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Books > Humanities > Archaeology > General
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I Love Trains
(Hardcover)
Joann a Quitmeyer; Photographs by Wallace D Quitmeyer
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R657
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Adrian Boas's combined use of historical and archaeological
evidence together with first-hand accounts written by visiting
pilgrims results in a multi-faceted perspective on Crusader
Jerusalem. Generously illustrated, this book will serve both as a
scholarly account of this city's archaeology and history, and a
useful guide for the interested reader to a city at the centre of
international and religious interest and conflict today.
More than any other category of evidence, ceramics ofters
archaeologists their most abundant and potentially enlightening
source of information on the past. Being made primarily of day, a
relatively inexpensive material that is available in every region,
ceramics became essential in virtually every society in the world
during the past ten thousand years. The straightfor ward technology
of preparing, forming, and firing day into hard, durable shapes has
meant that societies at various levels of complexity have come to
rely on it for a wide variety of tasks. Ceramic vessels quickly
became essential for many household and productive tasks. Food
preparation, cooking, and storage-the very basis of settled village
life-could not exist as we know them without the use of ceramic
vessels. Often these vessels broke into pieces, but the virtually
indestructible quality of the ceramic material itself meant that
these pieces would be preserved for centuries, waiting to be
recovered by modem archaeologists. The ability to create ceramic
material with diverse physical properties, to form vessels into so
many different shapes, and to decorate them in limitless manners,
led to their use in far more than utilitarian contexts. Some
vessels were especially made to be used in trade, manufacturing
activities, or rituals, while ceramic material was also used to
make other items such as figurines, models, and architectural
ornaments."
This volume was developed to meet a much noted need for accessible
case study material for courses in human ecology, cultural ecology,
cultural geography, and other subjects increasingly offered to
fulfill renewed student and faculty interest in environmental
issues. The case studies, all taken from the journal Human Ecology:
An Interdisciplinary Jouma represent a broad cross-section of
contemporary research. It is tempting but inaccurate to sug gest
that these represent the "Best of Human Ecology." They were
selected from among many outstanding possibilities because they
worked well with the organization of the book which, in turn,
reflects the way in which courses in human ecology are often
organized. This book provides a useful sample of case studies in
the application of the perspective of human ecology to a wide
variety of problems in dif ferent regions of the world. University
courses in human ecology typically begin with basic concepts
pertaining to energy flow, feeding relations, ma terial cycles,
population dynamics, and ecosystem properties, and then take up
illustrative case studies of human-environmental interactions.
These are usually discussed either along the lines of distinctive
strategies of food pro curement (such as foraging or pastoralism)
or as adaptations to specific habitat types or biomes (such as the
circumpolar regions or arid lands)."
THE TIMES TOP 10 BESTSELLER SHORTLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE
Drowned. Buried by sand. Decimated by plague. Plunged off a cliff.
This is the forgotten history of Britain's lost cities, ghost towns
and vanished villages: our shadowlands. 'A beautiful book, truly
original . . . It is a marvellous achievement.' IAN MORTIMER,
author of The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England 'Well
researched, beautifully written and packed with interesting
detail.' CLAIRE TOMALIN 'An exquisitely written, moving and elegiac
exploration.' SUZANNAH LIPSCOMB 'Consistently interesting . . .
Green's passion and historical vision bursts from the page,
summoning up the past in surround sound and sensual prose.' CAL
FLYN, THE TIMES (author of Islands of Abandonment) Historian
Matthew Green travels across Britain to tell the forgotten history
of our lost cities, ghost towns and vanished villages. Revealing
the extraordinary stories of how these places met their fate - and
exploring how they have left their mark on our landscape and our
imagination - Shadowlands is a deeply evocative and dazzlingly
original account of Britain's past. 'An eloquent tour of lost
communities.' PD SMITH, GUARDIAN 'A haunting, lyrical tour around
the lost places of Britain.' CHARLOTTE HIGGINS, author of Under
Another Sky 'A miraculous work of resurrection, stinging in a
perpetual present'. IAIN SINCLAIR, author of The Gold Machine
'Beautifully written.' SUNDAY TIMES 'Startling.' FINANCIAL TIMES
'Splendid.' THE HERALD 'Compelling.' HISTORY TODAY 'Excellent.' THE
SPECTATOR 'Fascinating.' DAILY MAIL 'Accomplished.' CAUGHT BY THE
RIVER 'Outstanding.' MIRROR
Dr Eric Mallow, a serious gun collector, complicates his life by
acquiring a pair of Japanese swords at a gun show. He has no idea
one of the swords was the personal weapon of a 14th century
patriot, or that the other carries a blood-thirsty reputation as
the 'Son Killer.'
Founded in 331 BC by Alexander the Great, Alexandria's unique
urban, political and religious organization evolved alongside the
numerous scientific innovations and philosophical expressions that
shaped the city into one of the ancient world's civilizational
centres. Located at the intersection of art and history, this book
revisits the former Egyptian megapolis of Alexandria with the aim
of going beyond the usual depictions of the city - focusing on the
Greeks, the Egyptians, the Lighthouse and the Library - to take a
journey of discovery into an ancient city that is full of nuance.
Several recent discoveries have enabled us to refine our knowledge
of the lost city of Alexandria. By examining the city's
multi-layered temporalities, this book echoes dominant accounts of
Alexandria as a city through which successive civilisations and
political formations of the past (Byzantine, Arab, Modern) have
rehearsed visions of futures that are either no longer present or
remain felt through Alexandria's remaining material culture and
built environment. This book also features a series of contemporary
artworks which develop a critical and poetic association with the
themes it covers. Exhibition Schedule: BOZAR, Center for Fine Arts,
Brussels : 29/09/2022 - 08/01/2023 MUCEM, Musee des Civilisations
de l'Europe et de la Mediterranee, Marseille : 08/02/2022 -
08/05/2023
An archaeology of innovation is the first monograph-length
investigation of innovation and the innovation process from an
archaeological perspective. It interrogates the idea of innovation
that permeates our popular media and our political and scientific
discourse, setting this against the long-term perspective that only
archaeology can offer. Case studies span the entire breadth of
human history, from our earliest hominin ancestors to the
contemporary world. The book argues that the present narrow focus
on pushing the adoption of technical innovations ignores the
complex interplay of social, technological and environmental
systems that underlies truly innovative societies; the inherent
connections between new technologies, technologists and social
structure that give them meaning and make them valuable; and the
significance and value of conservative social practices that lead
to the frequent rejection of innovations. -- .
Ever since Darwin, the world has been struggling with the
mystery of human diversity. As the historian Peter Bowler has
written, an evolutionary interpretation of the history of life on
the earth must inevitably extend itself to include the origins of
the human race. But this has proved to be a difficult and
controversial task. Understanding human origins means accounting
not only for the obvious differences between people and cultures
around the world, but also for the unity of "Homo sapiens" as a
single biological species. As Stephen Jay Gould has said,
flexibility is the hallmark of human evolution. Because so much of
who we are is learned rather than genetically predetermined, a
satisfactory understanding of human evolution--to use old
parlance--must account both for the human body and the human
soul.
At any single moment of time, it is always possible to find
instances where people seem to live in their own world, speak in
their own distinctive ways, and have their own exclusive cultural
traits and practices. Over the course of time, however, it is not
so easy to find places where these dimensions of our diversity stay
together. The essays in this collection show why we must stop
thinking that race, language, and culture go together, and why we
should be wary of the commonsense beliefs that human races exist
and that people who speak different languages come from
fundamentally different biological lineages.
Archaeology, as with all of the social sciences, has always been
characterized by competing theoretical propositions based on
diverse bodies of locally acquired data. In order to fulfill local,
regional expectations, different goals have been assigned to the
practitioners of Archaeology in different regions. These goals
might be entrenched in local politics, or social expectations
behind cultural heritage research.
This comprehensive book explores regional archaeologies from a
sociological perspective-to identify and explain regional
differences in archaeological practice, as well as their existing
similarities. This work covers not only the currently-dominant
Anglo-American archaeological paradigm, but also Latin America,
Western and Eastern Europe, Asia, and Africa, all of which have
developed their own unique archaeological traditions. The
contributions in this work cover these "alternative archaeologies,"
in the context of their own geographical, political, and
socio-economic settings, as well as the context of the currently
accepted mainstream approaches.
Bioarchaeologists who study human remains in ancient, historic and
contemporary settings are securely anchored within anthropology as
anthropologists, yet they have not taken on the pundits the way
other subdisciplines within anthropology have. Popular science
authors frequently and selectively use bioarchaeological data on
demography, disease, violence, migration and diet to buttress their
poorly formed arguments about general trends in human behavior and
health, beginning with our earliest ancestors. While
bioarchaeologists are experts on these subjects, bioarchaeology and
bioarchaeological approaches have largely remained invisible to the
public eye. Current issues such as climate change, droughts,
warfare, violence, famine, and the effects of disease are media
mainstays and are subjects familiar to bioarchaeologists, many of
whom have empirical data and informed viewpoints, both for topical
exploration and also for predictions based on human behavior in
deep time. The contributions in this volume will explore the how
and where the data has been misused, present new ways of using
evidence in the service of making new discoveries, and demonstrate
ways that our long term interdisciplinarity lends itself to
transdisciplinary wisdom. We also consider possible reasons for
bioarchaeological invisibility and offer advice concerning the
absolute necessity of bioarchaeologists speaking out through social
media.
This book provides a fascinating, encyclopedic antidote for the
mysticism and pseudoscience surrounding well-known or highly
publicized archaeological and anthropological "discoveries."
Archaeology attempts to answer the question "where do we come
from?" in the broadest sense possible; as a result, it is a highly
interesting topic for all mankind. When did human beings first walk
the earth? How did civilization develop? What compelled our human
ancestors to build things like the pyramids, the Great Sphinx, or
Monk's Mound? This book presents the widely unknown scientific
facts behind the most popular and enthralling "mysteries" of our
world from an expert archaeological perspective—and lays out the
information and research in a manner that is approachable,
engaging, and entertaining for any reader. Encyclopedia of Dubious
Archaeology: From Atlantis to the Walam Olum contains detailed and
highly descriptive definitions for—and explanations of—terms
related to extraordinary claims about human antiquity and its
study. Some of the terms in this extensive list of topics relate to
archaeological hoaxes. Many of the entries relate to dubious
interpretations of the human past; some of the terms relate to
far-fetched arguments that actually have produced evidence in
support of their veracity.
This book is an introduction to the study of artefacts, setting
them in a social context rather than using a purely scientific
approach. Drawing on a range of different cultures and extensively
illustrated, Archaeological Artefacts and Material Culture covers
everything from recovery strategies and recording procedures to
interpretation through typology, ethnography and experiment, and
every type of material including wood, fibers, bones, hides and
adhesives, stone, clay, and metals.
With over seventy illustrations with almost fifty in full
colour, this book not only provides the tools an archaeologist will
need to interpret past societies from their artefacts, but also a
keen appreciation of the beauty and tactility involved in working
with these fascinating objects. This is a book no archaeologist
should be without, but it will also appeal to anybody interested in
the interaction between people and objects.
Style, Society, and Person integrates the diverse current and past
understandings of the causes of style in material culture. It
comprehensively surveys the many factors that cause style; reviews
theories that address these factors; builds and tests a unifying
framework for integrating the theories; and illustrates the
framework with detailed analyses of archaeological and ethnographic
data ranging from simple to complex societies. Archaeologists,
sociocultural anthropologists, and educators will appreciate the
unique unifying approach this book takes to developing style
theory.
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