Showing titles in Archaeology

Much of human history is hidden from us, buried deep under our feet. Layered beneath the landscape are the unknown stories of ancient peoples and civilizations, written in bones and long-lost artefacts, waiting to be revealed and deciphered. In these eight series, renowned author and broadcaster Aubrey Manning delves into the past, following geological and archaeological clues in an attempt to unravel some of these mysteries – from the Lost Map of London and the Amber Room to the Pharos Lighthouse of Alexandria, the Antikythera Mechanism and the Land of Punt.

Paleoanthropologist Silvana Condemi and science journalist François Savatier tell the Denisovans’ story in The Secret World of Denisovans. Leading us through the excavation of Denisova cave, the sequencing of the Denisovan genome, and recent research on Denisovan fossils, Condemi and Savatier uncover how the Denisovans migrated to Asia, who they interacted with along the way, and why traces of Denisovan DNA can be found in modern-day humans.

The myths surrounding Sparta are as old as the city itself. Even in antiquity, Sparta was a unique society, considered an enigma. The Spartans' often bizarre rules and practices have the capacity to horrify as much they do to fascinate us today. But the truth behind these stories of the exotic other can be hard to discover, lost amongst the legend of Sparta which was even perpetuated by later Spartans, who ran a thriving tourist industry that exaggerated the famed brutality of their ancestors. As Andrew Bayliss explores in this book, there was also much to admire in ancient Sparta.

In 1922, Howard Carter peered into Tutankhamun's tomb for the first time, the only light coming from the candle in his outstretched hand. Urged to tell what he was seeing through the small opening he had cut in the door to the tomb, the Egyptologist famously replied, "I see wonderful things". Carter's fabulous discovery is just one of the many spellbinding stories told in Three Stones Make a Wall.

‘Popular history at its very best, thought-provoking and accessible. Underpinned by serious research, and written with panache, it summons up a vanished world’ SUNDAY TELEGRAPH This is an astonishing new account of Alexander the Great – one of the most important figures of the ancient...

An extraordinary tale of history, maritime drama, heroic rescue, scientific ingenuity and individual courage, recounting death, danger and discovery on the high seas in the search for lost treasure. In September 1857 the side-wheel steamer S.S Central America, which had been carrying five...

A Pocket History of Human Evolution brings us up-to-date on the exploits of all our ancient relatives. Paleoanthropologist Silvana Condemi and science journalist François Savatier consider what accelerated our evolution: Was it tools, our "large" brains, language, empathy, or something else entirely? And why are we the sole survivors among many early bipedal humans? Their conclusions reveal the various ways ancient humans live on today - from gossip as modern "grooming" to our gendered division of labor - and what the future might hold for our strange and unique species. 

Designed for visitors wishing to explore the archaeological landscape, this user-friendly guide sets out a plan of 20 Roman towns – explaining how visitors can find the site and what they may expect to see. Where appropriate, this book explores how the town developed from an Iron Age settlement or where it began life as a military fortress or fort.

Bill Schindler takes us deep into his lifetime of archaeological research to show us why and how our dietary choices and cooking techniques need to follow our ancestors' lead and focus on nutrient density and bioavailability. Our relationship to food is filled with confusion and insecurity...

La épica historia de uno de los imperios más ricos y poderosos de la Antigüedad.

Since the late 1980s the dominant theory of human origins has been that a "cognitive revolution" (c. 50,000 years ago) led to the advent of our species, Homo sapiens. As a result of this revolution our species spread and eventually replaced all existing archaic Homo species, ultimately leading to the superiority of modern humans. Or so we thought. As Clive Finlayson explains, the latest advances in genetics prove that there was significant interbreeding between modern humans and the Neanderthals.

The work of archaeology uncovers fascinating vestiges of humanity’s past, greatly enriching our knowledge of our ancestors and ourselves. Over the last century, archaeologists have increasingly ventured underwater, making spellbinding finds and opening an incredible new frontier for archaeological discovery. In the 12 delightful and eye-opening lectures of Underwater Archaeology: Mysteries of the Deep, Professor Lemke, an expert underwater archaeologist working in the field, invites you to discover astonishing treasures of history that lie beneath the waves.

How Roman Britain ended is one of the most controversial questions in British history. Unique among former Roman citizens in Western Europe, the Britons established long-lived kingdoms, resisting 'barbarian' political takeover for centuries. Archaeological evidence, along with re-analysis of the few existing texts, reveals an unexpectedly sophisticated society, connected to a wider international network of trade and cultural contacts than might until recently have seemed imaginable.

A spellbinding history of the hidden world below the Holy City—a saga of biblical treasures, intrepid explorers, and political upheaval “A sweeping tale of archaeological exploits and their cultural and political consequences told with a historian’s penchant for detail and a journalist’s...

This groundbreaking study is based on the author's systematic comparative analysis of the vast textile collections in Iceland, Greenland, Denmark, Scotland, and the Faroe Islands, materials that are largely unknown even to archaeologists and span 1,000 years. Through these garments and fragments, Hayeur Smith provides new insights into how the women of these island nations influenced international trade by producing cloth (vaðmál); how they shaped the development of national identities by creating clothing; and how they helped their communities survive climate change.

When we first encounter the Bible, we are taught its stories—Adam and Eve, Moses and the Red Sea, David and Goliath, Jonah and the whale, and more. When a story lacks the details we crave, we fill in the blanks—with what we've seen in movies, read in books, and been told by our Sunday school teachers. But there's a better way to encounter the whole story of Scripture: uncovering and understanding the ancient world and the people who experienced biblical events.

If adventure has a name, it must be Indiana Jones! He's both a mild-mannered archaeology professor and an intrepid adventurer traversing the globe in search of lost artifacts. Whether seeking the Ark of the Covenant in Egypt, the Sankara Stones in India, the Holy Grail in Turkey, or a mysterious crystal skull in Peru, Indy's adventures never fail to delight audiences. Indiana Jones and Philosophy takes you on a whirlwind journey to investigate some of the most enduring questions about the human condition.

In this authoritative but light-hearted account of beers gone by, archaeologist Tate Paulette brings the famous "land between the rivers" back to life in vivid detail. We meet not only the beers of ancient Mesopotamia, but also the people who brewed them and drank them, the places where these people lived and worked, the taverns and temples and tombs where they did their drinking, the stories they told about beer, their preferred styles of drinking, their brewing equipment and drinking paraphernalia, the gods and goddesses who governed their lives and who were also partial to a drink.

Griffins, cyclopes, monsters, and giants - these fabulous creatures of classical mythology continue to live in the modern imagination through the vivid accounts that have come down to us from the ancient Greeks and Romans. But what if these beings were more than merely fictions? Through careful research and meticulous documentation, Adrienne Mayor convincingly shows that many of the giants and monsters of myth did have a basis in fact - in the enormous bones of long-extinct species that were once abundant in the lands of the Greeks and Romans.

The monumental statues of Easter Island, both so magisterial and so forlorn, gazing out in their imposing rows over the island’s barren landscape, have been the source of great mystery ever since the island was first discovered by Europeans on Easter Sunday 1722. How could the ancient people who inhabited this tiny speck of land, the most remote in the vast expanse of the Pacific islands, have built such monumental works?