The study of stone circles has long played a major role in British and Irish archaeology, and for Scotland most attention has been focused on the large monuments of Orkney and the Western Isles. Several decades of fieldwork have shown how these major structures are likely to be of early date and recognised that that smaller settings of monoliths had a more extended history. Many of the structures in Northern Britain were reused during the later Bronze Age, the Iron Age and the early medieval period. A series of problems demand further investigation including: when were the last stone circles built? How did they differ from earlier constructions? How were they related to henge monuments, especially those of Bronze Age date? How frequently were these places reused, and did this secondary activity change the character of those sites? This major new assessment first presents the results of fieldwork undertaken at the Scottish recumbent stone circle of Hillhead; the stone circles of Waulkmill and Croftmoraig, the stone circle and henge at Hill of Tuach at Kintore; and the small ring cairn at Laikenbuie in Inverness-shire. Part 2 brings together the results of these five projects and puts forward a chronology for the construction and primary use of stone circles, particularly the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age examples. It considers the reuse of stone circles, long after they were built, and discusses four neighbouring stone circles in Aberdeenshire which display both similarites and contrasts in their architecture, use of raw materials, associated artefacts and structural sequences. Finally, a reassessment and reinterpretation of Croftmoraig and its sequence is presented: the new interpretation drawing attention to ways of thinking about these monuments which have still to fulfil their potential.

In pre-industrial societies, in which the majority of the population lived directly off the land, few issues were more important than the maintenance of soil fertility. Without access to biodegradable wastes from production processes or to synthetic agrochemicals, early farmers continuously developed strategies aimed at adding nutritional value to their fields using locally available natural materials. Manure really mattered, its collection/creation, storage, and spreading becoming major preoccupations for all agriculturalists no matter what environment they worked or at what period. This book brings together the work of a group of international scholars working on social, cultural, and economic issues relating to past manure and manuring. Contributors use textual, linguistic, archaeological, scientific and ethnographic evidence as the basis for their analyses. The scope of the papers is temporally and geographically broad; they span the Neolithic through to the modern period and cover studies from the Middle East, Britain and Atlantic Europe, and India. Together they allow us to explore the signatures that manure and manuring have left behind, and the vast range of attitudes that have surrounded both substance and activity in the past and present.

This innovative book is the first comprehensive study of ancient Roman gardens to combine literary and archaeological evidence with contemporary space theory. It applies a variety of interdisciplinary methods including access analysis, literary and gender theory to offer a critical framework for interpreting Roman gardens as physical sites and representations. The Roman Garden: Space, Sense, and Society examines how the garden functioned as a conceptual, sensual and physical space in Roman society, and its use as a vehicle of cultural communication. Readers will learn not only about the content and development of the Roman garden, but also how they promoted memories and experiences. It includes a detailed original analysis of garden terminology and concludes with three case studies on the House of Octavius Quartio and the House of the Menander in Pompeii, Pliny's Tuscan garden, and Caligula's Horti Lamiani in Rome. Providing both an introduction and an advanced analysis, this is a valuable and original addition to the growing scholarship in ancient gardens and will complement courses on Roman history, landscape archaeology and environmental history.

This book offers a critique of the all pervasive Western notion that other communities often live in a timeless present. Who Needs the Past? provides first-hand evidence of the interest non-Western, non-academic communities have in the past.

* Includes a major revision of archaeological theory coverage to provide the latest thinking to students * Written in a lively and engaging style to connect with students and encourage them into the discipline * Details the great advances in archaeological techniques in recent times to bring the book up-to-date and enable students to look not just at the past but the future of the discipline.

Using monuments and ruins by way of illustration, this fascinating book examines the symbolic, ideological, geographical and aesthetic importance of Greek classical iconography for the Western world. It examines how classical Greek monuments are simultaneously perceived as sublime national symbols and as a mythological and archetypal reference against which Western modernism is measured. The book investigates the dialogue this double identity leads to, as well as frequent clashes between ancient (but also later) monuments and their modern urban or regional environment. Living Ruins, Value Conflicts examines the complex historical process of monument restoration and enhancement, and analyses the nexus of changing perceptions, aesthetic visions and formal principles over the past two centuries. The book shows the ways in which archaeology and monumentality affect modern life, the modern aesthetic, our notions of nationhood, of place, of self - and the limits to and possibilities for national development imposed by the need to ensure ruins are kept 'alive'.

Museums and Archaeology brings together a wide, but carefully chosen, selection of literature from around the world that connects museums and archaeology. Part of the successful Leicester Readers in Museum Studies series, it provides a combination of issue- and practice-based perspectives. As such, it is a volume not only for students and researchers from a range of disciplines interested in museum, gallery and heritage studies, including public archaeology and cultural resource management (CRM), but also the wide range of professionals and volunteers in the museum and heritage sector who work with archaeological collections. The volume's balance of theory and practice and its thematic and geographical breadth is explored and explained in an extended introduction, which situates the readings in the context of the extensive literature on museum archaeology, highlighting the many tensions that exist between idealistic 'principles' and real-life 'practice' and the debates that surround these. In addition to this, section introductions and the seminal pieces themselves provide a comprehensive and contextualised resource on the interplay of museums and archaeology.

This important book addresses critical themes in the development of archaeology as a reflexive, self-critical discipline in the modern world. It explores the ethical, political and cultural tensions and responsibilities which need to be addressed by archaeologists when working within networks of global ecologies and communities, examining how authoritarian traditions can exacerbate the divide between expert and public knowledge. Moreover, it analyses how localized acts of archaeology relate to changing conceptions of risk, heritage, culture, identity, and conflict. Bringing insights from Alain Schnapp, Michael Shanks, Isabelle Stengers, Bruno Latour, Ulrich Beck, John Urry and others to cross-disciplinary discussions of these themes, Unquiet Pasts shows how archaeological discourse can contribute towards engaging and understanding current dilemmas. It also shows how archaeology, as a localized and responsibly exercised practice, can play a part in building our commonly shared and experienced world.

Flint knapping, which is the shaping of flint or other fracturing stone to manufacture tools, was one of the primary skills used for survival by our prehistoric ancestors. Early mankind once made and used these implements on a daily basis to hunt, prepare food and clothing, to farm, make shelters, and perform all the other tasks required for Stone Age existence. A material that has been with us since earliest times, flint still plays a part in our lives today: it is used in cigarette, gas and barbeque lighters; in some parts of Britain it is a major building material; and many of our beaches have shingle which is just flint by another name. In this informative and original guide, expert Robert Turner explains how flint was used, what tools were made and what they were made for, and provides detailed instruction of how to make them, enabling the reader to replicate their own Stone Age toolkit. Illustrated throughout, Flint Knapping is a journey of archaeological discovery through the Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Ages.

Industrial archaeology is the study of early industrial buildings and machinery, particularly of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. When this book was originally published in 1963, this was becoming a topic of lively interest and controversy among archaeologists, historians, architects and engineers. This book discusses the aims and methods of the science, giving examples of the contribution which different kinds of specialists can make. This shows a fascinating slice of the history of the discipline of archaeology as well as offering insights into industrial archaeology when the term was first being used. As the first text on the subject, this book also lead to the start of the industrial archaeology movement in the USA.

Despite a growing literature on identity theory in the last two decades, much of its current use in archaeology is still driven toward locating and dating static categories such as 'Phoenician', 'Christian' or 'native'. Previous studies have highlighted the various problems and challenges presented by identity, with the overall effect of deconstructing it to insignificance. As the humanities and social sciences turn to material culture, archaeology provides a unique perspective on the interaction between people and things over the long term. This volume argues that identity is worth studying not despite its slippery nature, but because of it. Identity can be seen as an emergent property of living in a material world, an ongoing process of becoming which archaeologists are particularly well suited to study. The geographic and temporal scale of the papers included is purposefully broad to demonstrate the variety of ways in which archaeology is redefining identity. Research areas span from the Great Lakes to the Mediterranean, with case studies from the Mesolithic to the contemporary world by emerging voices in the field. The volume contains a critical review of theories of identity by the editors, as well as a response and afterword by A. Bernard Knapp.

The Domestication of Humans explains the alternative to the African Eve model by attributing human modernity, not to a speciation event in Africa, but to the unintended self-domestication of humans. This alternative account of human origins provides the reader with a comprehensive explanation of all features defining our species that is consistent with all the available evidence. These traits include, but are not limited to, massive neotenisation, numerous somatic changes, susceptibility to almost countless detrimental conditions and maladaptations, brain atrophy, loss of oestrus and thousands of genetic impairments. The teleological fantasy of replacement by a 'superior' species that has dominated the topic of modern human origins has never explained any of the many features that distinguish us from our robust ancestors. This book explains all of them in one consistent, elegant theory. It presents the most revolutionary proposal of human origins since Darwin. Although primarily intended for the academic market, this book is perfectly suitable for anyone interested in how and why we became the species that we are today.

Artefacts made from skeletal materials since the Roman period were, before this book, neglected as a serious area of study. This is a comprehensive account which reviews over fifty categories of artefact. The book starts with a consideration of the formation, morphology and mechanical properties of the materials and illuminates characteristics concerning working with them. Following chapters discuss the organisation of the industry and trade in such items, including the changing status of the industry over time. Archaeological evidence is combined with that from historical and ethnological sources, with many illustrations providing key visual reference. Originally published in 1985.

Analysing the narration of the translatio of the body of Saint James from Palestine to Santiago de Compostela and its impact on the historical and biblical construction of Jacobean pilgrimages, this book presents an interdisciplinary approach to the two cities at the centre of the legend: Jerusalem and Compostela. Using a range of political, anthropological, historical and sociological approaches, the contributors consider archaeological research into Palestine in the early centuries and explore the traditions, iconography, and literary and social impact of the translatio on the current reality of pilgrimages to Compostela.

In 2014, the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World organized an international writing competition calling for accessible and engaging essays about any aspect of archaeology. Nearly 150 submissions from over two dozen countries were received. Archaeology for the People gathers the best of those entries. Their diverse topics-from the destruction of historic, urban gardens in contemporary Istanbul to the fall of the ancient Maya city- offer a taste of the global reach and relevance of archaeology. Their main common trait, however, is that they prove that archaeology can offer much more to a general audience than Indiana Jones or aliens building pyramids. All of the articles collected in this book combine sophisticated analysis of an exciting archeological problem with prose geared at a non-specialized audience. This book also offers a series of reflections on how and why to engage in dialogues about archaeology with people who are not specialists. These include a stunning photo-essay that captures the challenges of life at an archaeological site in northern Sudan, interviews with a number of leading archaeologists who have successfully written about archaeology for a broad public or who are actively engaged in practicing archaeology beyond academia, and a discussion of the experience of teaching a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) about archaeology to over 40,000 students. This book should be of interest to anyone who has wondered how and why to write about archaeology for people other than archaeologists.

Through a series of case studies, this third volume in the Earth series deals with the technological constraints and innovations that enabled societies to survive and thrive across a range of environmental conditions. The contributions are structured into three sections to draw out particular commonalities and contrasts in the choices made by pre-industrial communities in the construction of varied landscapes and cultural heritage: Landnam, from the Old Norse for'taking of land', deals with colonisation, including the drivers and processes through which colonisers developed an understanding of the productive potential and limitations of their new lands. Fields and field systems: Field-walls are a distinctive and apparently timeless characteristic of many pre-industrial farming landscapes but they present many the challenges to their study, such as the effects of ploughing, abandonment and land-use change and of urban development in fertile lowland zones which may eradicate, reduce or conceal past systems of land-use and division. The importance of indirect and proxy evidence is illustrated and the value of interdisciplinary and modelling approaches emphasised. Agro-pastoralism: focuses on the complex'time-space adaptations' devised for managing cultivation and livestock production, particularly the need to prevent stock incursions into arable fields during the growing season whilst making effective use of seasonal grazing resources. The contributions focus on mountainous areas, where temporary migrations, in the form of transhumance, provided access to a diversity of resources based around seasonal constraints on their availability and productivity.

The new mobilities paradigm has yet to have the same impact on archaeology as it has in other disciplines in the social sciences - on geography, sociology and anthropology in particular - yet mobility is fundamental to archaeology: all people move. Moving away from archaeology's traditional focus upon place or location, this volume treats mobility as a central theme in archaeology. The chapters are wide-ranging and methodological as well as theoretical, focusing on the flows of people, ideas, objects and information in the past; they also focus on archaeology's distinctiveness. Drawing on a wealth of archaeological evidence for movement, from paths, monuments, rock art and boats, to skeletal and DNA evidence, Past Mobilities presents research from a range of examples from around the world to explore the relationship between archaeology and movement, thus adding an archaeological voice to the broader mobilities discussion. As such, it will be of interest not only to archaeologists and historians, but also to sociologists, geographers and anthropologists.

The chapters in this book explore the range of physical and social attributes that have shaped and re-shaped our landscapes through time. International authors have contributed the latest results of investigating ancient landscapes (or "palaeolandscapes") in diverse settings of tropical forests, deserts, river deltas, remote islands, coastal zones, and continental interiors. The case studies embrace a liberal approach of combining archaeological evidence with other avenues of research in earth sciences, biology, and social relations. The chapters offer new perspectives on what the world's palaeolandscapes looked like, how people lived in these places, and how communities have engaged with long-term change in their natural and cultural environments though successive centuries and millennia. This book reaches across archaeology, ecology, geography, and broader studies of human-environment relations that will appeal to general readers. Specialists and students in these fields will find extra value in the primary datasets and in the new ideas and perspectives. It also provides unique examples from the past, toward understanding the workings of sustainable landscape systems.

The Roman empire afforded a kaleidoscope of sensations. Through a series of multisensory case studies centred on people, places, buildings and artefacts, and on specific aspects of human behaviour, this volume develops ground-breaking methods and approaches for sensory studies in Roman archaeology and ancient history. Authors explore questions such as: what it felt like, and symbolised, to be showered with saffron at the amphitheatre; why the shape of a dancer's body made him immediately recognisable as a social outcast; how the dramatic gestures, loud noises and unforgettable smells of a funeral would have different meanings for members of the family and for bystanders; and why feeling the weight of a signet ring on his finger contributed to a man's sense of identity. A multisensory approach is taken throughout, with each chapter exploring at least two of the senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch. The contributors' individual approaches vary, reflecting the possibilities and the wide application of sensory studies to the ancient world. Underlying all chapters is a conviction that taking a multisensory approach enriches our understanding of the Roman empire, but also an awareness of the methodological problems encountered when reconstructing past experiences.

Ancient Gordion has long been recognized as a key Iron Age site for Anatolia and the eastern Mediterranean. Archaeological research has revealed much about its sequence of occupation. However, as yet no study has explored the underlying drivers of political and economic change at this site. This volume presents an overview of the political and economic histories supporting emergent elites and how they constructed power at Gordion during the Iron Age (1200-300 BCE). Based on geochemical and typological analysis of nearly 2000 Late Bronze Age to Hellenistic ceramic samples, the volume contextualizes this primary dataset through the lens of ceramic production, consumption, exchange and emulation. Synthesizing site data sets, the volume more broadly contributes to our understanding of the pivotal role of groups and their economic, social, and ritual practices in the creation of complex societies.

* Shows how the archetypal symbols of the Pohnpaid petroglyphs have exact counterparts in other ancient cultures throughout the world * Provides evidence that Pohnpaid is closely related to--yet predates--neighboring Nan Madol * Includes hundreds of Pohnpaid petroglyphs and stone circle photos, many never before seen While residing on the small Pacific island of Pohnpei in the 1990s, Carole Nervig discovered that a recent brush fire had exposed hundreds of previously unknown petroglyphs carved on gigantic boulders. This portion of the megalithic site called Pohnpaid was unknown even to Pohnpei's state historic preservation officer. The petroglyphs were unlike others from Oceania, so Nervig began investigating and comparing them with petroglyphs and symbols from around the world. In this fully illustrated exploration, Nervig documents her discoveries on Pohnpei, revealing how the archetypal symbols of the Pohnpaid petroglyphs have exact counterparts in other ancient cultures and universal motifs throughout the world, including the Australian Aborigines, the Inca in Peru, the Vedic civilization of India, early Norse runes, and Japanese symbols. She provides evidence that Pohnpaid is closely related to--yet predates--neighboring Nan Madol and shows how Pohnpaid was an outpost of the sunken Kahnihmueiso, a city of the now-vanished civilization of Mu, or Lemuria. Discussing the archaeoastronomical function of the Pohnpaid stones, the author examines how many of the glyphs symbolize celestial phenomena and clearly reveal how their creators were sky watchers with a sophisticated understanding of astronomy, geophysics, geomancy, and engineering. She shows how the scientific concepts depicted in the petroglyphs reveal how the citizens of Mu had a much deeper understanding of the living Earth than we do, which gave them the ability to manipulate natural forces both physically and energetically. Combining archaeological evidence with traditional oral accounts, Nervig reveals Pohnpaid not only as a part of a geodetic network of ancient sacred sites and portals but also as a remnant of the now submerged but once enlightened Motherland of Mu.

This stimulating collection of essays by prominent scholars honours Turid Karlsen Seim. Bodies, Borders, Believers brings together biblical scholars, ecumenical theologians, archaeologists, classicists, art historians, and church historians, working side by side to probe the past and its receptions in the present. The contributions relate in one way or another to Seim's broad research interests, covering such themes as gender analysis, bodily practices, and ecumenical dialogue. The editors have brought together an international group of scholars, and among the contributors many scholarly traditions, theoretical orientations, and methodological approaches are represented, making this book an interdisciplinary and border-crossing endeavour. A comprehensive bibliography of Seim's work is included.

Excavations of medical school and workhouse cemeteries undertaken in Britain in the last decade have unearthed fascinating new evidence for the way that bodies were dissected or autopsied in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This book brings together the latest discoveries by these biological anthropologists, alongside experts in the early history of pathology museums in British medical schools and the Royal College of Surgeons of England, and medical historians studying the social context of dissection and autopsy in the Georgian and Victorian periods. Together they reveal a previously unknown view of the practice of anatomical dissection and the role of museums in this period, in parallel with the attitudes of the general population to the study of human anatomy in the Enlightenment.

Texts and Textiles in the Ancient World: Materiality - Representation - Episteme - Metapoetics presents 12 papers arranged under the four headings of the title which focus on the process of textile manufacture, the weaving process itself, and the materiality of fabric. Contributions adddress the problematic issues of cognitive archaeology, consumer research, literary theory and themes addressing both philosophical history and the history of reception of ideas and practice. The contributions seek both to close the critical gaps with respect to weaving, a broad and complex field in the area of ancient cultural techniques, and to identify new themes. Accordingly, the submissions expand our focus into late antiquity, to integrate texts such as letters written on Papyrus detailing the everyday correspondence of an Egyptian family or to spotlight the meaning of textile terms and the history of misunderstandings associated therein. Frequently overused analogies between writing and weaving are also examined in terms of their legitimacy as well as their limits. The papers presented here result from an international and interdisciplinary conference under the same title held in Castelen, near Basel in 2012.

The Emergence of Civilisation is a major contribution to our understanding of the development of urban culture and social stratification in the Near Eastern region. Charles Maisels argues that our present assumptions about state formation, based on nineteenth century speculations, are wrong. His investigation illuminates the changes in scale, complexity and hierarchy which accompany the development of civilisation. The book draws conclusions about the dynamics of social change and the processes of social evolution in general, applying those concepts to the rise of Greece and Rome, and to the collapse of the classical Mediterranean world.