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Eric Cline, an archaeologist with more than 30 seasons’ experience, traces the development of his profession for the general reader, from its amateur origins in the 18th century to today’s cutting-edge science. He also explores well-known excavations, including Pompeii, Petra, Troy and the Terracotta Warriors, and the careers of ground-breaking figures such as Heinrich Schliemann, Howard Carter and Mary Leakey.

Artworks showing how people lived, from a Roman villa to a coal mine of the Industrial Revolution, help to animate the past in this illustrated sweep through world history. Taking an international perspective, the book explores the peoples and cultures of different periods as well as important events and social and historical developments such as the French Revolution and the invention of the printing press.

Extending for 73 miles and built of more than 24 million stones, Hadrian’s Wall is one of the largest and most spectacular ancient monuments in Britain. This history of the Wall presents insights drawn from ancient texts and extensive archaeological researches to explain how and why it was built, how it affected the native peoples who lived in its shadow and what life was like for the soldiers stationed in its forts.

Although her life is poorly documented the beautiful appearance of Akhenaten’s consort Nefertiti has been made familiar by the haunting, colourfully painted bust excavated at Amarna in 1912. This history of the artwork first covers the evidence for its creator, manufacture and purpose during the ‘heretic’ pharaoh’s reign more than three millennia ago, then traces its remarkable (and sometimes controversial) celebrity and cultural influence in the modern world.

As the poet Theocritus wrote, ‘We are not the first mortals to see beauty in what is beautiful’. In this thorough survey of ancient Greeks’ attitudes to love, sex, marriage and adultery, Chrystal brings together mythology, literature and visual art with evidence from medical writings, sex manuals, and religious, philosophical and magical texts. The book ends with discussion of the Greek sexual vocabulary and an extensive bibliography listing ancient sources and modern scholarship. Sexually explicit.

After the defeat of Macedon and Carthage in 146 BCE, Rome was all-powerful in the Mediterranean world, yet within a decade, internal Roman rivalries escalated into violence and political murder. From 133 BCE, when the military reforms of Tiberius Gracchus led to the massacre of the tribune and his followers, Gareth Sampson describes the role of each key reformer and how they met their death as the late Republic descended into bloodshed on the streets of Rome.

These 28 essays on the evolution and conduct of warfare cover the period from the establishment of Sumer and Egypt as nation states to the age of the Arab conquests. Informed by the author’s own years as an army officer, they provide a wide-ranging survey of topics including ancient military logistics and medical care, Buddha’s experiences in war and the strategy of great generals such as Hannibal and Thutmose III.

Ranging across the world’s largest continent, this illustrated history takes the form of a timeline running from the Stone Age and early Mesopotamian civilizations to the era of the Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century CE. It introduces major events, conflicts and personalities, as well as highlighting ancient societies’ cultural innovations, including the first law codes and the oldest temple.

Aimed at armchair readers and travellers, this book offers a chronological history of the Mediterranean from ancient Rome – the only state to control its entire coastline – to the two world wars and the Middle East conflict. It records naval battles between Christians and Ottomans, and the rise and fall of the maritime empires of Genoa and Venice, while also acknowledging the role of the sea in trade, tourism and migration.

Containing 162 items, this survey provides the texts of inscriptions (almost all in Greek) from the uplands of southwest Anatolia, with translations and brief commentary. They date from the Hellenistic and Roman periods and illustrate the region’s Romanization: in addition to funerary inscriptions there are administrative records including water-supply regulations and an enquiry into the oppressive treatment of villagers.

This volume reports on archaeological investigations at the largest of three mounds at Canhasan in south central Turkey, which revealed a series of settlements from the period c.5500–3000 BCE. David French, who excavated the site in the 1960s, describes his approach, provides information on the site’s stratigraphy and gives an overview of the structures uncovered at each level.

In the confusion of the Western Empire’s collapse, the Franks fought both for and against Rome, eventually achieving supremacy in Gaul and giving their name to modern France. This military history of the Germanic tribe analyses the size, composition, equipment and tactics of its armies to explain why they were so effective against Roman forces, from early incursions in the 3rd century to the Battle of Casilinum in 554.

Richard Evans has visited each of the ancient battle sites analysed in this volume and brings new perspectives based on an understanding of the terrain and the latest archaeological finds. The study covers the famous battles of the Persian Wars such as Marathon and Thermopylae, Caesar's campaigns in Iberia, and Vitellius’s battles of Bedriacum in 69 CE.

From medieval Christian mappa mundi, which bear little resemblance to modern maps, to the familiar Mercator projection of Van Keulen’s World Map (1682), this study of how Europeans depicted the world explores the changing purpose of maps, who used them and how they were made over a period of 1,000 years. Marjo Nurminen decodes the visual metaphors and reveals the cultural information embedded in maps, portolan charts, nautical maps and globes, and illustrates and comments on over 200 examples. Slightly off-mint.

Philip Matyszak tells the story of the Roman Empire and its ‘conquest by absorption’, showing how conquered peoples became ‘contributors and partners in a civilisation so dynamic and vibrant that it survived the collapse of Roman military and civic power’. Off-mint.

Discovered in 1979, the Roman fort at Elginhaugh near Dalkeith is now the most completely excavated timber-built auxiliary fort in the Roman Empire. Here, Professor Hanson describes the discovery, excavation and interpretation of the site and sets the findings in the wider context of the fort’s builders and the lives of its inhabitants. Slightly off-mint

Focused on the Early Helladic III to Late Helladic I period in southern Greece, this volume focuses on the processes of social and economic change in the Bronze Age. The nine essays include studies of Pre-Mycenaean pottery shapes; the dynamics of Bronze Age social structures (explored through feasting and hospitality); and domestic architecture as a means to analyse social change.

During the Mesolithic period and throughout Europe, hunter-fisher-gatherer communities occupied and exploited the resources of a diverse range of ecological zones: coastal, lacustrine and riverine, lowland and upland. Aiming to characterize such communities, this study focuses on the Mesolithic period in Wales, but also links evidence found in Wales with examples from northwest Europe, to offer insights into hunter-fisher-gatherer settlement, subsistence and economic activity between 10,200 and 6,000 years ago.

This volume deals with the transition of Near East economies from the Late Bronze to the early Iron Age, a period in which some monarchies collapsed while others adapted to a new economic environment of expanded trade networks, private ‘entrepreneurs’ and new forms of currency. Among the 17 essays are studies of urban craftsmen in the Neo-Assyrian state; Phoenician trade; temples, trade and money in first millennium BCE Egypt; and the organization and financing of trade caravans.

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Off-mint.

The hillforts of Northumberland are extraordinarily well-preserved, their interiors relatively untouched since they were last occupied, around 1,500 years ago. Presenting the key results of the detailed and extensive archaeological landscape surveys carried out by English Heritage, this well-illustrated account, aimed at hill-walkers and other visitors, describes what hillforts would have looked like when they were first built and what life was like for the inhabitants.

It has long been recognized that Stonehenge was a religious site, but recent intensive research has helped us understand much more about its place within the ancient ritual landscape of Salisbury Plain. In this book one of Britain’s most distinguished archaeologists traces the centuries-long process of construction, explaining how the enigmatic stone circle relates to a wider complex of monuments and what this reveals about the social and ideological system of our prehistoric ancestors during a period of significant change.

Although her life is poorly documented the beautiful appearance of Akhenaten’s consort Nefertiti has been made familiar by the haunting, colourfully painted bust excavated at Amarna in 1912. This history of the artwork first covers the evidence for its creator, manufacture and purpose during the ‘heretic’ pharaoh’s reign more than three millennia ago, then traces its remarkable (and sometimes controversial) celebrity and cultural influence in the modern world.

Aimed at non-specialist readers, this collection of surveys introduces the diversity and complexity of religious currents across pre-Christian Europe. The contributors examine archaeological and written evidence to analyse beliefs and rituals ranging from the Palaeolithic to the early modern period.

This military history of Rome during the short reign of Caligula (37–41 CE) analyses the Emperor’s campaigns and personal character through the evidence of contemporary writers such as Suetonius, Tacitus and Josephus. Although only 24 when he came to power, he proved a competent military strategist and despite the accusations of madness, cruelty and sexual perversion, managed to set the groundwork of Roman foreign policy for his successor Claudius.

Inscriptions are a fascinating source of information, offering insight into the lives, customs and concerns of ancient people, from kings and emperors to gladiators and restaurant owners. More than 200 examples are illustrated and discussed here, written between the 3rd millennium BCE and the 4th century CE. They include a dedicatory inscription from a Carthaginian street, a Hebrew calendar, Ptolemy V’s Rosetta Stone and the tomb inscription of Cyrus the Great. Previously published as The Ancients in their Own Words.

Egypt’s ancient rulers carefully constructed their image as brave, all-powerful military leaders who were pleasing to the gods. This volume, which focuses on highlights from a 2016 exhibition, is an exploration of the different ways in which pharaohs manipulated art to fashion that public persona. The authors reveal how the imagery and symbolism of traditional models were reinvented and how artistic representations of kingship played down court rivalries, civil war and delicate foreign relations.

Tom Holland’s lively account of the Roman Republic focuses on the events that led to the collapse of this increasingly dysfunctional political system during the 1st century BCE. The narrative brings to life the period’s most prominent figures, including Sulla, Pompey and Julius Caesar, whose illegal crossing of the Rubicon ‘helped to bring about the ruin of Rome’s ancient freedoms’.

In 480 BCE Xerxes, ruler of the Persian Empire, invaded mainland Greece, intending to subdue democratic Athens and the sternly militarized state of Sparta. This award-winning history of the Persian Wars explains the background to the invasion and describes the battles of Thermopylae, Salamis and Plataea, where the outnumbered Greeks resisted the largest expeditionary force ever assembled.

Taking a sceptical approach to the traditional story of Islam’s origins, Holland surveys the world of late antiquity, which saw ‘the establishment, for the first time in history, of various brands of monotheism as state religions’. He explores how patterns of thought were altered as an Arab superpower replaced the Roman and Persian empires, with far-reaching consequences for world history.

Most histories of Ancient Greece focus on male protagonists, implying that women were a secluded, excluded part of society. Paul Chrystal questions this assumption, investigating the lives of Ancient Greek women writers, philosophers, artists and scientists, and their experiences of love, marriage, religion and death. Drawing on Homer, Hesiod and others, he demonstrates that women’s roles were far more nuanced and complex than previously portrayed.

Although Jesus’ conversation with Pilate was a moment of enormous political and theological significance, the Roman governor of Judaea is a shadowy figure in the Gospel accounts. Schiavone takes the reader on a ‘journey within early Christian memory’ to investigate what can be learned from those narratives and their intersection with Judaeo-Roman historiography: who was Pilate, what was he thinking during his questioning of Jesus and how did he become a figure of such controversy and ambiguity? American-cut pages.

From underwater breathing equipment (as described by Aristotle) to star charts (drawn on the walls of the Lescaux caves, 33,000–10,000 years ago), James Russell describes the inventions of ancient times. There are chapters on everyday life, with items as diverse as alarm clocks, make-up, games and chewing gum; mechanical and industrial technology, including the spoked wheel and movable type; military inventions; medical breakthroughs; scientific advances; and mysterious lost inventions such as Greek fire, Maya blue and the Baghdad battery.

Beneath the waters of Abukir Bay, at the edge of the north-western Nile delta, lie the submerged remains of the ancient Egyptian cities Thonis-Heracleion and Canopus. This volume, which accompanied the British Museum exhibition in 2016, describes the technical challenges that faced the underwater archaeologists; presents, with over 270 illustrations, the submerged buildings and artefacts, including jewellery and ceramics, that have been found; and discusses how these discoveries have transformed our understanding of the relationship between ancient Egypt and Greece.

Informed by the author’s long experience of travel in North Africa, this ‘journey into a landscape of ruins’ is structured around the lives of six much-mythologized figures who represent the region’s rich classical culture: the refugee Queen Dido, the generals Hannibal and Masinissa, King Juba II, Septimus Severus and Augustine the intellectual careerist. Rogerson argues that the choices each made about cultural assimilation and resistance to Rome resemble those still faced by their modern descendants.

Cats, birds and crocodiles are among the animals mummified in quantity by the ancient Egyptians and deposited as votive offerings. With contributions from 19 experts, this collection of illustrated essays details animals’ role in Egyptian religion and traces both the British fascination with such artefacts and the recent development of innovative techniques for studying them.

In 83 CE, following a seven-year campaign against Caledonian tribesmen, the Romans fought a final battle at which 10,000 of the enemy died. But recent investigation of marching camps in northern England and Scotland has suggested that Tacitus’ account, our main source for the battle, may not be accurate. Forder triangulates the ancient sources with the archaeological evidence to suggest a new location for the elusive battle site known as Mons Graupius.

An archaeologist who has been studying Stonehenge for 40 years, Julian Richards clearly explains the development of our greatest prehistoric monument in a richly illustrated and accessible volume. He places the complex structures of Stonehenge in their landscape of burial and ceremony, and examines both practical approaches to and current theories about how and why it was built. Off-mint.

In 376 CE, under attack by the Huns, the Goths took the radical step of crossing the Danube and, with Emperor Valens’ agreement, settling in Thrace, within the protection of Rome, their former enemy. The arrangement was short lived: in 378 CE, the Goths, led by Fritigern, inflicted a stinging defeat on the Roman army, with the emperor himself among the dead. Coombs-Hoar’s history describes in detail the events leading up to this crucial battle, the battle itself and its aftermath.

The Vandals, who are best remembered for their sack of Rome in 455 CE, have become synonymous with wanton and barbaric destruction. But who were these people and do they deserve their reputation? MacDowell follows the Vandals’ great migration across Germany, Gaul, Spain and North Africa as they sought a new homeland; he also analyses the evolution of their armies’ tactics and equipment and emphasizes the centrality of Arian Christian beliefs in the tribe’s identity.

Beginning with a survey of the period 55 BCE to 122 CE and the decades of Roman government in Britain before the wall was begun, Patricia Southern, a renowned authority on ancient Roman history, gives a closely detailed account of Hadrian himself, how his wall was built and manned by Roman soldiers, what life was like on this northernmost outpost of the Empire, the building of the Antonine Wall, and what happened to Hadrian’s Wall when the Romans left.

It was while planning a cycling expedition along the Via Heraklea, the legendary route of Hercules from the western tip of the Iberian Peninsula to the Alps, that Graham Robb discovered a precise pattern of towns and holy places based on astronomical and geometrical measurements: the three-dimensional 'Middle Earth' of the Celts. This volume describes his historical treasure hunt, revealing the lasting influence of the Druids, and looking afresh at the 'protohistory' of Europe.

Nam C Kim explores the origins of civilization in the Red River Delta of Vietnam and, in particular, the Co Loa settlement which was once the political capital of an ancient culture.

The naval battle at Actium, when the future emperor Augustus defeated the forces of Antony and Cleopatra, was perhaps the most significant military engagement in Roman history. Yet many details of exactly what happened on that September day continue to elude scholars. This study of the literary and historical sources offers a fresh examination of the evidence, with close analysis of hitherto unconsidered allusions to Actium in the description of an equestrian engagement in Book Eleven of Virgil’s Aeneid.

Ranging from Egypt and the Mediterranean world to South Asia and China, this volume surveys the history and culture of each of the major imperial powers that held sway in the ancient world between 1600 BCE and 500 CE. As well as accessible accounts by a team of eminent scholars, the book features sections quoting texts written by inhabitants of the empires and is illustrated with maps, timelines and images showing such splendid artistic achievements as Sasanian silver and Roman mosaics.

Ancient Greek science and philosophy began in the sixth century BCE in the wealthy city of Miletus in Asia Minor, where Thales and Anaximander proposed theories about the nature of the universe. This sweeping history of the Greek scientific tradition follows the chain of knowledge from these early physicists, through such thinkers as Aristotle and Archimedes, to the twilight of the classical age, the transmission of Greek ideas to the Islamic world and their revival in Europe during the Renaissance.

Even during his lifetime, Julius Caesar was a legendary figure, not least because his own writings were carefully designed to enhance his image. Complementing Southern’s other engaging biographies of late-Republican figures, this new account of Caesar’s life and death sheds light on the man behind the legend through careful examination of contemporary sources. The book reveals how he surmounted each difficulty with ‘a combination of determination, quick thinking, opportunism and, more often than not, a certain amount of luck’.

Ancient Greek myth tells of ferocious female warriors called Amazons who lived near the Black Sea and slaughtered their male children. Could the story reflect a real matriarchal society, or perhaps a women-only religious cult? This book follows the author’s quest for the evidence, not only in ancient texts and artistic depictions but also in archaeological discoveries such as the graves of Iron-Age women buried with arrows, swords and armour.

The first prose history in European civilization, Herodotus’ great work traces the growth of the Persian Empire and its great conflict with the Greeks, up to the defeat of Xerxes in 480–79 BCE. Read by David Timson. Unabridged.

Viriathus – the humble shepherd who became leader of the Lusitanians – inflicted many humiliating reverses on theoretically superior Roman forces. Renowned during his lifetime, he has been unfairly neglected by modern historians, so Silva here presents for Anglophone readers the insights of recent Portuguese research and uses his own military expertise to inform his analysis of Viriathus’ guerrilla tactics. The final chapter traces the ancient leader’s transformation into a Portuguese national hero after his story was rediscovered in the Renaissance.

Sicily’s strategic location at the heart of the Mediterranean enabled Syracuse to become one of the most powerful cities of the ancient world but it also made the island a target for expansionist powers. This second volume of Champion’s narrative history covers the tumultuous political and military events in Sicily from the death of Dionysius the Elder until the Roman siege of Syracuse (213–211 BCE), when even the ingenious defences and inventions of Archimedes could not prevent the city’s capture.

Hadrian’s Wall and the Great Wall of China are world famous, but they are not exceptional phenomena. This impressively researched volume shows how, throughout history and across the globe, societies have built such barriers to reinforce their control over territory. Illustrated with numerous photographs and specially commissioned maps, the book ranges from Mesopotamia to Kievan Rus to examine their construction and strategic function, and identifies a recurrent theme: the separation of nomadic peoples from areas of settled agriculture.

Intended as first introductions for students new to a subject, each of these guidebooks gives an overview of the fundamental principles of a subject area in an accessible format and jargon-free language.

Intended as first introductions for students new to a subject, each of these guidebooks gives an overview of the fundamental principles of a subject area in an accessible format and jargon-free language.

Intended as first introductions for students new to a subject, each of these guidebooks gives an overview of the fundamental principles of a subject area in an accessible format and jargon-free language.

In short essays, each of these volumes focuses on the 50 essential writers, movements, works or themes in disciplines ranging from ancient history to modern media studies.

Classical Athens, a community of just 200,000 citizens, not only gave birth to some of antiquity's greatest geniuses but also created the world's first democracy, raising political issues that remain relevant today. Complementing his account of The Rise of Rome, Everitt surveys the Athenian achievement, from the early centuries of kings and tyrants, through the democratic revolution and the city's intellectual and artistic flowering in the age of Socrates and Pericles, to its decline with the growth of Macedon.

This handsomely produced abridgement of Gibbon's great work features 28 of the original 71 chapters, with a precis of the remainder. Illustrated with Piranesi's engravings of Rome as Gibbon saw it, the volume also includes additional explanatory notes complementing the author's own and translating those 'licentious passages' which he left 'in the obscurity of a learned language'. Gilt-edged pages and silk marker.

Britain's leading expert on stone circles here offers a comprehensive introduction to our most enigmatic ancient site. He explains how the stones were transported and their relationship with the surrounding burial sites; he carefully examines the possible astronomical meanings of the stones' alignment; and also debunks many myths and inaccurate mystical notions. Each successive generation has developed its own reading of the stones; Burl offers the most up-to-date assessment.

Situated just south of Avebury, Silbury Hill in Wiltshire is Europe's tallest prehistoric structure; when this book was first published in 1976, recent archaeological investigations had suggested that the hill was not, as had previously been believed, a burial mound. Dames surveys the history of earlier digs at the hill, then uses comparative archaeological evidence, astronomy, ethnography, folklore, mathematics and place-name research to argue that the shape of the site represents the Neolithic Great Goddess.

Interpreting Japanese mandalas as sanctified realms where identification between the human and sacred occurs, the author examines 8th- to 17th-century paintings from three traditions: Esoteric Buddhism, Pure Land Buddhism and Shinto.

Much of our knowledge about ancient Egyptian daily life concerns the highest levels of society, but archaeological excavations are now revealing valuable information about workers and their families. Examining this evidence, together with tomb inscriptions and papyri ranging from laundry lists to legal documents, Booth introduces intriguing characters such as the violent drunkard Paneb, the workmen who staged a strike over delayed payment, and Naunakhte, who disinherited her neglectful children.

Writers' lurid tales of their rulers' sex lives are a familiar part of our image of ancient Rome, but how reliable are these accounts and what can such stories tell us about Roman attitudes to sexual behaviour and morality? Drawing on twelve centuries of evidence from literature, inscriptions, graffiti, medical handbooks, legal texts, magic spells and frequently explicit visual arts, this wide-ranging account explores the Roman view of love, marriage, childbirth, homosexuality, prostitution and infidelity.

The Macedonian army created by Philip II's reforms is widely recognized as representing 'one of the most important leaps in military thinking in the West before Napoleon'. However, Karunanithy's comprehensive analysis shows that modern scholarly research has neglected important sources of information about this hugely successful system. He presents the full range of archaeological and literary evidence, investigating such aspects as the army's training and preparation, soldiers' dress and battle equipment, and the logistical support provided by non-combatant specialists.

Written at the close of the fourth century CE, Augustine's Confessions explains how and why he came to abandon a successful secular career to follow a life of prayer and study. In this introductory text, Clark sets the work in the social and intellectual context of late antiquity, discusses its structure, style and purpose and examines the problems of rhetoric and truth posed by Augustine's personal search for his true self.

Using literary criticism and philosophies of history to formulate a new model for reading history, Cosgrove's re-evaluation of Gibbon's magnum opus queries the illusion of authorial omniscience. Slightly off-mint.