Stonehenge is woven into the earliest Arthurian legends and has been analysed by everyone from archaeologists, to town planners, to the Druids who have made it their spiritual home. By refusing to adopt one theoretical position, Rosemary Hill provides the most wide-ranging and expansive history of the megalithic structure to date, from its creation in 3000 BC to the threat of the thunderous main roads that flank it today.

The excavations of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at Marsa Matruh on Bates's Island, which is located on the seacoast at the north of Egypt's western desert, uncovered a small site with a metalworking workshop and nearby houses. The pottery found in the excavations indicates that this small Late Bronze Age settlement had links to several cultures: Cyprus, the Aegean, Egypt, the coast of western Asia, and the local Marmarican people. The results of the excavations are published in two volumes. This volume provides an overview of the excavations at the site, the Late Bronze Age and historical period occupations, and an introduction to the environmental morphology and history of the island.

Richard B. Seager excavated the Minoan town and cemetery at Pseira in 1906-1907, but the work was not fully published. The Temple University excavations (1985-1994) under the direction of Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras conducted an intensive surface survey of the island. The results of the survey on the small island off the northeast coast of Crete are published in two volumes. Pseira IX presents the results from the intensive surface survey.

The title of this volume, ke-ra-me-ja in Linear B, was chosen because it means "potter" ( , from Greek , "potter's clay") and combines two major strands of Cynthia Shelmerdine's scholarship: Mycenaean ceramics and Linear B texts. It thereby signals her pioneering use of archaeological and textual data in a sophisticated and integrated way. The intellectual content of the essays demonstrate not only that her research has had wide-ranging influence, but also that it is a model of scholarship to be emulated.

Since its publication in 1982, the Archaeological Gazetteer of Afghanistan has become the main reference work for the archaeology of Afghanistan, and the standard sites and monuments record for the region; archaeological sites are now referred to under their Gazetteer catalogue number as routine in academic literature, and the volume has become a key text for developing research in the area. This revised and updated edition has been significantly expanded to incorporate new field-work and discoveries, as well as older field-work more recently published, and presents new cases of synthesis and unpublished material from private archives. New discoveries include the Rabatak inscription detailing the genealogy of the Kushan kings, a huge archive of Bactrian documents, Aramaic documents from Balkh on the last days of the Persian empire, a new Greek inscription from Kandahar, two tons of coins from Mir Zakah, a Sasanian relief of Shapur at Rag-i Bibi, a Buddhist monastic 'city' at Kharwar, new discoveries of Buddhist art at Mes Aynak and Tepe Narenj, and a newly revealed city at the Minaret of Jam. With over 1500 catalogue entries, supplemented with concordance material, site plans, drawings, and detailed maps prepared from satellite imagery, the Archaeological Gazetteer of Afghanistan: Revised Edition is the most comprehensive reference work on the archaeology and monuments of the region ever undertaken. Cataloguing all recorded sites and monuments from the earliest times to the Timurid period, this volume will be an invaluable contribution to the renewed interest in Afghanistan's cultural heritage and an essential resource for students and researchers.

There have been many accounts of prehistoric 'art', but nearly all of them begin by assuming that the concept is a useful one. In this extensively illustrated study, Richard Bradley asks why ancient objects were created and when and how they were used. He considers how the first definitions of prehistoric artworks were made, and the ways in which they might be related to practices in the visual arts today. Extended case studies of two immensely popular and much-visited sites illustrate his argument: one considers the megalithic tombs of Western Europe, whilst the other investigates the decorated metalwork and rock carvings of Bronze Age Scandinavia.

A beautifully illustrated account of the history and archaeology of an iconic feature of the English landscape, as part of the stunning Landmark Library series. Perched on the chalk uplands of Salisbury Plain, the megaliths of Stonehenge offer one of the most recognizable outlines of any ancient structure. Its purpose - place of worship, sacrificial arena, giant calendar - is unknown, but its story is one of the most extraordinary of any of the world's prehistoric monuments. Constructed in several phases over a period of some 1500 years, beginning c. 3000 BC, Stonehenge's key elements are its 'bluestones', transported from West Wales by unexplained means, and sarsen stones quarried from the nearby Marlborough Downs. Francis Pryor is one of Britain's most distinguished archaeologists. In Stonehenge, he delivers a rigorous account of the nature and history of the monument, while also placing the enigmatic stones in a wider cultural context, exploring how antiquarians, scholars, writers, artists, 'the heritage industry' - and even neopagans - have interpreted the site over the centuries.

In this book, Krish Seetah uses butchery as a point of departure for exploring the changing historical relationships between animal utility, symbolism, and meat consumption. Seetah brings together several bodies of literature - on meat, cut marks, craftspeople, and the role of craft in production - that have heretofore been considered in isolation from one another. Focusing on the activity inherent in butcher, he describes the history of knowledge that typifies the craft. He also provides anthropological and archaeological case studies which showcase examples of butchery practices in varied contexts that are seldom identified with zooarchaeological research. Situating the relationship between practice, practitioner, material and commodity, this imaginative study offers new insights into food production, consumption, and the craft of cuisine.

When was the human threshold crossed? What is the evidence for evolving humans and their emerging humanity? This volume explores in a global overview the archaeology of the Middle Pleistocene, 800,000 to 130,000 years ago when evidence for innovative cultural behaviour appeared. The evidence shows that the threshold was crossed slowly, by a variety of human ancestors, and was not confined to one part of the Old World. Crossing the Human Threshold examines the changing evidence during this period for the use of place, landscape and technology. It focuses on the emergence of persistent places, and associated developments in tool use, hunting strategies and the control of fire, represented across the Old World by deeply stratified cave sites. These include the most important sites for the archaeology of human origins in the Levant, South Africa, Asia and Europe, presented here as evidence for innovation in landscape-thinking during the Middle Pleistocene. The volume also examines persistence at open locales through a cutting-edge review of the archaeology of Northern France and England. Crossing the Human Threshold is for the worldwide community of students and researchers studying early hominins and human evolution. It presents new archaeological data. It frames the evidence within current debates to understand the differences and similarities between ourselves and our ancient ancestors.

Reading Between the Lines: The Neolithic Cursus Monuments of Scotland is the first systematic analysis of Scotland's cursus monuments and is written by one of the foremost scholars of the Neolithic in Scotland. Drawing on fifteen years of experience of cropmark interpretation, as well as his involvement in several excavations of cursus monuments and contemporary sites, Kenneth Brophy uncovers some of the secrets of the Neolithic landscape. While outlining the physical characteristics of the cursus, this book also addresses the limitations of this kind of typological description when applied to monuments which varied so remarkably in terms of materiality and size. Moving beyond a morphological account, Brophy considers what can be said of this diverse group of sites, and how they were actually built and used in prehistory, in light of several decades of aerial reconnaissance and excavation in Scotland. Through a close study of the differences, as well as the similarities, between these structures, this book offers a nuanced account of cursus monuments, finally allowing this important monument type to be better understood and placed alongside others of the period. Offering exciting new ways of thinking about these enigmatic yet important monuments, Reading Between the Lines: The Neolithic Cursus Monuments of Scotland is an essential resource for students and specialists in British prehistory, providing an introduction to the Early Neolithic archaeology of lowland Scotland as well as a meditation on broader aspects of monumentality and architecture.

Warfare in Bronze Age Society takes a fresh look at warfare and its role in reshaping Bronze Age society. The Bronze Age represents the global emergence of a militarized society with a martial culture, materialized in a package of new efficient weapons that remained in use for millennia to come. Warfare became institutionalized and professionalized during the Bronze Age, and a new class of warriors made their appearance. Evidence for this development is reflected in the ostentatious display of weapons in burials and hoards, and in iconography, from rock art to palace frescoes. These new manifestations of martial culture constructed the warrior as a 'Hero' and warfare as 'Heroic'. The case studies, written by an international team of scholars, discuss these and other new aspects of Bronze Age warfare. Moreover, the essays show that warriors also facilitated mobility and innovation as new weapons would have quickly spread from the Mediterranean to northern Europe.

An account of all the new and surprising evidence now available for the beginnings of the earliest civilizations that contradict the standard narrative Why did humans abandon hunting and gathering for sedentary communities dependent on livestock and cereal grains, and governed by precursors of today's states? Most people believe that plant and animal domestication allowed humans, finally, to settle down and form agricultural villages, towns, and states, which made possible civilization, law, public order, and a presumably secure way of living. But archaeological and historical evidence challenges this narrative. The first agrarian states, says James C. Scott, were born of accumulations of domestications: first fire, then plants, livestock, subjects of the state, captives, and finally women in the patriarchal family-all of which can be viewed as a way of gaining control over reproduction. Scott explores why we avoided sedentism and plow agriculture, the advantages of mobile subsistence, the unforeseeable disease epidemics arising from crowding plants, animals, and grain, and why all early states are based on millets and cereal grains and unfree labor. He also discusses the "barbarians" who long evaded state control, as a way of understanding continuing tension between states and nonsubject peoples.

With contributions by Thomas M. Brogan and Sevi Triantaphyllou, with Costis Davaras, Nikos P. Papadakis, Chrysa Sophianou, Joanna Bending, Jerolyn E. Morrison, Dimitra Mylona, Maria Ntinou, Douglas P. Park, and David S. Reese. The results of excavations carried out at two Late Minoan III sites at Mochlos in eastern Crete are presented. The stratigraphy and architecture of a total of 31 tombs and 11 houses are discussed together with a complete list of artifacts, ecofacts, and skeletal remains from each context. The cemetery remains mirror the settlement remains, and the conclusions discuss how the two sites reflect each other. Rarely in Crete are a settlement and its cemetery both preserved, and it is extremely fortunate to be able to excavate both.

Richard B. Seager excavated the Minoan town and cemetery at Pseira in 1906-1907, but the work was not fully published. The Temple University excavations (1985-1994) under the direction of Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras conducted an intensive surface survey of the island. The results of the survey on the small island off the northeast coast of Crete are published in two volumes. Pseira VIII presents the results from the corollary studies that accompany the surface survey. The surface survey is presented in Part IX.

Richard B. Seager excavated the Minoan cemetery at Pseira in 1907, but the work was never published. The Temple University excavations (1985-1994) under the direction of Philip P. Betancourt and Costis Davaras conducted an intensive surface survey of the cemetery area, cleaned and drew plans of all visible tombs, and excavated tombs that had not been previously excavated. The results of the cemetery excavations on the small island off the northeast coast of Crete are published in two volumes. Pseira VII presents the results from the excavation and cleaning of the 19 tombs that still exist at the Pseira cemetery. The cemetery is remarkable for the diversity of its tomb types. Burials were in cist graves built of vertical slabs (a class with Cycladic parallels), in small tombs constructed of fieldstones, in house tombs, and in jars. Burials were communal, as is usual in Minoan cemeteries. Artifacts included clay vases, stone vessels, obsidian, bronze tools, jewelry, and other objects.

The North American Arctic was one of the last regions on Earth to be settled by humans, due to its extreme climate, limited range of resources, and remoteness from populated areas. Despite these factors, it holds a complex and lengthy history relating to Inuit, Inupiat, Inuvialuit, Yup'ik and Aleut peoples and their ancestors. The artifacts, dwellings, and food remains of these ancient peoples are remarkably well-preserved due to cold temperatures and permafrost, allowing archaeologists to reconstruct their lifeways with great accuracy. Furthermore, the combination of modern Elders' traditional knowledge with the region's high resolution ethnographic record allows past peoples' lives to be reconstructed to a level simply not possible elsewhere. Combined, these factors yield an archaeological record of global significance-the Arctic provides ideal case studies relating to issues as diverse as the impacts of climate change on human societies, the complex process of interaction between indigenous peoples and Europeans, and the dynamic relationships between environment, economy, social organization, and ideology in hunter-gatherer societies. In the The Oxford Handbook of the Prehistoric Arctic, each arctic cultural tradition is described in detail, with up-to-date coverage of recent interpretations of all aspects of their lifeways. Additional chapters cover broad themes applicable to the full range of arctic cultures, such as trade, stone tool technology, ancient DNA research, and the relationship between archaeology and modern arctic communities. The resulting volume, written by the region's leading researchers, contains by far the most comprehensive coverage of arctic archaeology ever assembled.

This book presents a balanced combination of practical and theoretical aspects of geoarchaeology. To do so, it gathers all the components of a natural framework (geology, relief, hydrography, climate, soils, flora and fauna), which have been analyzed from an archaeological perspective. While globally this is a highly developed and researched area, unfortunately in Romania it is still a largely neglected field of study, as limited funds are available. However, the country has a huge potential and international researchers have applied geoarchaeological methods and techniques and published results in numerous journals. This area is important because traces of the Chalcolithic population (Cucuteni culture) have been discovered here. The culture is considered to be the oldest one in Europe, and is highly significant for Romanian as well as European archaeology. The degradation of these settlements is the main core of the work, with illustrative case studies offering insights into the natural and, in some cases, anthropic effects on the sites.

Written to appeal to professional archaeologists, students, and the interested public alike, this book is a long overdue introduction to the ancient peoples of the Great Basin and northern Colorado Plateau. Through detailed syntheses, the reader is drawn into the story of the habitation of the Great Basin from the entry of the first Native Americans through the arrival of Europeans. Ancient Peoples is a major contribution to Great Basin archaeology and anthropology, as well as the general study of foraging societies.

The 27 papers in this volume harken to the themes that Jeffrey Soles has influenced during his illustrious career in Aegean Bronze Age archaeology: ancestry, burial customs, religion, trade, jewelry, the development of the Minoan settlement of Mochlos in eastern Crete, and the rise and fall of the Minoan civilization.

This text has been extensively revised to reflect new developments in a rapidly changing field. It reviews techniques for reconstruction of ancient environments, taking up the biological, chemical and physical principles of each technique. Coverage has been broadened to include more material from micropaleontology, vertebrate paleontology and paleobotany. Case studies have been added to describe paleogeologic procedures in greater depth.

Modern archaeology has amassed considerable evidence for the disposal of the dead through burials, cemeteries and other monuments. Drawing on this body of evidence, this book offers fresh insight into how early human societies conceived of death and the afterlife. The twenty-seven essays in this volume consider the rituals and responses to death in prehistoric societies across the world, from eastern Asia through Europe to the Americas, and from the very earliest times before developed religious beliefs offered scriptural answers to these questions. Compiled and written by leading prehistorians and archaeologists, this volume traces the emergence of death as a concept in early times, as well as a contributing factor to the formation of communities and social hierarchies, and sometimes the creation of divinities.

The Neolithic period is noted primarily for the change from hunter-gatherer societies to agriculture, domestication and sedentism. This change has been studied in the past by archaeologists observing the movements of plants, animals and people. But has not been examined by looking at the domestic architecture of the time. Along with tracking the movement of sedentism, Neolithic houses are also able to show researchers the beginnings of cultural identity, group representation through the construction and decoration of these structures. Additionally as agriculture moved west and north in this era, the architecture and material culture shows this change and its significance. Chapters are arranged chronologically so that authors can address differences and similarities of their region to neighboring ones. To ensure continuity, authors have framed the chapters around the following considerations: construction materials and architectural characteristics; how houses facilitated or perpetua

Cultural evolution, much like general evolution, works from the assumption that cultures are descendent from much earlier ancestors. Human culture manifests itself in forms ranging from the small bands of hunters, through intermediate scale complex hunter-gatherers and farmers, to the high density urban settlements and complex polities that characterize much of today's world. The chapters in the volume examine the dynamic interaction between the micro- and macro-scales of cultural evolution, developing a theoretical approach to the archaeological record that has been termed evolutionary processual archaeology. The contributions in this volume integrate positive elements of both evolutionary and processualist schools of thought. The approach, as explicated by the contributors in this work, offers novel insights into topics that include the emergence, stasis, collapse and extinction of cultural patterns, and development of social inequalities. Consequently, these contributions form a stepping off point for a significant new range of cultural evolutionary studies.