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Books > Humanities > Archaeology
The Tomb of the Priests of Amun, also known as Bab el-Gasus, was
uncovered in 1891 at Deir el-Bahari (Thebes). The site proved to be
the largest undisturbed tomb ever found in Egypt, as there were
found the intact burials of 153 individuals that lived under the
21st Dynasty (ca. 1069-945 BC). This outstanding find was
subsequently divided in lots of antiquities and dispersed by 17
nations. This volume presents the first comprehensive publication
of the Italian Lot, kept in the Egyptian Museum of Florence.
Besides the formal description of the objects, a critical
assessment of the collection is provided regarding the
reconstruction of the burial assemblages, the reuse of the burial
equipment and the art historical examination of coffin decoration.
"Although aimed primarily at specialists, this is a splendid volume
and will be easy to use by anyone having an interest in these
objects." -Lester L. Grabbe, Journal for the Study of the Old
Testament 44.5 (2020)
Egyptian Deportations of the Late Bronze Age explores the political
economy of deportations in New Kingdom Egypt (ca. 1550-1070 BCE)
from an interdisciplinary angle. The analysis of ancient Egyptian
primary source material and the international correspondence of the
time draws a comprehensive picture of the complex and far-reaching
policies. The dataset reveals their geographic scope, economic and
demographic impact in Egypt and abroad as well as their
interconnection with territorial expansion, international
relations, and labour management. The supply chain, profiting
institutions and individuals in Egypt as the well as the labour
tasks, origins and the composition of the deportees are discussed
in detail. A comparative analytical framework integrates the
Egyptian policies with a review of deportation discourses as well
as historical premodern and modern cases and enables a global and
diachronic understanding of the topic. The study is thus the first
systematic investigation of deportations in ancient Egyptian
history and offers new insights into Egyptian governance that
revise previous assessments of the role of forced migration und
unfree labour in ancient Egyptian society and their long-term
effects.
A mammoth and successful endeavour by Richard Frost, Ancient
Greece: Its Principal Gods and Minor Deities offers Greek mythology
enthusiasts a comprehensive 'who's who' dictionary for quick
reference to the myriad gods and goddesses of ancient Greece.
Produced and expanded from the author's original student notebook,
and intended primarily to aid others studying the subject, it is an
ideal companion to classical studies for both the curious and the
connoisseur.
This book discusses erotic and magical goddesses and heroines in
several ancient cultures, from the Near East and Asia, and
throughout ancient Europe; in prehistoric and early historic
iconography, their magical qualities are often indicated by a
magical dance or stance. It is a look at female display figures
both cross-culturally and cross-temporally, through texts and
iconography, beginning with figures depicted in very early
Neolithic Anatolia, early and middle Neolithic southeast
Europe--Bulgaria, Romania, and Serbia--continuing through the late
Neolithic in East Asia, and into early historic Greece, India, and
Ireland, and elsewhere across the world. These very similar female
figures were depicted in Anatolia, Europe, Southern Asia, and East
Asia, in a broad chronological sweep, beginning with the
pre-pottery Neolithic, ca. 9000 BCE, and existing from the
beginning of the second millennium of this era up to the present
era. This book demonstrates the extraordinary similarities, in a
broad geographic range, of depictions and descriptions of magical
female figures who give fertility and strength to the peoples of
their cultures by means of their magical erotic powers. This book
uniquely contains translations of texts which describe these
ancient female figures, from a multitude of Indo-European, Near
Eastern, and East Asian works, a feat only possible given the
authors' formidable combined linguistic expertise in over thirty
languages. The book contains many photographs of these
geographically different, but functionally and artistically
similar, female figures. Many current books (academic and
otherwise) explore some of the female figures the authors discuss
in their book, but such a wide-ranging cross-cultural and
cross-temporal view of this genre of female figures has never been
undertaken until now. The "sexual" display of these female figures
reflects the huge numinosity of the prehistoric divine feminine,
and of her magical genitalia. The functions of fertility and
apotropaia, which count among the functions of the early historic
display and dancing figures, grow out of this numinosity and
reflect the belief in and honoring of the powers of the ancient
divine feminine.
This illustrated book continues themes in Central European cultural
history treated elsewhere with the intention of presenting an
interdisciplinary study of early medieval socio-cultural
developments.
A continuation of the preceding books, this volume examines the
archeological evidence of the groups who settled Central Europe. It
aims to amplify the information recorded during the late Roman
Empire about societies, social dynamics and ethnological contexts
by examining their material culture. The language of significant
objects complements the literature of significant texts.
The three parts of the book inform of the historical and
archeological evidence; elaborate the socio-cultural conclusions
provided by archeology; examine the system of values as reflected
in the forms of artistic expression. The study of objects helps
clarify the contours of the Germanic populations of pre-Carolingian
Central Europe.
Environment and human habitation have become principal topics of
research with the growing interest in the Black Sea region in
antiquity. This book highlights their interaction around all the
coasts of the region, from different perspectives and disciplines.
Here, archaeological excavation and survey combine with studies of
classical texts, cults, medicine, and more, to explore ancient
experiences of the region. Accordingly, the region is examined from
external viewpoints, centred in the Mediterranean (Herodotus, the
Hippocratics, ancient geographers, and poets), and through local
lenses, particularly supplied by archaeology. While familiar
disconnects emerge, there is also a striking coherence in the
results of these different pathways into the study of local
environments, which embrace not only Graeco-Roman settlement, but
also a broader range of agricultural and pastoralist activities
across a huge landscape which stretches as far afield as ancient
Hungary. Throughout, there are methodological implications for
research elsewhere in the ancient world. This book shows people in
landscapes across a huge expanse, in local reality and in external
conceptions, complete with their own agency, ideas, and lifestyles.
Material Encounters and Indigenous Transformations in the Early
Colonial Americas brings together 15 case studies focusing on the
early colonial history and archaeology of indigenous cultural
persistence and change in the Caribbean and its surrounding
mainland(s) after AD 1492. With a special emphasis on material
culture and by foregrounding indigenous agency in shaping the
diverse outcomes of colonial encounters, this volume offers new
perspectives on early modern cultural interactions in the first
regions of the 'New World' that were impacted by European
colonization. The volume contributors specifically investigate how
foreign goods were differentially employed, adopted, and valued
across time, space, and scale, and what implications such material
encounters had for indigenous social, political, and economic
structures. Contributors are: Andrzej T. Antczak, Ma. M. Antczak,
Oliver Antczak, Jaime J. Awe, Martijn van den Bel, Mary Jane
Berman, Arie Boomert, Jeb J. Card, Charles R. Cobb, Gerard Collomb,
Shannon Dugan Iverson, Marlieke Ernst, William R. Fowler, Perry L.
Gnivecki, Christophe Helmke, Shea Henry, Gilda Hernandez Sanchez,
Corinne L. Hofman, Menno L.P. Hoogland, Rosemary A. Joyce, Floris
W.M. Keehnen, J. Angus Martin, Clay Mathers, Maxine Oland, Alberto
Sarcina, Russell N. Sheptak, Roberto Valcarcel Rojas, Robyn
Woodward.
Collective Winner of the 2019 Highland Book Prize Under the
ravishing light of an Alaskan sky, objects are spilling from the
thawing tundra linking a Yup'ik village to its hunter-gatherer
past. In the shifting sand dunes of a Scottish shoreline,
impressively preserved hearths and homes of Neolithic farmers are
uncovered. In a grandmother's disordered mind, memories surface of
a long-ago mining accident and a 'mither who was kind'. For this
luminous new essay collection, acclaimed author Kathleen Jamie
visits archaeological sites and mines her own memories - of her
grandparents, of youthful travels - to explore what surfaces and
what reconnects us to our past. As always she looks to the natural
world for her markers and guides. Most movingly, she considers, as
her father dies, and her children leave home, the surfacing of an
older, less tethered sense of herself. Surfacing offers a profound
sense of time passing and an antidote to all that is instant,
ephemeral, unrooted.
The collection Migration, Integration and Connectivity on the
Southeastern Frontier of the Carolingian Empire offers insights
into the Carolingian southeastern frontier-zone from historical,
art-historical and archaeological perspectives. Chapters in this
volume discuss the significance of the early medieval period for
scholarly and public discourses in the Western Balkans and Central
Europe, and the transfer of knowledge between local scholarship and
macro-narratives of Mediterranean and Western history. Other essays
explore the ways local communities around the Adriatic (Istria,
Dalmatia, Dalmatian hinterland, southern Pannonia) established and
maintained social networks and integrated foreign cultural
templates into their existing cultural habitus. Contributors are
Mladen Ancic, Ivan Basic, Goran Bilogrivic, Neven Budak, Florin
Curta, Danijel Dzino, Kresimir Filipec, Richard Hodges, Nikola
Jaksic, Miljenko Jurkovic, Ante Milosevic, Marko Petrak, Peter
Stih, Trpimir Vedris.
Olynthus, an ancient city in northern Greece, was preserved in an
exceptionally complete state after its abrupt sacking by Phillip II
of Macedon in 348 B.C., and excavations in the 1920s and 1930s
uncovered more than a hundred houses and their contents. In this
book Nicholas Cahill analyzes the results of the excavations to
reconstruct the daily lives of the ancient Greeks, the organization
of their public and domestic space, and the economic and social
patterns in the city. Cahill compares the realities of daily life
as revealed by the archaeological remains with theories of ideal
social and household organization espoused by ancient Greek
authors. Describing the enormous variety of domestic arrangements,
he examines patterns and differences in the design of houses, in
the occupations of owners, and in the articulations between
household and urban economies, the value of land, and other aspects
of ancient life throughout the city. He thus challenges the
traditional view that the Greeks had one standard household model
and approach to city planning. He shows how the Greeks reconciled
conflicting demands of ideal and practice, for instance between
egalitarianism and social inequality or between the normative roles
of men and women and roles demanded by economic necessities. The
book, which is extensively illustrated with plans and photographs,
is supported by a Web site containing a database of the
architecture and finds from the excavations linked to plans of the
site.
Critical approaches to public archaeology have been in use since
the 1980s, however only recently have archaeologists begun using
critical theory in conjunction with public archaeology to challenge
dominant narratives of the past. This volume brings together
current work on the theory and practice of critical public
archaeology from Europe and the United States to illustrate the
ways that implementing critical approaches can introduce new
understandings of the past and reveal new insights on the present.
Contributors to this volume explore public perceptions of museum
interpretations as well as public archaeology projects related to
changing perceptions of immigration, the working classes, and race.
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