This volume expands archaeological understandings of the past by using a neglected database - ground stone artifacts - to stretch the boundaries of our comprehension of the ancient world. Ground stone artifacts, long recognized as part of the essential domestic tool kit for food production and other activities, have received little methodical attention in the archaeological community until relatively recently. A trend of increasing focus on ground stone artifacts in the archaeological literature over the past two decades, particularly in the New World, indicates the need to integrate such analyses with larger theoretical and methodological issues. The editors bring together for the first time a detailed, comprehensive view of the variety of approaches to the archaeological analyses of these artifacts melding together archaeological data and innovative analyses of the most recent research. In a thought provoking introduction, the editors provide context for the issues and note recent advances made in ground stone artifact analysis. Case studies based on original data, organized along broad thematic interests, form the bulk of the volume. The limitations and opportunities that natural resources of a given region impose on technological change, production, and exchange are key points that many contributors touch upon. In the concluding remarks, the case studies are critically summarized with an eye towards a synthetic, diachronic appraisal, and potential avenues for future related studies.

The volume is co-published by the Winchester Excavations Committee and forms Volume 11 of the Winchester Studies series. Following the success of volumes IV (Windsor and Eton) and V (York) in the series of Historic Towns Atlases, the new volume maps and explains the history of Winchester - a city which has played such an important part in English history from Roman times onwards. Combining many full-colour maps with an authoritative but very readable text, the atlas shows how the Roman city of Venta Belgarum became the second-most important city in England for several centuries, a walled town, the seat of kings and an ecclesiastical centre almost unparalleled in the country before gently declining into a judicial centre and county town. The atlas is centred on a detailed map of the city at the scale of 1:2500, showing Winchester's historic buildings and structures on a map of the city as it was in 1800. A series of maps show how Winchester was at key points in its history, charting its development and changing shape. The atlas includes an early OS map, modern maps and historic aerial photographs, as well as colour illustrations, many of which have never been published before. The introduction offers a full history of how and why Winchester developed from prehistoric times onwards, in a series of chapters written by historians but aimed at the general reader. It also includes a comprehensive reference gazetteer listing every place shown on the maps, with a map location, a brief history, and further reading for those interested in finding out more. Like its companion volumes, the maps, text, gazetteer and illustrations are presented in an A3 stiff card binder, and the format allows for maps of different date to be compared side-by-side.

The Association's 2001 conference was held in Carlisle and concentrated on the Roman and medieval art, architecture and archaeology of the city and county. Under the Romans, and with its position on Hadrian's Wall, Carlisle had the distinction of being the most north-westerly centre of 'Romanitas' in a vast empire. Later, the castle-building programme, initiated under William II, the establishment of the priory in 1123, followed by the See in 1133, marked Carlisle out as a key strategic bulwark against an ever-present threat from the Scots. The majority of papers at the conference and in this volume focus on the cathedral, various aspects of its architectural development, the wonderful east window and its stained glass, the fine medieval woodwork and extraordinary paintings on the backs of the choir stalls and the ceiling of the Prior's Tower. The castle and other important churches and monastic sites in Cumbria were also examined, along with the Bishop's residence at Rose Castle, and an appreciation of the work of that distinguished cleric, Dean Tait.This volume will go a long way towards providing future generations of scholars with a firm baseline for future research in this area.

Two prehistoric cave sites on the Bird's Head of western New Guinea provide a detailed narrative of 26,000 years of human occupation of this area. During Late Pleistocene times, lower temperatures allowed a suite of montane animal species to descend onto the lowland Ayamaru Plateau. When the montane fauna receded during the subsequent climatic amelioration, people switched their hunting focus to a forest wallaby, known locally as Djief. Detailed analysis of this species' remains, including the reconstruction of their age profile, provides insights into why prolonged hunting of this species did not lead to its extinction. The wallaby population evidently thrived at its demographic maximum throughout the early and mid-Holocene, suggesting that human population densities, and therefore hunting pressure, were low until c. 5000 BP.This volume of Modern Quaternary Research in Southeast Asia offers a unique perspective on sustainable hunting in prehistory and provides intriguing insights into hunter-gatherer subsistence, tool manufacturing and use, the changing intensity of occupation of the sites, and environmental exploitation from Late Pleistocene times onwards in a lowland tropical region. It forms an important contribution to the current debate on the possibilities of human occupation of tropical rainforest before the advent of agriculture.

With Wayne Bennett From the silky wax qualities of the surfaces of some quartz menhirs to the wood-grain textures of others, to the golden honeycombed limestones of Malta, to the icy frozen waves of the Cambrian sandstone of south-east Sweden, this book investigates the sensuous material qualities of stone. Tactile sensations, sonorous qualities, colour, and visual impressions are all shown to play a vital part in our understanding of the power and significance of prehistoric monuments in relation to their landscapes. In The Materiality of Stone, Christopher Tilley presents a radically new way of analyzing the significance of both 'cultural' and 'natural' stone in prehistoric European landscapes. Tilley's groundbreaking approach is to interpret human experience in a multidimensional and sensuous human way, rather than through an abstract analytical gaze. The studies range widely from the menhirs of prehistoric Brittany to Maltese Neolithic temples to Bronze Age rock carvings and cairns in southern Sweden. Tilley leaves no stone unturned as he also considers how the internal spaces and landscape settings are interpreted in relation to artifacts, substances, and related places that were deeply meaningful to the people who inhabited them and remain no less evocative today. In its innovative approach to understanding human experience through the tangible rocks and stone of our past, The Materiality of Stone is both a major theoretical and substantive contribution to the field of material culture studies and the study of European prehistory.

This comprehensive and absorbing book traces the cultural history of Southeast Asia from prehistoric (especially Neolithic, Bronze-Iron age) times through to the major Hindu and Buddhist civilisations, to around AD 1300. Southeast Asia has recently attracted archaeological attention as the locus for the first recorded sea crossings; as the region of origin for the Austronesian population dispersal across the Pacific from Neolithic times; as an arena for the development of archaeologically rich Neolithic, and metal using communities, especially in Thailand and Vietnam, and as the backdrop for several unique and strikingly monumental Indic civilisations, such as the Khmer civilisation centred around Angkor. Invaluable to anyone interested in the full history of the region.

The construction of a natural gas pipeline across southern Wales and into Herefordshire and Gloucestershire between 2005 and 2007 resulted in numerous archaeological discoveries, including sites of national significance. The project not only produced a wealth of new archaeological sites, it also generated important radiocarbon and environmental datasets for the region. The earliest activity is indicated by worked flint of Mesolithic (or earlier) date, with the earliest Neolithic communities represented by pits, evidence for occasional timber houses, and the discovery of a previously unknown henge. Beaker and Bronze Age settlement and burial remains were found too, including a rare copper halberd. The excavations also produced evidence for Early Bronze Age houses and numerous examples of burnt mounds. Other discoveries comprised much new evidence for Iron Age settlement (including some in areas of upland), Roman roads, crop-processing ovens, and ironworking. Rare evidence for the early medieval period was also found, along with the remains of later farmsteads and field systems. Moves towards industrialisation were reflected in the discovery of a brick kiln and charcoal-burning platforms.

The three-thousand-year-old rock-cut temples at Abu Simbel and the story of their rescue from the rising waters of Lake Nasser in the 1960s are almost as familiar worldwide as the tale of the gold funerary mask and brief life of the boy king Tutankhamun. Yet although they are among the most celebrated, visited, and photographed archaeological sites in the world, the two temples are among the least understood by the visitor. In this lucidly written, beautifully illustrated guide, Nigel Fletcher-Jones explains the main features of both temples, discusses what they teach us about ancient Egypt during the reign of Rameses II (1265-1200 BC), and illustrates which gods and goddesses were worshipped here. With over 80 new photographs, drawings, and diagrams, and packed with fascinating insights, The Brief Guide to Abu Simbel is an indispensable companion and souvenir to one of the world's great archaeological sites.

New insights from the Tikal excavations and epigraphic breakthroughs suggest that a thriving marketplace existed in the center of the city, that foreigners comprised a significant element of its populace, and that differences in tomb form and contents signal the changing fortunes of Tikal's rulers. Essay topics include the timing of the foundation of the Tikal dynasty, the earliest experiments in socio-political complexity, the 6th-7th century hiatus in monument erection, the reassertion of central authority around A.D. 700, and the complex causality behind the collapse and depopulation during the 9th century. Featuring some of the premiere specialists in the field as well as innovative new scholars, this volume promises to shape Tikal's interpretations and research agenda for decades to come.

More than quarter of a century ago Richard Bradley published The Passage of Arms. It was conceived as An Archaeological Analysis of Prehistoric Hoards and Votive Deposits, but, as the author concedes, these terms were too narrowly focused for the complex subject of deliberate deposition and the period covered too short. A Geography of Offerings has been written to provoke a reaction from archaeologists and has two main aims. The first is to move this kind of archaeology away from the minute study of ancient objects to a more ambitious analysis of ancient places and landscapes. The second is to recognise that problems of interpretation are not restricted to the pre-Roman period. Mesolithic finds have a place in this discussion, and so do those of the 1st millennium AD. Archaeologists studying individual periods confront with similar problems and the same debates are repeated within separate groups of scholars - but they arrive at different conclusions. Here, the author presents a review that brings these discussions together and extends across the entire sequence. Rather than offer a comprehensive survey, this is an extended essay about the strengths and weaknesses of current thinking regarding specialised deposits, which encompass both sacrificial deposits characterised by large quantities of animal and human bones and other collections which are dominated by finds of stone or metal artefacts. It considers current approaches and theory, the histories of individual artefacts and the landscape and physical context of the of places where they were deposited, the character of materials, the importance of animism and the character of ancient cosmologies.

The countryside is a gigantic puzzle which contains within its intricate pattern of lanes, woods and farmsteads the keys to its history. This book takes the reader through the process of landscape detection, by way of a journey through a fascinating landscape in the Yorkshire Dales. Richard Muir shows how exploring landscape history can be compared to investigating a crime. The detective analyses different kinds of evidence to construct what happened, when and why. Along the way he or she has to think logically, to interpret all sorts of complex evidence, and be prepared to abandon false trails. Gradually, as the evidence accumulates, the past comes to life. It is much easier to understand how the process works if you actually look at a particular landscape. Ripley township covers only a few square miles, but crams a wealth of features into its tiny territory. The author finds a 'lost' Roman road, reveals field-systems dating from Anglo-Saxon times, and finds oak trees, which may date from the time of Domesday Book, still alive in the deer park. He recreates the appearance of deserted medieval villages, discovers a lost formal garden, and evaluates the impact of landscaping and Parliamentary Enclosure. The end result is a chronicle of the past times of Ripley, the story of a landscape. One of the great joys of landscape history is that the techniques employed here can be adopted by any reader who wants to understand his or her own patch of countryside. This is a book which is sure to stimulate the imagination.

Rethinking Global Governance argues that long-ignored, non-western political systems from the distant and more recent past can provide critical insights into improving global governance. These societies show how successful collection action can occur by dividing sovereignty, consensus building, power from below, and other mechanisms. For a better tomorrow, we need to free ourselves of the colonial constraints on our political imagination. A pandemic, war in Europe, and another year of climatic anomalies are among the many indications of the limits of global governance today. To meet these challenges, we must look far beyond the status quo to the thousands of successful mechanisms for collective action that have been cast aside a priori because they do not fit into Western traditions of how people should be organized. Coming from long past or still enduring societies often dismissed as "savages" and "primitives" until well into the twentieth century, the political systems in this book were often seen as too acephalous, compartmentalized, heterarchical, or anarchic to be of use. Yet as globalization makes international relations more chaotic, long-ignored governance alternatives may be better suited to today's changing realities. Understanding how the Zulu, Trypillian, Alur, and other collectives worked might be humanity's best hope for survival. This book will be of interest both to those seeking to apply archaeological and ethnographic data to issues of broad contemporary concern as well as to academics, politicians, policy makers, students, and the general public seeking possible alternatives to conventional thinking in global governance.

A study of archaeology and the early Church in Greece is long overdue. So far, no book has been published in English that examines the growth of Christianity in southern Greece from New Testament times until the medieval period, taking into account both contemporary theological expertise and a detailed knowledge of the numerous and exciting current archaeological excavations. Situated between Israel and Italy, Greece is now yielding vital evidence of the development of early Christianity. Mainland Greece and its surrounding islands is a vast region, and I have chosen to focus on an area rich in early Christian remains, namely the region stretching from Athens southwards. The book examines evidence relating to Christianity in New Testament times, particularly through the writings of St Paul and early theologians, and juxtaposes these texts with recent and current excavations at Corinth, with its twin ports of Kenchreai and Lechaion, and its chief sanctuary beyond the city at Isthmia, where St Paul worked during the celebration of the pan-Hellenic Games. Much of the excavation at Lechaion has been carried out underwater by divers pioneering new methods of preserving submerged material, since most of the harbour is entirely submerged. Later, particularly from the sixth century onwards, Christian basilicas were built throughout Greece. A number of these are examined, including those at Nemea and Epidaurus. Nemea provides unique evidence of an agricultural community guided by a bishop; numerous Christian artefacts have been excavated at the site. Epidaurus was honoured as the birthplace of the healing god Asclepius, and early Christians inherited and developed these healing skills in unexpected ways. At other locations, monks developed a wide variety of lifestyles that were little known in the Western Church. The archaeology of Christian sites in Greece is a new and unfolding discipline; this book will hopefully encourage scholars and students to take these studies further.

In this book, Bleda During offers an archaeological analysis of Asia Minor, the area equated with much of modern-day Turkey, from 20,000 to 2,000 BC. During this period human societies moved from small-scale hunter-gatherer groups to complex and hierarchical communities with economies based on agriculture and industry. Dr During traces the spread of the Neolithic way of life, which ultimately reached across Eurasia, and the emergence of key human developments, including the domestication of animals, metallurgy, fortified towns and long-distance trading networks. Situated at the junction between Europe and Asia, Asia Minor has often been perceived as a bridge for the movement of technologies and ideas. By contrast, this book argues that cultural developments followed a distinctive trajectory in Asia Minor from as early as 9,000 BC.

Collaborative archaeology and the lasting character of a historic Black community The Archaeology of Race and Class at Timbuctoo is the first book to examine the historic Black community of Timbuctoo, New Jersey, which was founded in 1826 by formerly enslaved migrants from Maryland and served as a stop on the Underground Railroad. In collaboration with descendants and community members, Christopher Barton explores the intersectionality of life at Timbuctoo and the ways Black residents resisted the marginalizing structures of race and class.Despite some support from local Quaker abolitionists, the people of Timbuctoo endured strained relationships with neighboring white communities, clashes with slave catchers, and hostilities from the Ku Klux Klan. Through a multiscalar approach that ranges from landscape archaeology and settlement patterns to analysis of consumer artifacts, this book demonstrates how residents persevered to construct their own identities and navigate poverty. Barton incorporates oral histories from community elders that offer insights into the racial tensions of the early- to mid-twentieth century and convey the strong, lasting character of the community in the face of repression. Weaving together memories and inherited accounts, current archaeological investigations, historical records, and comparisons to nearby Black-established communities of the era, this book illuminates the everyday impacts of slavery and race relations in a part of the country that seemed to promise freedom and highlights the use of archaeology as a medium for social activism. Publication of this work made possible by a Sustaining the Humanities through the American Rescue Plan grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Iconoclasm, the debate about the legitimacy of religious art that began in Byzantium around 730 and continued for nearly 120 years, has long held a firm grip on the historical imagination. Byzantium in the Iconoclast Era is the first book in English to survey the original sources crucial for a modern understanding of this most elusive and fascinating period in medieval history. It is also the first book in any language to cover both the written and the visual evidence from this period, a combination of particular importance to the iconoclasm debate. The authors, an art historian and a historian who both specialise in the period, have worked together to provide a comprehensive overview of the visual and the written materials that together help clarify the complex issues of iconoclasm in Byzantium.

There is no possibility of entering the world of Yiddish, its literature and culture, without understanding what the shtetl was, how it functioned, and what tensions charged its existence. Whether idealized or denigrated, evaluated as the site of memory or mined for historical data, scrutinized as a socio-economic phenomenon or explored as the mythopoetics of a rich literature, the shtetl was the heart of Eastern European Jewry. The papers published in this volume - most of them presented at the second Mendel Friedman International Conference on Yiddish organized by the Oxford European Humanities Research Centre and the Oxford Institute for Yiddish Studies (July 1999) - re-examines the structure, organization and function of numerous small market towns that shaped the world of Yiddish. The different perspectives from which these studies view the shtetl trenchently re-evaluate common preconceptions, misconceptions and assumptions, and offer new insights that are challenging as they are informative.

Explains how Cairo came to have its important Genizah archive, how Cambridge developed its interests in Hebraica, and how a number of colourful figures brought about the connection between the two centres. Also shows the importance of the Genizah material for Jewish cultural history.

Series Information:
One World Archaeology

These studies examine the physical remains of Frankish settlement in Palestine in the 12th and 13th centuries. In recent years the view that Frankish settlement was largely confined to the fortified urban centres and castles, with few westerners venturing into the open countryside, has come to be challenged in the light of new archaeological evidence and re-examination of the sources. The present studies contribute to an understanding of the nature of Frankish settlement by illustrating aspects of the relationship between fortification and settlement: in particular, the role of castles and towers in promoting settlement and providing both security and domestic accommodation; the relationship between castles, towers and other semi-fortified rural structures; the physical planning of the new towns established by the canons of the Holy Sepulchre; the measures undertaken to defend urban settlements; and the contribution that town walls and castles made to the security of the kingdom.

This volume examines the archaeology of precolonial West African societies in the era of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Using historical and archaeological perspectives on landscape, this collection of essays sheds light on how involvement in the commercial revolutions of the early modern period dramatically reshaped the regional contours of political organization across West Africa. The essays examine how social and political transformations occurred at the regional level by exploring regional economic networks, population shifts, cultural values and ideologies. The book demonstrates the importance of anthropological insights not only to the broad political history of West Africa, but also to an understanding of political culture as a form of meaningful social practice.

A collection of papers presented to the 1992 international British Archaeological Association conference in Chester. Presented in chronological order, the fourteen essays comprise Martin Henig's analysis of carved stonework from Roman Deva; Alan Thacker's study of the formation of the town and its parishes during the early medieval period; Simon Ward, Virginia Jansen, John Maddison and Christa Grossinger examine the architecture, fittings and restoration of the Cathedral and churches; Elizabeth Danbury, J Patrick Greene and Nigel Ramsay assess the life and dissolution of religious foundations; Roland B Harris looks at the origins of the famous Chester Rows and Sharon Cather, David Park and Robyn Pender discuss the recently rediscovered Henry III wall paintings at Chester Castle. A broad and illustrated guide to many aspects of Chester's long history.

This collection of essays focuses on the peoples and communities of ancient, and mainly pre-Roman Italy. Alongside the Etruscans, a range of less well-known ancient peoples of the Italian peninsula are increasingly coming into focus, and it is now possible to write the history of these communities; a history that led eventually to the formation of Roman Italy and ultimately of the Roman empire. 'Ancient Italy' consists of a series of studies, covering the Ligurians and Celts in north-west Italy, the Veneti, Picenes, the Etruscans, the Faliscans, the Latins, the Samnites, the peoples of Campania and the peoples of south-east Italy. Each essay provides a brief introduction to the region and its communities, a summary of recent scholarship and a map showing the location of significant sites, and then goes on to bring out the key issues raised by the most recent research within that region. The book addresses themes in the study of the ancient world: settlement and landscape; identity; religious and funerary ritual; elite stratification and display; social and cultural interaction drawing on evidence from archaeological excavation and survey, numismatics, epigraphy and literature. Designed to be an important tool for researchers working on the ancient Mediterranean, it is also accessible to undergraduates, providing a starting point for anyone interested in the peoples of Ancient Italy.

Published on the 100th anniversary of the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb and the 200th anniversary of the deciphering of the Rosetta stone, this book responds to the ever-growing enthusiasm and curiosity for Egyptomania. This concept refers to a collective imagination which was nurtured throughout the 19th and 20th centuries by archaeological digs and exploratory trips. These key discoveries were crucial for creation and particularly for the Art Deco artists who found their inspiration in Egyptian lines and patterns. Art Déco & Egyptomanie explores the origins and functioning of this cultural and artistic movement shaped by many fields: architecture, cinema, sculpture, popular art, theatre and fashion. Art Déco & Egyptomanie comes with an explicit and previously unseen iconography. Text in French.