from flying kites to winding string, from drawing to writing. The book will appeal to students and practitioners alike, with interests in social and cultural anthropology, archaeology, architecture, art and design, visual studies and material culture.

    Hidden in Nefertiti's tomb is a bundle of papyrus sheaves. Although badly decayed, the documents have survived well enough to tell an epic tale of war, murder and treachery...Thuya is a woman who craves greatness. Her son, Aye, is a man who will stop at nothing to attain it. Together they will concoct a scheme so monumental in its scope that it will mould the reigns of Egypt's kings and rewrite the future of the known world.The Maya Papyrus is populated with some of the most extraordinary characters in history: Tutankhamun, the boy king; Akhenaten, the deformed tyrant; Akhenaten's queen, Nefertiti, whose beauty remains legendary three millennia later.Who among them can stand against a man willing to risk everything to achieve immortality?

    Combining more than four decades of his own research with Native Hawaiian oral traditions and the evidence of archaeology, Kirch puts a human face on the gradual rise to power of the Hawaiian god-kings, who by the late eighteenth century were locked in a series of wars for ultimate control of the entire archipelago.This lively, accessible chronicle works back from Captain James Cook’s encounter with the pristine kingdom in 1778, when the British explorers encountered an island civilization governed by rulers who could not be gazed upon by common people. Interweaving anecdotes from his own widespread travel and extensive archaeological investigations into the broader historical narrative, Kirch shows how the early Polynesian settlers of Hawai'i adapted to this new island landscape and created highly productive agricultural systems.

    Famed archaeologist John Romer draws on a lifetime of research to tell one history's greatest stories; how, over more than a thousand years, a society of farmers created a rich, vivid world where one of the most astounding of all human-made landmarks, the Great Pyramid, was built. Immersing the reader in the Egypt of the past, Romer examines and challenges the long-held theories about what archaeological finds mean and what stories they tell about how the Egyptians lived. More than just an account of one of the most fascinating periods of history, this engrossing book asks readers to take a step back and question what they've learned about Egypt in the past. Fans of Stacy Schiff's Cleopatra and history buffs will be captivated by this re-telling of Egyptian history, written by one of the top Egyptologists in the world.

    Special attention is paid to the archaeology of Jerusalem and the Second Temple period, in the time of Herod the Great and Jesus. For each period, the book offers a historical background for the Mediterranean world and the ancient Near East, as well as the events in Palestine. Major sites such as Masada, Caesarea Maritima and Petra are examined in archaeological and historical detail, along with the material culture – coins, pottery, glass and stone vessels – of each period. This book provides a thorough overview of the archaeology of this historically vibrant part of the world.

    Stonehenge A striking and original interpretation of the awesome Stone Age site from one of the world's foremost archaeologists on death and burial Full description

    But paleolithic cave paintings, stunning as they are, form just a part of a story that begins with the arrival of the first humans to Europe 1.3 million years ago, and culminates in the achievements of Greece and Rome.In Europe before Rome, T. Douglas Price takes readers on a guided tour through dozens of the most important prehistoric sites on the continent, from very recent discoveries to some of the most famous and puzzling places in the world, like Chauvet, Stonehenge, and Knossos. This volume focuses on more than 60 sites, organized chronologically according to their archaeological time period and accompanied by 200 illustrations, including numerous color photographs, maps, and drawings. Our understanding of prehistoric European archaeology has been almost completely rewritten in the last 25 years with a series of major findings from virtually every time period, such as Otzi the Iceman, the discoveries at Atapuerca, and evidence of a much earlier eruption at Mt. Vesuvius. Many of the sites explored in the book offer the earliest European evidence we have of the typical features of human society--tool making, hunting, cooking, burial practices, agriculture, and warfare. Introductory prologues to each chapter provide context for the wider changes in human behavior and society in the time period, while the author's concluding remarks offer expert reflections on the enduring significance of these places.Tracing the evolution of human society in Europe across more than a million years, Europe before Rome gives readers a vivid portrait of life for prehistoric man and woman.

    

    Believed to have been created by lost technology, it is quickly determined by a team of archeologists to be the centerpiece of Eden, a once illustrious civilization and the cradle of mankind. But what if Eden is not the Paradise texts make it out to be? What if it held dark secrets and unholy terrors instead? As Senior Archeologist Alyssa Moore and her team of experts discover the truth of man’s beginning, she realizes that the secrets of man’s true origins lie within the sacred tombs inside the temple. But the journey for the truth is not without its dangers or pitfalls . . . Something walks the warrens within.

    Celestial Geometry explores the remarkable achievements of ancient astronomers at over 60 archaeological sites, from European stone circles like Stonehenge to the pyramids of Egypt and Central America, the medicine wheels of North America, the carved monoliths of Easter Island, and lesser-known structures like the sun clock of Goseck. Combining myths and legends with modern science, this beautifully illustrated book is a profoundly illuminating celebration of human curiosity, creativity, and astounding achievements.

    Including material hitherto unpublished from recent excavations, the articles are organised thematically using evidence from archaeology, texts and the natural sciences. This broad treatment will also make the volume of interest to students looking for comparative data in allied subjects such as ancient literature and early religions.Providing an authoritative, comprehensive and up to date overview of the Sumerian period written by some of the best qualified scholars in the field, The Sumerian World will satisfy students, researchers, academics, and the knowledgeable layperson wishing to understand the world of southern Mesopotamia in the third millennium.

    From this, objects including swords, daggers, pins and quern (corn-grinding) stones were broken, placed into the dark waters and left.Whether sat by the fire with your Kindle, on the bus with your smart phone, or studying with your laptop, the bite-sized chapters of 'Flag Fen: A Concise Archæoguide' will take you through the story of this remarkable site, and inspire further curiosity for Britain's prehistoric past.Chapters include: The Discovery of Flag Fen; The Platform; The Finds; The Religious Ceremonies; Wood, Wheels and Status; The Sophistication of Ancient Technology; and Flag Fen and the Public.(Note: Not to be confused with the author's other excellent books on this subject - this is a stand alone digital edition)

    Christoph Baumer's ambitious four-volume treatment of the region charts the 3000-year drama of Scythians and Sarmatians; Soviets and transcontinental Silk Roads; trade routes and the transmission of ideas across the steppes; and the breathless and brutal conquests of Alexander the Great and Chinghiz Khan.Masterfully interweaving the stories of individuals and peoples, the author's engaging prose is richly augmented throughout by color photographs taken on his own travels. For all the complexity of the history, Dr. Baumer, a noted authority on Central Asia, never loses sight of the sweeping grandeur of its overall setting.Volume 1 focuses on the geography of the area now occupied by present-day Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, northern Afghanistan, western and central Mongolia and parts of southern Russia and northern China. Discussing the changing climates of the Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Ages, the author explores subjects as diverse as glacial retreat; the invention of the wheel; the legendary Cimmerians and Amazons; Hellenism and Zoroastrianism; and the Oxus Treasure. Future volumes will explore the later historical periods of the region.

    Clements Center for Southwest Studies, Southern Methodist University.The Pueblo Revolt of 1680 is the most renowned colonial uprisings in the history of the American Southwest. Traditional text-based accounts tend to focus on the revolt and the Spaniards' reconquest in 1692—completely skipping over the years of indigenous independence that occurred in between. Revolt boldly breaks out of this mold and examines the aftermath of the uprising in colonial New Mexico, focusing on the radical changes it instigated in Pueblo culture and society.In addition to being the first book-length history of the revolt that incorporates archaeological evidence as a primary source of data, this volume is one of a kind in its attempt to put these events into the larger context of Native American cultural revitalization. Despite the fact that the only surviving records of the revolt were written by Spanish witnesses and contain certain biases, author Matthew Liebmann finds unique ways to bring a fresh perspective to Revolt.Most notably, he uses his hands-on experience at Ancestral Pueblo archaeological sites—four Pueblo villages constructed between 1680 and 1696 in the Jemez province of New Mexico—to provide an understanding of this period that other treatments have yet to accomplish. By analyzing ceramics, architecture, and rock art of the Pueblo Revolt era, he sheds new light on a period often portrayed as one of unvarying degradation and dissention among Pueblos. A compelling read, Revolt's "blood-and-thunder" story successfully ties together archaeology, history, and ethnohistory to add a new dimension to this uprising and its aftermath.

    Derived from one or more Mediterranean prototypes, they were used by Germanic peoples to write different kinds of Germanic language, principally Anglo-Saxon and the various Scandinavian idioms, and were carved into stone, wood, bone, metal, and other hard surfaces; types of inscription range from memorials to the dead, through Christian prayers and everyday messages to crude graffiti. First reliably attested in the second century AD, runes were in due course supplanted by the roman alphabet, though in Anglo-Saxon England they continued in use until the early eleventh century, in Scandinavia until the fifteenth (and later still in one or two outlying areas). This book provides an accessible, general account of runes and runic writing from their inception to their final demise. It also covers modern uses of runes, and deals with such topics as encoded texts, rune names, how runic inscriptions were made, runological method, and the history of runic research. A final chapter explains where those keen to see runic inscriptions can most easily find them. Professor Michael P. Barnes is Emeritus Professor of Scandinavian Studies, University College London.

    It is divided into sections on how the Romans collected water and fuel, milled flour, and produced thread; how they cleaned the house, illuminated it, did the washing up, cleaned their clothes, got rid of waste water and sewage, and threw out their garbage. The evidence is taken from literary, archaeological, and artistic sources, and often compared to historical or modern parallels from communities using the same methods.

    1200 BCE), the last ruling descendent of Ramesses the Great, and one of only two female monarchs buried in Egypt's renowned Valley of the Kings. Though mentioned even in Homer as the pharaoh of Egypt who interacted with Helen at the time of the Trojan War, she has long remained a figure shrouded in mystery, hardly known even by many Egyptologists. Nevertheless, recent archaeological discoveries have illuminated Tausret's importance, her accomplishments, and the extent of her influence. Tausret: Forgotten Queen and Pharaoh of Egypt combines distinguished scholars whose research and excavations have increased our understanding of the life and reign of this great woman. This lavishly illustrated book utilizes recent discoveries to correctly position Tausret alongside famous ruling queens such as Hatshepsut and Cleopatra, figures who have long dominated our view of the female monarchs of ancient Egypt. Tausret brings together archaeological, historical, women's studies, and other approaches to provide a scholarly yet accessible volume that will be an important contribution to the literature of Egyptology -- and one with appeal to both scholars and anyone with an interest in ancient Egypt culture.

    Modern understandings of religion emerged out of a specifically Western genealogy, and recognizing this, many anthropologists have become deeply suspicious of claims that such understandings can be applied with fidelity to premodern or non-Western contexts. And yet, archaeologists now write about religion and ritual with greater ease than ever, even though their deeply premodern and fully non-Western objects of study would seem to make the use of these concepts especially fraught.In this probing study, Severin Fowles challenges us to consider just what is at stake in archaeological reconstructions of an enchanted past. Focusing on the Ancestral Pueblo societies of the American Southwest, he provocatively argues that the Pueblos prior to missionization did not have a religion at all, but rather something else, something glossed in the indigenous vernacular as doings. Fowles then outlines a new archaeology of doings that takes us far beyond the familiar terrain of premodern religion."

    The bones of several other individuals soon emerged from the peat bog. It would be determined that the human remains uncovered at Windover were between 7,000 and 8,000 years old, making them 3,200 years older than King Tutankhamen and 2,000 years older than the Great Pyramids of Egypt. This was just the beginning of an archaeological adventure that continues today.“Windover is truly a unique site that continues to astonish. Dr. Wentz does a wonderful job of telling the two stories of Windover. One is the story of the people who lived in the area and are buried in the pond. The other story introduces you to the amazing people and circumstances which made the excavation possible. From its discovery by a backhoe operator and a concerned and interested landowner to the crew who worked on the project, Wentz effectively captures the stories of a fascinating archaeological discovery.”

    Less well known, but equally impressive, are the rare and ancient images of people, animals, and landscapes made by the Egyptians who lived prior to the age of the pharaohs, when the formal conventions of Egyptian art had not yet fully evolved. With illustrations of more than 180 objects created from about 4000 to 2650 BC, Dawn of Egyptian Art presents the art forms and iconography in which the early Egyptians recorded their beliefs about the land where they lived, the yearly events that took place there, and what they thought was important to the eternal survival of their world. Comprehensive texts explore the origins and early development of the culture of ancient Egypt while discussing the relationship between image and writing as well as the representation of the self and the universe.

    an elegant summary of complex theory, and synthesis of an impressive body of material. It will be eagerly read by current and future generations of archaeologists, and will demonstrate the significance of historical archaeology to a much wider scholarly audience.- Dr Kate Giles, University of York. The aim of this book is to explore how medieval life was actually lived - how people were born and grew old, how they dressed, how they inhabited their homes, the rituals that gave meaning to their lives and how they prepared for death and the afterlife. Its fresh and original approach uses archaeological evidence to reconstruct the material practices of medieval life, death and the afterlife. Previous historical studies of the medieval -lifecycle- begin with birth and end with death. Here, in contrast, the concept of life course theory is developed for the first time in a detailed archaeological case study. The author argues that medieval Christian understanding of the -life course- commenced with conception and extended through the entirety of life, to include death and the afterlife. Five thematic case studies present the archaeology of medieval England (c.1050-1540 CE) in terms of the body, the household, the parish church and cemetery, and the relationship between the lives of people and objects. A wide range of sources is critically employed: osteology, costume, material culture, iconography and evidence excavated from houses, churches and cemeteries in the medieval English town and countryside. Medieval Life reveals the intimate and everyday relations between age groups, between the living and the dead, and between people and things. Roberta Gilchrist is Professor of Archaeology at the University of Reading.

    Yet often these groups have little input to archaeological research, and its results remain inaccessible. As archaeologists consider the consequences and benefits of research, the skills, methodologies, and practices required of them will differ dramatically from those of past decades.As an archaeologist and a Native American, Sonya Atalay has investigated the rewards and complex challenges of conducting research in partnership with indigenous and local communities. In Community-Based Archaeology, she outlines the principles of community-based participatory research and demonstrates how CBPR can be effectively applied to archaeology. Drawing on her own experiences with research projects in North America and the Near East, Atalay provides theoretical discussions along with practical examples of establishing and developing collaborative relationships and sharing results. This book will contribute to building an archaeology that is engaged, ethical, relevant, and sustainable.

    Mosaic pavements with geometric and figural motifs first appeared in Greece at the end of the fifth century BC and subsequently spread throughout the entire classical world, from the palaces of the Greco-Bactrian rulers of present-day Afghanistan to the villas of Roman Britain. Local workshops cultivated many distinctive regional styles, while traveling teams of Hellenistic craftsmen produced figural mosaics of stunning refinement, often modeled after famous paintings; indeed, their work constitutes one of our only records of classical Greek painting, which has been almost entirely lost.The styles and techniques of the ancient mosaicist’s art are given a concise yet authoritative exposition in the first part of this handsome volume. The second, and larger, part conducts the reader on a chronological tour of the most important centers of the art form’s development, from the Macedonian capital of Pella, whose compositions in natural pebbles set a high artistic standard for mosaics at the very beginning of their history, to the Basilica of San Vitale at Ravenna, whose wall and vault mosaics, with their glittering vision of a triumphant Christianity, mark the transition between antiquity and the Middle Ages. Special attention is given to Pompeii and its surroundings, where the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79 preserved intact an astonishing variety of mosaics, including such ambitious figural scenes as the famous Alexander mosaic, composed of some four million miniscule tesserae, as well as characteristically Roman pavements in black and white, and the brightly colored wall mosaics of garden grottoes.Featuring more than two hundred newly commissioned photographs, Greek and Roman Mosaics is the first survey of its subject to be illustrated in full color. It will be a necessary addition to every art lover’s library, and a worthy companion to Abbeville’s Italian Mosaics: 300–1300.

    By 15,000 BC, humans had migratedfrom northeastern Asia across the frozen Beringland bridge to the Americas. When the world warmed up and the last Ice Age came to an end,the Bering Strait refilled with water, dividing America from Eurasia. This division—with two great populations on Earth, each unaware of theater—continued until Christopher Columbus voyaged to the New World in the fifteenth century.The Great Divide compares the development of human kind in the Old World and the New between 15,000 BC and AD 1500. Watson identifies three major differences between the two worlds—climate, domesticable mammals, and hallucinogenic plants—that combined to produce very different trajectories of civilization in the two hemispheres. Combining the most up-to-date knowledge in archaeology, anthropology, geology, meteorology, cosmology, and mythology, this unprecedented, masterful study offers uniquely revealing insight into what it means to be human.

    Shapwick lies in the middle of Somerset, next to the important monastic centre of Glastonbury: the abbey owned the manor for 800 years from the 8th to the 16th century and its abbots and officials had a great influence on the lives of the peasants who lived there. It is possible that abbot Dunstan, one of the great reformers of tenth century monasticism directed the planning of the village. The Shapwick Project examined the development and history of an English parish and village over a ten thousand-year period. This was a truly multi-disciplinary project. Not only were a battery of archaeological and historical techniques explored - such as field walking, test-pitting, archaeological excavation, aerial reconnaissance, documentary research and cartographic analysis - but numerous other techniques such as building analysis, dendrochronological dating and soil analysis were undertaken on a large scale. The result is a fascinating study about how the community lived and prospered in Shapwick. In addition we learn how a group of enthusiastic and dedicated scholars unravelled this story. As such there is much here to inspire and enthuse others who might want to embark on a landscape study of a parish or village area. Seven of the ten chapters begin with a fictional vignette to bring the story of the village to life. Text-boxes elucidate re-occurring themes and techniques. Extensively illustrated in colour including 100 full page images. This title was the winner of the 2014 British Archaeological Association's Best Archaeological Book Award.

    A must-read for anyone interested in the origin and evolution of aggression and violence in human societies.”—Debra L. Martin, University of Nevada “In this exciting new work, Dr. Tung provides the first comprehensive view of life and the bodies inside ancient Peru’s Wari Empire. Situating the study of archaeological human remains where bioarchaeology and the contemporary archaeology intersect, Tung focuses on the lived experience of Wari inhabitants to explore the creation of bioarchaeological narratives, the ways that bodies become material culture, and the influence of imperial control.”—Christina Torres-Rouff, Colorado College The Wari Empire thrived in the Peruvian Andes between AD 600 and 1000. This study of human skeletons reveals the biological and social impact of Wari imperialism on people’s lives, particularly its effects on community organization and frequency of violence of both ruling elites and subjects.The Wari state was one of the first politically centralized civilizations in the New World that expanded dramatically as a product of its economic and military might. Tiffiny Tung reveals that Wari political and military elites promoted and valorized aggressive actions, such as the abduction of men, women, and children from foreign settlements. Captive men and children were sacrificed, dismembered, and transformed into trophy heads, while non-local women received different treatment relative to the men and children.?By inspecting bioarchaeological data from skeletons and ancient DNA, as well as archaeological data, Tung provides a better understanding of how the empire’s practices affected human communities, particularly in terms of age/sex structure, mortuary treatment, use of violence, and ritual processes associated with power and bodies. Tiffiny A. Tung is associate professor of anthropology at Vanderbilt University. A volume in the series Bioarchaeological Interpretations of the Human Past: Local, Regional, and Global Perspectives, edited by Clark Spencer Larsen

    Some works are well known, particularly the magnificent gold and garnet regalia from Sutton Hoo, but this represents only a fraction even of the surviving work, and much more has been lost. This book is the first to look at the goldsmiths' products through the eyes of both a specialist in the period and a practical craftsman, combining close examination of the surface and structure of the objects with analysis of inscriptions and evidence for design, and with literary and visual sources of evidence for smiths and their work. Archaeological and documentary evidence for workshops, tools and working processes is also assessed, and up-to-date technical information on materials and techniques is juxtaposed with new practical research to throw light on manufacturing and decorative processes, and, more widely, to give a fresh idea of the position of the goldsmith in his society. Dr ELIZABETH COATSWORTH is Senior Lecturer in the Department of History of Art and Design, Manchester Metropolitan University; Dr MICHAEL PINDER is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Architecture, Landscape and 3DD, at the same university.

    Steven Collins felt pulled in different directions when it came to apparent conflicts between the Bible and scholarly research and theory—an intellectual crisis that inspired him to lay it all on the line as he set off to locate the lost city of Sodom. Recounting Dr. Collins’s quest for Sodom in absorbing detail, this adventure-cum-memoir reflects the tensions that define biblical archaeology as it narrates a tale of discovery. Readers follow “Dr. C” as he tracks down biblical, archaeological, and geographical clues to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, narrowing the list of possible sites as he weighs evidence and battles skeptics. Finally, he arrives at a single location that looms as the only option: a massive ancient ruin called Tall el-Hammam in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Many scholars who were initially opposed to Dr. Collins’s theory now concede that history books may need to be rewritten in light of his groundbreaking discovery. It—along with several other recent finds—is challenging the assumptions of academics and asserting a new voice in the controversy of biblical archaeology and the dispute over using the Bible as a credible historical source.***From respected archaeologist Dr. Steven Collins and award-winning author Dr. Latayne C. Scott comes the fascinating, true account of the frustrating search and exciting excavation of the city the Bible calls Sodom, which scholars and others had “misplaced” for hundreds of years. Like many modern-day Christians, Dr. Collins struggled with what seemed to be a clash between his heritage of belief in the Bible and the research regarding ancient history and human evolution. This crisis of faith led him to embark on a quest to put both his archaeological education and the Bible to the test by seeking out the lost ancient city, an expedition that has led to one of the most exciting finds in recent archaeology. Challenging the assumptions of academics around the world, Discovering the City of Sodom may well inspire a revision of the history books. Dr. Collins has become a new voice in the controversy over using the Bible as a credible source of understanding the past—and opened a new chapter in the struggle over the soul of biblical archaeology.

    Richard Morris brilliantly weaves a series of interconnecting studies of apparently unrelated things and periods that are normally considered in isolation. In the process he re-examines aspects of England's story from the end of the last glacial period 12,500 years ago to the present, touching upon such things as Britain's apparent emptiness for long stretches of deep prehistory, battlefields, and the human element of the Industrial Revolution. Morris not only describes the evolution of archaeology's craft but also explores an awakening curiosity and an open embrace of the mystery of the identity of the early inhabitants of our land, who have disappeared and left little trace of themselves but were more like us than we think. Combining the personal with the academic, amalgamating literature and myth with science, and reflecting on how and why archaeology goes about its business, the result is a fresh account of who we are and our relationship with Nature. 'Humanity's achievement', writes Morris, 'is to be the one animal out of one and a half million currently living on the planet to have discovered this story; its weakness is to suppose itself to be the story's subject'. TIME'S ANVIL challenges some popular assumptions of history, such as Domesday Book's comprehensiveness or the Romans as civilising colonists. The threads come seamlessly together a mile from where the book began, at the graveside of Cardinal Newman. The result is provocative, compelling and salutary.

    The study of the cap-figures and their symbolism yields an outstanding contribution to the uniqueness of Majapahit culture.

    Although, as the title indicates, the focus is upon archaeological investigations of ritual and religion, by necessity ideas and evidence from other disciplines are also included, among them anthropology, ethnography, religious studies, and history. The Handbook covers a global span - Africa, Asia, Australasia, Europe, and the Americas - and reaches from the earliest prehistory (the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic) to modern times. In addition, chapters focus upon relevant themes, ranging from landscape to death, from taboo to water, from gender to rites of passage, from ritual to fasting and feasting. Written by over sixty specialists, renowned in their respective fields, the Handbook presents the very best in current scholarship, and will serve both as a comprehensive introduction to its subject and as a stimulus to further research.

    Yet is has been all but fogotten. This book puts Northumbria back in its rightful place, at the heart of British history. From the impregnable fastness of Bamburgh Castle, the kings of Northumbria rules a vast area, and held sway as High Kings of Britain. From the tidal island of Lindisfarne, extraordinary saints and learned scholars brough Christianity and civilisation to the rest of the country. Now, thanks to the ongoing work of a dedicated team of archaeologists this story is slowly being brought to light. The excavations at Bamburgh Castle have revealed a society of unsuspected sophistication and elegance, capable of creating swords and jewellery unparalleled before or since, and the works of art and devotion that still fill the beholder with wonder.

    This series includes an age appropriate (grades 3-5) introduction to curriculum-relevant subjects and a robust resource section that encourages independent study. Millions of years ago, Earth was populated by animals unlike any that we know today. The only way to learn anything about these extinct species is to study the remains they have left behind in Earth's rocks and soil.

    Building on a solid methodological foundation, we are served theoretical perspectives that are unusually rich and nuanced in their application to the case studies. This collection of case studies is a valuable contribution to the bioarchaeological literature.”—George Armelagos, Emory UniversityViolence has played an essential role in human social relations. Violence and conflict often have the ability to unite, create stability, and be a productive force while at the same time generating the antithesis of these positive influences. Previous perspectives on the subject have been narrowly conceived, and this volume aims to broaden theoretical paradigms within violence studies.The Bioarchaeology of Violence provokes readers to imagine acts of violence not as a necessary evil or an abhorrent behavior but rather as a response to certain problems. It provides different ways to think about the relationship between violence and lived experience, and lived experience and cultural processes. Experts on a wide range of ancient societies describe how violence can become ritualized over time, describe why and how certain forms of violence emerge, and explore both the costs and the benefits of violence throughout human prehistory. The contributors ultimately aim to explain why violence persists in the world today and offer insights into the factors that can disrupt and transform violence into less deadly activities.A volume in the series Bioarchaeological Interpretations of the Human Past: Local, Regional, and Global Perspectives, edited by Clark Spencer Larsen

    In this book, she offers a radically new interpretation of two medieval Icelandic tales, known as the Vinland sagas. She contends that they are the first known European narratives about contact with North America. After carefully explaining the evidence for that conclusion, Kolodny examines what happened after 1837, when English translations of the two sagas became widely available and enormously popular in the United States. She assesses their impact on literature, immigration policy, and concepts of masculinity.Kolodny considers what the sagas reveal about the Native peoples encountered by the Norse in Vinland around the year A.D. 1000, and she recovers Native American stories of first contacts with Europeans, including one that has never before been shared outside of Native communities. These stories contradict the dominant narrative of "first contact" between Europeans and the New World. Kolodny rethinks the lingering power of a mythic American Viking heritage and the long-standing debate over whether Leif Eiriksson or Christopher Columbus should be credited as the first discoverer. With this paradigm-shattering work, Kolodny shows what literary criticism can bring to historical and social scientific endeavors.Annette Kolodny is College of Humanities Professor Emerita of American Literature and Culture at the University of Arizona. She is the author of Failing the Future: A Dean Looks at Higher Education in the Twenty-first Century and the editor of The Life and Traditions of the Red Man, by Joseph Nicolar, both also published by Duke University Press. In addition, she is the author of The Land Before Her: Fantasy and Experience of the American Frontiers, 1630–1860, and The Lay of the Land: Metaphor as Experience and History in American Life and Letters. "Having long argued that English-language texts alone provide an inadequate understanding of frontier history, Annette Kolodny now challenges the Eurocentric assumptions involved in what constitutes a 'literary' source. She makes the case that North American literary history begins not with the European exploration narratives customarily taken as its start, but with 'contact texts' culled from the pictographic materials of tribes in the Algonquian-speaking Wabanaki Confederacy and from the Norse sagas with which she suggests they intersect. Kolodny's sophisticated understanding of the theoretical implications of her findings, her meticulous and fair attention to previous scholarship, and her indefatigable and innovative efforts to mine material that has not previously figured prominently in these conversations result in a book that is exciting, fresh, and more ambitious and synthetic than any previous effort to explore contact narratives."—Shelley Fisher Fishkin, Joseph S. Atha Professor of Humanities and Director of the American Studies Program, Stanford University"In Search of First Contact contributes a great deal to scholarly knowledge of the Vinland narratives. Annette Kolodny explains what those stories help us to comprehend about the indigenous peoples of the northern Atlantic coast, and she illuminates the process by which people in Anglo-America have come to understand their own history on this continent. Her exposition of the sagas is absolutely superb. This is an outstanding and important work."—Robert Warrior, Director of the American Indian Studies Program, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and author of The People and the Word: Reading Native Nonfiction."In Search of First Contact is a tour de force. In this masterful exploration of the Anglo-American fascination with Vikings in North America, Annette Kolodny unravels the mythology around Viking contact with the continent and explains how it has inspired Americans' search for their roots, been used politically, and served to set newcomers apart from the inhabitants already here. She brings a penetrating perspective to bear on the notion of first contact and what it might have meant both to Native Americans and to the Norse. This brilliantly written book is bound to become a classic."—Birgitta Linderoth Wallace, archaeologist and author of Westward Vikings: The Saga of L'Anse aux Meadows.

    Death waits in shadows as slavers make their way through East Africa's Great Rift Valley. They attack a group of young warriors who strike back. Six centuries later, a team, led by archaeologists Allan Cline and Christopher Ward, is exploring caves in the very region. Mesmerized by 50,000-year-old-artefacts, they stumble into a strange land and find themselves among the Ashais people who protect a strange bird and world-changing secrets. The archaeologists have a compelling story to tell, truths that upend written history and challenge beliefs about the very genesis of humankind. The people sense danger and take preemptive action to protect their secrets and way of life. The archaeologists feel the weight of centuries of betrayal and brutality that shatters lives.“An epic tale of an ancient civilization confronting the present…explorers are torn between their respect and reverence for the land they’ve discovered and the potential cures they could bring back to the world, transforming this fast-paced adventure story into a much deeper and more complicated tale…A unique, engaging story of star-crossed love, history and mythical magic.”—Kirkus Reviews.“A dynamic story that echoes classic time-and-space travel odysseys...it grips readers with its focus on the dilemma of imperiled explorers and star-crossed lovers, and the contrastingly serene, enviable lives of the Ashais...Readers will no doubt be enchanted by Drayton’s atmospheric descriptions of the magical world of Ashaise.”—ForeWord Clarion Reviews."A beautifully written tale of what was, what could have been, and what could still be! Set in a land outside time, it deals with all of mankind’s frailties and strengths. It’s also a beautiful love story. This book has an intricate storyline with well-developed characters. It’s the first book I have ever read where the main characters were African/African American. I was so impressed with the attention to detail, supported by authentic research showing that many of us have badly pre-conceived notions of what civilization really is and where it started. It bumped up my curiosity to learn more about these ancient civilizations and I am amazed at what I have found. Worth every penny and I strongly recommend it!" - Thora Dorn."Plenty of action throughout to keep the reader interested. Perfect amount of twists and turns you don't expect. Pleasantly surprised at ending. A must read to the the end. No skipping pages, reader will miss out. One more P. Passion driven to the end. Will look for more from this author." - Autumn27Zoeyon.

    Grauer, Loyola University, Chicago"The populational approach to bioarchaeology tends to be monochrome in its efforts to answer broader research-oriented questions. This volume splashes the past with color through a select group of individuals who actually experienced it."--Margaret A. Judd, University of PittsburghFrom Bronze Age Thailand to Viking Iceland, from an Egyptian oasis to a family farm in Canada, The Bioarchaeology of Individuals invites readers to unearth the daily lives of people throughout history. Covering a span of more than four thousand years of human history and focusing on individuals who lived between 3200 BC and the nineteenth century, the essays in this book examine the lives of nomads, warriors, artisans, farmers, and healers.     The contributors employ a wide range of tools, including traditional macroscopic skeletal analysis, bone chemistry, ancient DNA, grave contexts, and local legends, sagas, and other historical information. The collection as a whole presents a series of osteobiographies--profiles of the lives of specific individuals whose remains were excavated from archaeological sites. The result offers a more "personal" approach to mortuary archaeology; this is a book about people--not just bones.

    Though the emphasis is on prehispanic societies, this Handbook also includes coverage of important new work by archaeologists on the Colonial and Republican periods. Unique among recent works, the text brings together in a single volume article-length regional syntheses and topical overviews written by active scholars in the field of Mesoamerican archaeology.The first section of the Handbook provides an overview of recent history and trends of Mesoamerica and articles on national archaeology programs and practice in Central America and Mexico written by archaeologists from these countries. These are followed by regional syntheses organized by time period, beginning with early hunter-gatherer societies and the first farmers of Mesoamerica and concluding with a discussion of the Spanish Conquest and frontiers and peripheries of Mesoamerica. Topical and comparative articles comprise the remainder of Handbook. They cover important dimensions of prehispanic societies--from ecology, economy, and environment to social and political relations--and discuss significant methodological contributions, such as geo-chemical source studies, as well as new theories and diverse theoretical perspectives. The Handbook concludes with a section on the archaeology of the Spanish conquest and the Colonial and Republican periods to connect the prehispanic, proto-historic, and historic periods. This volume will be a must-read for students and professional archaeologists, as well as other scholars including historians, art historians, geographers, and ethnographers with an interest in Mesoamerica.

    Textiles express who we are - our gender, age, family affiliation, occupation, religion, ethnicity and social, political, economic and legal status. Besides expressing our identity, textiles protect us from the harsh conditions of the environment, whether as clothes or shelter. We use them at birth for swaddling, in illness as bandages and at death as shrouds. We use them to carry and contain people and things. We use them for subsistence to catch fish and animals and for transport as sails. In fact, textiles represent one of the earliest human craft technologies and they have always been a fundamental part of subsistence, economy and exchange. Textiles have an enormous potential in archaeological research to inform us of social, chronological and cultural aspects of ancient societies. In archaeology, the study of textiles is often relegated to the marginalized zone of specialist and specialized subject and lack of dialogue between textile researchers and scholars in other fields means that as a resource, textiles are not used to their full potential or integrated into the overall interpretation of a particular site or broader aspects of human activity. Textiles and Textile Production in Europe is a major new survey that aims to redress this. Twenty-three chapters collect and systematize essential information on textiles and textile production from sixteen European countries, resulting in an up-to-date and detailed sourcebook and an easily accessible overview of the development of European textile technology and economy from prehistory to AD 400. All chapters have an introduction, give the chronological and cultural background and an overview of the material in question organized chronologically and thematically. The sources of information used by the authors are primarily textiles and textile tools recovered from archaeological contexts. In addition, other evidence for the study of ancient textile production, ranging from iconography to written sources to palaeobotanical and archaeozoological remains are included. The introduction gives a summary on textile preservation, analytical techniques and production sequence that provides a background for the terminology and issues discussed in the various chapters. Extensively illustrated, with over 200 color illustrations, maps, chronologies and index, this will be an essential sourcebook not just for textile researchers but also the wider archaeological community.

    But that's not unusual. Her mom's an archaeologist who often disappears into the wild-places with no indoor plumbing or connection to the Internet. An odd encounter with a ministry official offering protection sends Ana into the confusing maze of streets as she decides to find her mother herself. Instead she encounters an antiquities collector who ends up dead, a fortuneteller who knows too much, and a key to what is lost. Ana begins to suspect the secret package from her mother she carries wrapped in muslin is much more than just a clue to an ancient Nabatean treasure, the fabled Horde of the Golden Girdle. In a world where djinn play mean tricks and someone's always watching, Ana finds a friend in a boy named Gordy. Together they track tomb robbers, uncover a spy, and discover much more than gold and silver. A surprising twist may even prove to be the end for Ana, as she discovers no one is who they appear to be.

    From the Arctic south to the Mexican border and east to the Atlantic Ocean, all of the major cultural developments are covered in 53 chapters, with certain periods, places, and historical problems receiving special focus by the volume's authors. Questions like who first peopled the continent, what did it mean to have been a hunter-gatherer in the Great Basin versus the California coast, how significant were cultural exchanges between Native North Americans and Mesoamericans, and why do major historical changes seem to correspond to shifts in religion, politics, demography, and economy are brought into focus. The practice of archaeology itself is discussed as contributors wrestle with modern-day concerns with the implications of doing archaeology and its relevance for understanding ourselves today. In the end, the chapters in this book show us that the principal questions answered about human history through the archaeology of North America are central to any larger understanding of the relationships between people, cultural identities, landscapes, and the living of everyday life.

    The fabric of that network stretched and frayed as the Creek Civil War of 1813−14 pitted a faction of the Creek nation known as Red Sticks against those Creeks who supported the Creek National Council.  The war began in July 1813, when Red Stick rebels were attacked near Burnt Corn Creek by Mississippi militia and settlers from the Tensaw area in a vain attempt to keep the Red Sticks’ ammunition from reaching the main body of disaffected warriors. A retaliatory strike against a fortified settlement owned by Samuel Mims, now called Fort Mims, was a Red Stick victory.  The brutality of the assault, in which 250 people were killed, outraged the American public and “Remember Fort Mims” became a national rallying cry. During the American-British War of 1812, Americans quickly joined the war against the Red Sticks, turning the civil war into a military campaign designed to destroy Creek power. The battles of the Red Sticks have become part of Alabama and American legend and include the famous Canoe Fight, the Battle of Holy Ground, and most significantly, the Battle of Tohopeka (also known as Horseshoe Bend)—the final great battle of the war. There, an American army crushed Creek resistance and made a national hero of Andrew Jackson.New attention to material culture and documentary and archaeological records fills in details, adds new information, and helps disabuse the reader of outdated interpretations. Contributors Susan M. Abram / Kathryn E. Holland Braund/ Robert P. Collins / Gregory Evans Dowd /John E. Grenier / David S. Heidler / Jeanne T. Heidler / Ted Isham / Ove Jensen / Jay Lamar /Tom Kanon / Marianne Mills / James W. Parker / Craig T. Sheldon Jr. / Robert G. Thrower / Gregory A. Waselkov

    It also serves as a basic reference for professional archaeologists worldwide on the record of a remarkable region. The book summarizes the history of archaeological research in the Southeast, and the record of the Native American inhabitants of the Southeast, from initial colonization in the late Pleistocene to the complex societies of the late prehistoric and early European Contact period. The emphasis is on research conducted in the last two decades, and particularly in the new millennium, after A.D. 2000. The volume demonstrates that southeastern archaeology is a dynamic and exciting field to study and practice, with important contributions to make to our understanding of human prehistory, and to archaeological method and theory. The Southeast has a rich and well-documented archaeological record, useful for the exploration of big questions of interest to archaeologists, anthropologists, historians, and indeed anyone who has wondered about the past, such as how the initial colonization and settlement of the region occurred during the last glacial period; how people, once established, interacted with one another and with the biotic and physical landscape; how people in this diverse temperate forest environment developed and adopted agriculture, in one of the few centers of independent domestication anywhere on the planet; and how complex societies rose and fell over time. The objectives are to educate and to inspire, to attract new people to work in the region and in the process expand ongoing research, so that more can be done and learned. David Anderson and Kenneth Sassaman are professors at the Universities of Tennessee and Florida, respectively, and combined have more than 70 years of direct experience in southeastern archaeology, encompassing fieldwork in nearly every state in the region. Each has authored numerous technical publications, books, and monographs, many they co-authored or co-edited, and each has served as President of the Southeastern Archaeological Conference, both receiving its prestigious C.B. Moore Award for Excellence in Southeastern Archaeology by a Young Scholar in their younger years. They have served leadership roles in other national organizations, including the Society for American Archaeology and the Archaeology Division of the American Anthropological Association. The text for Recent Developments in Southeastern Archaeology brings out their deep interest and love for southeastern archaeology and archaeological research on every page.

    + 1 treasure hunter's helperp.p.s. ++ 1 treasure hunter's helper's super-snooper dogThe biggest treasure hunt in the world is about to beginEleven-year-old Arkie Sparkle's archaeologist parents have been kidnapped. With the help of her genius cousin TJ and basset hound Cleo, she must find seven treasures across the seven continents in seven days.DAY 1: Egypt A golden queen, a famous pharaoh, greedy explorers, a pair of pyramid pantsArkie Sparkle must find the first treasure in the temple of the famous Egyptian pharaoh, Ramses II. But first she has to find the temple, buried deep in the sands of the Sahara Desert.N.B. The Teachers' Notes supplied are for Books 1-7

    Written with an open mind and a determination to uncover the truth, this book contains everything we know about the ancient societies that once called America home. Perfect for the historian in anyone.

    The Caddos lived in the Southeastern Woodlands for more than 900 years beginning around A.D. 800–900, before being forced to relocate to Oklahoma in 1859. They left behind a spectacular archaeological record, including the famous Spiro Mound site in Oklahoma as well as many other mound centers, plazas, farmsteads, villages, and cemeteries.The Archaeology of the Caddo examines new advances in studying the history of the Caddo peoples, including ceramic analysis, reconstructions of settlement and regional histories of different Caddo communities, Geographic Information Systems and geophysical landscape studies at several spatial scales, the cosmological significance of mound and structure placements, and better ways to understand mortuary practices. Findings from major sites and drainages such as the Crenshaw site, mounds in the Arkansas River basin, Spiro Mound, the Oak Hill Village site, the George C. Davis site, the Willow Chute Bayou Locality, the Hughes site, Big Cypress Creek basin, and the McClelland and Joe Clark sites are also summarized and interpreted. This volume reintroduces the Caddos’ heritage, creativity, and political and religious complexity.

    This highly readable volume introduces us to the people, objects, and landscapes of Poplar Forest in the tumultuous period between the Revolution and the Civil War. Jefferson’s Poplar Forest presents a remarkably multidimensional portrait of the estate as a personal retreat, a designed landscape, a plantation, and a home and workplace for enslaved African American families.”—Lu Ann De Cunzo, University of Delaware“With their productive commitments to long-term and interdisciplinary research, the contributors draw upon the traditional themes of slavery and plantation landscapes but imbue those with new energy through incorporating the issues of ecology, identity, agency, and consumerism.”­—Douglas Sanford, University of Mary WashingtonThomas Jefferson once called his plantation Poplar Forest, “the most valuable of my possessions.” For Jefferson, Poplar Forest was a private retreat for him to escape the hoards of visitors and everyday pressures of his iconic estate, Monticello.           Jefferson’s Poplar Forest uses the knowledge gained from long-term and interdisciplinary research to explore the experiences of a wide range of people who lived and worked there between the American Revolution and the Civil War. Multiple archaeological digs reveal details about the lives of Jefferson, subsequent owners and their families, and the slaves (and descendants) who labored and toiled at the site. From the plantation house to the weeds in the garden, Barbara Heath, Jack Gary, and numerous contributors examine the landscapes of the property, investigating the relationships between the people, objects, and places of Poplar Forest. As the first book-length study of the archaeology of a president’s estate, Jefferson’s Poplar Forest offers a compelling and uniquely specific look into the lives of those who called Poplar Forest home.

    Evidence for the removal, curation and display of heads ranges from classical literary references to iconography and skeletal remains. Traditionally, this material has been associated with a Europe-wide 'head-cult', and used to support the idea of a unified Celtic culture in prehistory. This book demonstrates instead how headhunting and head-veneration were practised across a range of diverse and fragmented Iron Age societies. Using case studies from France, Britain and elsewhere, it explores the complex and subtle relationships between power, religion, warfare and violence in Iron Age Europe.

    This volume presents editions of sixty-four Jewish Aramaic incantation bowls from the Schoyen Collection, with accompanying introductions, translations, philological notes, photographs and indices, relating to the magical divorce and the wonder-working sages Hanina ben Dosa and Joshua bar Perahia."

    The book also includes unpublished material, as well as specially composed introductions to each chapter, a full biography and a select bibliography. Professor Charles Thomas CBE DL DLitt FBA FSA is a former President of the Council for British Archaeology, the Society for Medieval Archaeology, the Royal Institution of Cornwall, the Cornwall Archaeological Society and the Cornish Methodist Historical Society. He is currently the President of The John Harris Society. Edited by Chris Bond. This book is also available in a hardcover edition. Hardcover: ISBN 978 1 908878 02 1; Paperback: ISBN 978 1 908878 03 8. Published by The Cornovia Press, 2012.

    This provocative study argues that many well-documented but apparently disparate events - such as recurrent drought and famine in Egypt; mass migrations in the steppes of central Asia; and the decline in population in urban centres such as Baghdad and Constantinople - are connected and should be understood within the broad context of climate change. Drawing on a wealth of textual and archaeological evidence, Ronnie Ellenblum explores the impact of climatic and ecological change across the eastern Mediterranean in this period, to offer a new perspective on why this was a turning point in the history of the Islamic world.

    Exploration of an excavation in southeastern Turkey, Gobekli Tepe, near the city of Sanliurfa which includes a man-made complex of stone circles constructed around 10,000 BC

    Expanding the role and influence of the Babylonian city-state into an imperium that crushed its rivals and dominated the entire fertile plain of Mesopotamia, Hammurabi (who ruled c. 1792-1750 BCE) transformed a minor kingdom into the regional superpower of its age. But this energetic monarch, whose geopolitical and military strategies were unsurpassed in his time, was more than just a war-leader or empire-builder. Renowned for his visionary Code of Laws, Hammurabi's famous codex - written on a stele in Akkadian, and publicly displayed so that all citizens could read it - pioneered a new kind of lawmaking. The Code's 282 specific legal injunctions, alleged to have been divinely granted by the god Marduk, remain influential to this day, and offer the historian fascinating parallels with the biblical Ten Commandments. Dominique Charpin is one of the most distinguished modern scholars of ancient Babylon.In this fresh and engaging appraisal of one of antiquity's iconic figures, he shows that Hammurabi, while certainly one of the most able rulers in the whole of prehistory, was also responsible for pivotal developments in the history of civilization.

    Only a handful of archaeologists have studied its history or unearthed the Nubian cities, temples, and cemeteries that once dotted the landscape of southern Egypt and northern Sudan. Nubia's remote setting in the midst of an inhospitable desert, with access by river blocked by impassable rapids, has lent it not only an air of mystery, but also isolated it from exploration. Over the past century, particularly during this last generation, scholars have begun to focus more attention on the fascinating cultures of ancient Nubia, ironically prompted by the construction of large dams that have flooded vast tracts of the ancient land. This book attempts to document some of what has recently been discovered about ancient Nubia, with its remarkable history, architecture, and culture, and thereby to give us a picture of this rich, but unfamiliar, African legacy.

    1000-1600). This groundbreaking volume lifts the veil of uniformity frequently draped over these regions in the literature, providing the first comprehensive examination of Mississippi-period archaeology in the state.     Featuring contributions from some of the most prominent researchers in the field, this collection describes and synthesizes the latest data from excavations throughout Florida. In doing so, it reveals a diverse and vibrant collection of cleared-field maize farmers, part-time gardeners, hunter-gatherers, and coastal and riverine fisher/shellfish collectors who formed a distinctive part of the Mississippian southeast.

    Addressing the content, context, and interpretation of the New Testament in a faith-friendly light, Invitation to the New Testament: First Things is unique in that keeps the original social and rhetorical milieux of the New Testament in mind. An ideal textbook for college survey courses, this volume is also captivating reading for seminary students and general readers.FEATURES* Numerous dynamic color photos keep students engaged* Maps and charts provide visual overviews at a glance* Marginal definitions bring students up to speed on new concepts* Chapter-ending study questions review key ideas and encourage reflection* First-century quotations expose students to the world of the New Testament* A Closer Look boxes cover more advanced topics* An Instructor's Manual on CD (not included with book, available separately) includes PowerPoint-based lecture outlines, chapter goals and summaries, media resources, pedagogical suggestions, and key terms* A Companion Website offers all of the material from the Instructor's Manual along with self-quizzes and flashcards of key terms for students

    Highlights of the exhibition are grave goods from the burial mounds at the site of Berel and gold mortuary ornaments from Shilikty, Zhalauli, and Kargaly. Attesting to a sophisticated decorative art flourishing among these nomadic populations, the objects skillfully combine older iconographic traditions of animal style in the steppe with more recent influences from foreign cultures--most notably Persia and China.Contributors include Nursan Alimbai, Nikolay A. Bokovenko, Claudia Chang, Bryan K. Hanks, Sagynbay Myrgabayev, Karen S. Rubinson, Zainolla S. Samashev, Soren Stark, and Abdesh T. Toleubaev.Cover photograph (c) Bruce M. White, 2016

    Dan managed to live out many of the roles cast for someone born at the close of World War II. He was a coffeehouse guitar-strumming Folkie a combat engineer in Vietnam, an anti-war activist, a journalist and photographer for the “underground” press, a back-to-the-land hippie, a single father, a college professor, and a veteran plagued by Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Dan’s life story encompasses so many of the major themes of his times: the Vietnam War, the struggle for Civil Rights, women’s rights, gay liberation, and personal relationships during that unique historical moment that was “after the Pill and before HIV.” In Dan’s view, the baby boomer generation is not “all about rock-and-roll music or getting high or free love.” It was a generation born out of history’s biggest war, and dominated by one of America’s longest and most contentious wars. Dan writes, “We are not ‘peaceniks.’ We are war babies.”

    While the power to shape the landscape inevitably lay with the Crown, the nobility and the religious houses, this study also highlights the contribution of the peasantry in the layout of rural settlements and ridge-and-furrow field works, and the funding of parish churches by ordinary townsfolk. The importance of population trends is emphasised as a major factor in shaping the medieval landscape: the rising curve of the eleventh to thirteenth centuries imposing growing pressures on resources, and the devastating impact of the Black Death leading to radical decline in the fourteenth century. Opening with a broad-ranging analysis of political and economic trends in medieval England, the book progresses thematically to assess the impact of farming, rural settlement, towns, the Church, and fortification using many original case studies. The concluding chapter charts the end of the medieval landscape with the dissolution of the monasteries, the replacement of castles by country houses, the ongoing enclosure of fields, and the growth of towns.

    This book offers a radical new approach to understanding the Achaemenid Persian Empire and imperialism more generally. Through a wide array of textual, visual, and archaeological material, Elspeth R. M. Dusinberre shows how the rulers of the empire constructed a system flexible enough to provide for the needs of different peoples within the confines of a single imperial authority and highlights the variability in response. This book examines the dynamic tensions between authority and autonomy across the empire, providing a valuable new way of considering imperial structure and development.

     Summarizes the diversity of views on ancient rock art from leading international scholars Includes new discoveries and research, illustrated with over 160 images (including 30 color plates) from major rock art sites around the world Examines key work of noted authorities (e.g. Lewis-Williams, Conkey, Whitley and Clottes), and outlines new directions for rock art research Is broadly international in scope, identifying rock art from North and South America, Australia, the Pacific, Africa, India, Siberia and Europe Represents new approaches in the archaeological study of rock art, exploring issues that include gender, shamanism, landscape, identity, indigeneity, heritage and tourism, as well as technological and methodological advances in rock art analyses

    Well-informed and imbued with stories from around the globe, the book is written in a very accessible style, highlighting the author's obvious love for these boats. It is a pioneering piece of work that throws new light on an ancient Irish craft. An overview of the history of the Boyne currach and related skin boats is followed by a how-to guide with instructions on how to build your own currach, including the materials needed, where to source them, and how to master the age-old techniques of weaving and binding. With so few currach-makers left in the world, the author hopes to preserve this craft for generations to come. The final section of the book details the Newgrange Currach Project. This project is a unique attempt by the author - an expert currach-maker - to recreate the currach used by the builders of the Newgrange passage tombs. At 34 ft. long, this wicker currach represents an incredible feat of boat engineering and a piece of living history. On completion, it will embark on a journey retracing (in reverse) the voyage believed to have been made by the Neolithic tomb-builders, from Newgrange to northern Spain. *** " Gibne reveals that 'by learning how to make these boats and by visiting the homes of the men and women who had based their lives around the River Boyne, I have crafted this voyage into the story of a civilization.' Readers quickly understand that they are in the hands of an eloquent scribe as well as a master craftsman. This splendid (36-foot Newgrange Currach) project delivers a powerful cultural tribute to prehistoric people's desires and hopes to learn, explore, and better their lives in new lands." - The Celtic Connection, March 2013 *** " Gibne's relationship to the Boyne currach is akin to devotion and his charismatic and almost evangelical writing shows this throughout the book." - International Journal of Maritime History, Vol. XXV, No. 1, June 2013

    Written with an open mind and a determination to uncover the truth, this eye-opening volume revolutionizes what we know about the ancient societies that once called America home. Fascinating and informative for readers of all ages.

    . . . This is a serious deficiency in Syro-Palestinian and biblical archaeology, when one considers that the general field of archaeology has been moving toward social archaeology for 20 years or more. (Dever, "Social Structure in Palestine in the Iron Age II Period on the Eve of Destruction," in The Archaeology of Society in the Holy Land [ed. T. E. Levy, London, 1995, p. 416]).Lack of discussion of social questions has characterized the archaeology of the land of Israel for some time, even though around the world these questions constitute an important component of archaeological research (see, for instance, the work of Renfrew, Flannery, Gibbon, Blanton, Dark, Bahn, Hodder, Trigger, and many others).The Archaeology of Israelite Society in Iron Age II fills this gap and analyzes the structure of society in the ancient kingdoms of Israel and Judah from an archaeological viewpoint. It also applies models and theories from the field of social and cognitive archaeology, using the tools of various social-science disciplines (anthropology, sociology, economics, geography, and so on).Due to his ability to use what is probably the largest archaeological data set in the world--hundreds of planned excavations, thousands of salvage excavations, and extensive surveys, all from the small region that was ancient Israel--Avi Faust contributes not only to the study of ancient Israelite society but to the most fundamental questions about ancient societies. These questions include the identification of socioeconomic stratification in the archaeological record, the study of family and community organization, the significance of pottery, small finds and architecture as indicators of wealth, and more.This groundbreaking monograph is one of the first attempts at a large-scale study of Israelite society based primarily on the archaeological evidence.The following acknowledgments were inadvertently omitted from the front matter of the volume:Amihai Mazar: figure 31Amnon Ben-Tor: figures 40, 41Israel Antiquities Authority: figures 21, 24, 25, 26, 29, 30., 32, 33, 36, and Photo 5Israel Exploration Society: figures 11, 13, 15, 17, 18, 19, 27, 42Israel Finkelstein: figure 28Izhak Beit Arieh: figures 34, 35Shimon Dar: figures 22, 23The Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University: figures 7, 8The Institute of Archaeology, the Hebrew University: figures 40, 41Zeev Herzog: figures 6, 9, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20

    The religion of the Viking Age is conventionally identified through its mythology: the ambiguous character Odin, the forceful Thor, and the end of the world approaching in Ragnarök. However, pre-Christian religion consisted of so much more than mythic imagery and legends and has long lingered in folk tradition. Exploring the religion of the North through an interdisciplinary approach, the book sheds new light on a number of topics, including rituals, gender relations, social hierarchies, and interregional contacts between the Nordic tradition and the Sami and Finnish regions.

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    Rather, in both ancient and contemporary contexts, caves have served primarily as ritual spaces. In Sacred Darkness, contributors use archaeological evidence as well as ethnographic studies of modern ritual practices to envision the cave as place of spiritual and ideological power and a potent venue for ritual practice. Covering the ritual use of caves in Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa, Mesoamerica, and the US Southwest and Eastern woodlands, this book brings together case studies by prominent scholars whose research spans from the Paleolithic period to the present day. These contributions demonstrate that cave sites are as fruitful as surface contexts in promoting the understanding of both ancient and modern religious beliefs and practices. This state-of-the-art survey of ritual cave use will be one of the most valuable resources for understanding the role of caves in studies of religion, sacred landscape, or cosmology and a must-read for any archaeologist interested in caves.

    Much light has now been shed on it; although there is a lack of historical documentation, archaeology has provided new information. Surviving objects demonstrate that Scotland was part of a sophisticated network and that craftsmen had mastered complex technologies, as shown by the elaborately carved Hilton of Cadboll stone, the house-shaped Monymusk Reliquary, and the sumptuously decorated Hunterston brooch.The book argues that archaeological material surviving from this time needs to be treated on its own terms and not made to fit historical texts; and tells stories backed up by archaeological evidence under the headings Individuals/Communities/Ideas and Ideologies. It does not deconstruct previous studies of the period but rather highlights the possibilities provided by the material culture evidence.

    The authors devote extensive analysis to the common set of intellectual and political forces that shaped the study of history, from the ideas ofevolution, positivism, nationalism, historicism, and Marxism to political processes such as revolution, imperialism, and modernization. Also discussed are the impact and problems associated with the nation-state as the subject of history, the linear model of historical time, and the spatial system of nation-states. The result is a convincing study that illustrates how history has transformed into a modern academic discipline in China.

    This title details the uniforms of the Roman army and its enemies, from the first decades of tribal warfare in Italy, through the republican and imperial periods, up to the end of the eastern Roman Empire.

    And yet, archaeology reveals that Native Americans lived in the region at least 13,000 years before such European incursions. Archaeology of Minnesota tells their story—or as much as the region’s wealth of artifacts, evidence of human activity, and animal and plant remains can convey.From archaeological materials, Guy Gibbon reconstructs the social, economic, and political systems—the lifeways—of those who inhabited what we now call Minnesota for thousands of years before the first contact between native peoples and Europeans. From the boreal coniferous forests to the north, to the tall grass prairie to the west and southwest, to the deciduous forest to the east and southeast, the richly diverse land of the upper Mississippi River region, crossed and bordered by all manner of waterways, was a virtual melting pot of prehistoric cultures.Demonstrating how native cultures adapted and evolved over time, Gibbon provides an explanation that is firmly rooted in the nature of local environments. In doing so, he shows how the study of Minnesota archaeology is relevant to a broader understanding of long-term patterns of change in human development throughout the world.

    From the monumental former Reserve Bank of India, which records every step of the country's fiscal history, to the now derelict Pegu Club, which was once the favoured watering hole for officers of the British colonial government, each building has a story to tell. The buildings have survived war, natural disaster, and numerous changes of ownership. Many have been repurposed over the years. Today, the biggest threat to these buildings is neglect and lack of protection. In recent years they have become increasingly vulnerable. In 2005, when the government moved to the new capital of Naypyidaw, it abandoned many of its ministerial offices or left them only partially in use. Many were also badly damaged during Cyclone Nargis in 2008. As the country opens up to new investment and tourism, the buildings are in danger of falling prey to property developers as most occupy prime plots of land in the city centre. This book focuses on a selection of 30 key buildings and examines their past, present, and future. Piecing together the often forgotten social history of each building has involved delving into out-of-print books, company records, old city directories, newspaper archives, and people s memories. Published in both Burmese and English language editions, this book aims to contribute to the collective conversation about the social and economic potential of Yangon s colonial-era heritage in the hopes that the city s architectural past can become a vibrant and sustainable part of its future.

    The seaside land that once was home to several thousand Tequesta is now congested with roads and millions of people while skyscrapers and artificial lights dominate the landscape.            Ironically, Miami’s development both continually erases monuments and traces of indigenous people and historic pioneers yet also leads to the discovery of archaeological treasures that have lain undiscovered for centuries. In Digging Miami, Robert Carr traces the rich 11,000-year human heritage of the Miami area from the time of its first inhabitants through the arrival of European settlers and up to the early twentieth century.            Carr was Dade County’s first archaeologist, later historic preservation director, and held the position at a time when redevelopment efforts unearthed dozens of impressive archaeological sites, including the Cutler Site, discovered in 1985, and the controversial Miami Circle, found in 1998. Digging Miami presents a unique anatomy of this fascinating city, dispelling the myth that its history is merely a century old.This comprehensive synthesis of South Florida’s archaeological record will astonish readers with the depth of information available throughout an area barely above sea level. Likewise, many will be surprised to learn that modern builders, before beginning construction, must first look for signs of ancient peoples’ lives, and this search has led to the discovery of over one hundred sites within the county in recent years. In the end, we are left with the realization that Miami is more than the dream of entrepreneurs to create a tourist mecca built on top of dredged rock and sand; it is a fascinating, vibrant spot that has drawn humans to its shores for unimaginable years.

    

    It came to light in 1974 when local farmers were drilling a well. Since then, remarkable discoveries at the First Emperor's burial site have ben ongoing, revealing the wealth of China's ancient past.With contributions from leading scholars, China's Terracotta Warriors presents a panoramic view of Qin artistic, military, and administrative achievements under the powerful ruler sho proclaimed himself First Emperor of China. In addition to findings from his tomb complex, it examines the period of Chinese history preceding the First Emperor's reign (246-210 BCE) and his establishment of the Qin empire and dynasty in 221 BCE.The Qin state had been in existence for over half a millennium before the First Emperor came to the throne, and its rulers had played their parts in the evolution of a small state into a superpower. Only in recent years has that history been revealed through a series of remarkable and often accidental discoveries of tombs and burials of early Qin royals and aristocracy. In the absence of substantive and reliable written sources, it is this archaeological evidence which provides clues to Qin's rise from state to empire.China's Terracotta Warriors is published to accompany exhibitions at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco

    But in the Middle Ages intensive practical use was made of its resources: its extensive moorlands provided summer pasture for thousands of cattle from the Devon lowlands, which flowed in a seasonal tide, up in the spring and down in the autumn.  This book describes, for the first time, the social organization and farming practices associated with that annual transfer of livestock. It presents evidence for a previously unsuspected Anglo-Saxon period of transhumance, by which the cattle's lowland owners moved with their animals and lived temporarily on the moor every summer.

    This fascinating book chronicles the work of these patient scientists as they dig up the past, journeying to the top of volcanoes, beneath city streets, and within Māori pā and explorers’ huts. Sharing their discoveries—obsidian adzes, enamel cups, and the carved prow of a canoe, for example—this account narrates the remarkable, uncovered stories of Polynesian voyagers and Pākehā sealers, Māori gardeners and Chinese storekeepers. Engaging and informative, it offers great insight into the science of archaeology while encouraging readers to do some excavating of their own.