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Pagan Britain
Britain's pagan past, with its mysterious monuments, atmospheric sites, enigmatic artifacts, bloodthirsty legends, and cryptic inscriptions, is both enthralling and perplexing to a resident of the twenty-first century. In this ambitious and thoroughly up-to-date book, Ronald Hutton reveals the long development, rapid suppression, and enduring cultural significance of paganism, from the Paleolithic Era to the coming of Christianity. He draws on an array of recently discovered evidence and shows how new findings have radically transformed understandings of belief and ritual in Britain before the arrival of organized religion. Setting forth a chronological narrative, Hutton along the way makes side visits to explore specific locations of ancient pagan activity. He includes the well-known sacred sites—Stonehenge, Avebury, Seahenge, Maiden Castle, Anglesey—as well as more obscure locations across the mainland and coastal islands. In tireless pursuit of the elusive “why” of pagan behavior, Hutton astonishes with the breadth of his understanding of Britain’s deep past and inspires with the originality of his insights.
The English Coast
This book examines the interaction between people and the coast of England. It spans from 700,000 years ago, and the earliest evidence of humans in this remote corner of north-west Europe, to the end of the 20th century. The coastline has witnessed interesting and significant events throughout history and looks set to do so in the future. Often it is the first place where changes can be seen, for example the effects of climate change. It is also where evidence for human adaptation to environmental changes can most readily be seen. The coast has, of course, also been a cultural contact zone for millennia in terms of trade, industry, immigration and conflict. We are certainly at a time of great environmental and economic transition, so it is apt to now take a long view and place current events in context. Some changes happening today may seem unprecedented but in fact are not, while others are entirely new. One thing we can be sure of is that the coast and sea will become increasingly important to us, both as an economic benefit and as a threat.
The Archaeology of Death and Burial
The archaeology of death and burial is central to our attempts to understand vanished societies. Through the remains of funerary rituals we can learn not only about the attitudes of prehistoric people to death and the afterlife, but also about their way of life, their social organisation and their view of the world. This ambitious book reviews the latest research in this huge and important field, and describes the sometimes controversial interpretations that have led to rapid advances in our understanding of life and death in the distant past. A unique overview and synthesis of one of the most revealing fields of research into the past, it covers archaeology's most breathtaking discoveries, from Tutankhamen to the Ice Man, and will find a keen market among archaeologists, historians and others who have a professional interest in, or general curiosity about, death and burial.
A Norse Settlement in the Outer Hebrides
The settlement at Bornais in the Western Isles of Scotland is one of the largest rural settlements known from the Norse period in Britain. It spans the period from the fifth to the fifteenth century AD when the Atlantic seaboard was subject to drastic changes. The islands were systematically ravaged by Viking raiders and then colonised by Norse settlers. In the following centuries the islanders were central to the emergence of the Kingdom of Man and the Isles, played a crucial role in the development of the Lordship of the Isles and were finally assimilated into the Kingdom of Scotland. This volume explores the stratigraphic sequence uncovered by the excavation of Bornais mounds 2 and 2A. Th...
Environmental Archaeology: Meaning and Purpose
Despite the fact that the human life of the past cannot be understood without taking into account its ecological relationships, environmental studies are often marginalized in archaeology. This is the first book that, by discussing the meaning and purpose we give to the expression `environmental archaeology', investigates the reasons for such a problem. The book is written in an accessible manner and is of interest to all students who want to understand the essence of archaeology beyond the boundary of the individual subdisciplines.
A Continental Distinction in the Common Law
The development of an autonomous English public law has been accompanied by persistent problems - a lack of systematic principles, dissatisfaction with judicial procedures, and uncertainty about the judicial role. It has provoked an ongoing debate on the very desirability of the distinctionbetween public and private law. In this debate, a historical and comparative perspective has been lacking. A Continental Distinction in the Common Law introduces such a perspective. It compares the recent emergence of a significant English distinction with the entrenchment of the traditional Frenchdistinction. It explains how persistent problems of English public law are related to fundamental differences ...
Land, Sea and Home
The twenty-eight papers in this volume explore the practical !ife, domestic settings, landscapes and seascapes of the Viking world. Their geographical horizons stretch from Iceland to Russia, with particular emphasis on new discoveries in the Scandinavian homelands and in Britain and Ireland. With a rich combination of disciplinary perspectives, new interpretations are presented of evidence for buildings and technology, navigation, trade and military organization, the ideology of place, and cultural interactions and comparisons between Viking and native groups. Together, these reveal the multivalent importance of settlement archaeology and history for an understanding of the pivotal phase within the Middle Ages that was the Viking Period.
Iron Age and Roman Coin Hoards in Britain
More coin hoards have been recorded from Roman Britain than from any other province of the Empire. This comprehensive and lavishly illustrated volume provides a survey of over 3260 hoards of Iron Age and Roman coins found in England and Wales with a detailed analysis and discussion. Theories of hoarding and deposition and examined, national and regional patterns in the landscape settings of coin hoards presented, together with an analysis of those hoards whose findspots were surveyed and of those hoards found in archaeological excavations. It also includes an unprecedented examination of the containers in which coin hoards were buried and the objects found with them. The patterns of hoarding...
Life and Death in Roman Carlisle
Finds from a Roman cremation cemetery in Carlisle offer an important study of burials and identity in the region. Excavated graves, including rare richly furnished burials, reveal cultural ties to the Nervii of Gallia Belgica and suggest a Nervian presence in early Roman Carlisle linked to military recruitment and local pottery production.
Bronze Age Britain
During the Neolithic and Bronze Age - a period covering some 4,000 years from the beginnings of farming by stone-using communities to the end of the era in which bronze was an important material for weapons and tools - the face of Britain changed profoundly, from a forest wilderness to a large patchwork of open ground and managed woodland. The axe was replaced as a key symbol, first by the dagger and finally by the sword. The houses of the living came to supplant the tombs of the dead as the most permanent features in the landscape. In this fascinating book, eminent archeologist Michael Parker Pearson looks at the ways in which we can interpret the challenging and tantalising evidence from this prehistoric era. He also examines the various arguments and current theories of archeologist about these times. Drawing on recent discoveries and research, and illustrated with numerous maps, plans, reconstructions and photographs, this book shows what life was like and how it changed during the Neolithic and Bronze Age.
