--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Andrew Jarrette" <anjarrette@...> wrote:
>
>
>
> These questions may seem pointless, too many, and maybe confusing -- I
> just want to be informed and satisfy my curiosity so that I can fully
> understand these aspects of IE history. I don't think I will be able
> to do this by scanning the archives, since they are often about
> specific words rather than general IE history.
>
> Andrew
>
I've just been informed of two informative books:
1. "Europe Between the Oceans: 9000 BC-AD 1000 (Hardcover)" by Barry
Cunliffe :
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Cunliffe, emeritus professor of archeology at Oxford,
colorfully weaves history, geography archeology and anthropology into
a mesmerizing tapestry chronicling the development of Europe. The
sheer size of the European coastlines, as well as the inland rivers
pouring into these seas, enabled many groups to move easily from one
place to another and establish cultures that flourished commercially.
Between 2800 and 1300 B.C., for example, Britain, the Nordic states,
Greece and the western Mediterranean states were bound together by
their maritime exchange of bronze, whose use in Britain and Ireland
had spread by 1400 B.C. to Greece and the Aegean. From 800 to 500
B.C.the three hundred years that changed the worldthe Greeks,
Phoenicians, Romans and Carthaginians emerged from relative obscurity
into major empires whose struggles to control the seas were for the
first time recorded in writing. Cunliffe points out that each oceanic
culture developed unique sailing vessels for the kinds of commerce
peculiar to it. Richly told, Cunliffe's tale yields a wealth of
insights into the earliest days of European civilization. Illus.,
maps. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier
Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
"This book is an achievement of astonishing scope: the first to
present the whole prehistory of Europe from the origins of farming to
the rise of urban society with evident authority, and then to go on to
review the Roman world right through to the dawn of the Middle Ages. A
pioneering work of synthesis on a continental scale, this is the first
coherent overview of the origins of Europe which meets the challenge
of treading the path from prehistory into the full light of history.
Only an archaeologist could have written it, yet Professor Cunliffe
has an impressive grasp also of the historical sources for the Roman
world and its aftermath. His easy style should please the general
reader, while the boldness and assurance of his masterly treatment
will challenge and intrigue the specialist." - Lord Colin Renfrew,
Formerly Disney Professor of Archaeology and Director of the McDonald
Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge (Colin
Renfrew )
2. "Prehistory: The Making of the Human Mind (Modern Library
Chronicles) (Hardcover)" by Colin Renfrew:
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
"In this complex, closely argued text, best suited to archaeology
professionals, field giant Renfrew sets forth quite a task, to sum up
the progress of prehistoric archaeology thus far and then explore
current challenges. In Part I, Renfrew surveys the history of the
concept-prehistory refers to the long period of "human existence
before... written records"-and how it developed into a rich field of
study, developing excavation and chronological techniques and coming
to major, sometimes startling conclusions (like the parallel evolution
of distant cultures throughout the world). Part II considers the
prehistory of the human mind-that is, how concepts such as relative
value and social rank came into being. In a compelling but debatable
argument, he finds that sedentarism-permanent residence in one
place-was a pre-requisite for the emergence of material culture.
Ultimately, however, "good local narratives" can be compiled for
societies such as ancient China, Mesopotamia, Egypt and Mesoamerica,
but a unifying model that encompasses their individual trajectories
has yet to be developed; Renfrew regards its development as a major
task for 21st century prehistorians. The value of Renfrew's book is
that it lays out these arguments, with the intent to spur thought,
debate, analysis and, especially, theoretical modeling of social
evolution.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier
Inc. All rights reserved.
Product Description
In Prehistory, the award-winning archaeologist and renowned scholar
Colin Renfrew covers human existence before the advent of written
recordswhich is to say, the overwhelming majority of our time here on
earth. But Renfrew also opens up to discussion, and even debate, the
term "prehistory" itself, giving an incisive, concise, and lively
survey of the past, and how scholars and scientists labor to bring it
to light.
Renfrew begins by looking at prehistory as a discipline, particularly
how developments of the past century and a halfadvances in
archaeology and geology; Darwin's ideas of evolution; discoveries of
artifacts and fossil evidence of our human ancestors; and even more
enlightened museum and collection curatorshiphave fueled continuous
growth in our knowledge of prehistory. He details how breakthroughs
such as radiocarbon dating and DNA analysis have helped us to define
humankind's pasthow things have changedmuch more clearly than was
possible just a half century ago. Answers for why things have changed,
however, continue to elude us, so Renfrew discusses some of the issues
and challenges past and present that confront the study of prehistory
and its investigators.
In the book's second part, Renfrew shifts the narrative focus,
offering a summary of human prehistory from early hominids to the rise
of literate civilization that is refreshingly free from conventional
wisdom and grand "unified" theories. The author's own case studies
encompass a vast geographical and chronological rangethe Orkney
Islands, the Balkans, the Indus Valley, Peru, Ireland, and Chinaand
help to explain the formation and development of agriculture and
centralized societies. He concludes with a fascinating chapter on
early writing systems, "From Prehistory to History."
In this invaluable, brief account of human development prior to the
last four millennia, Colin Renfrew delivers a meticulously researched
and passionately argued chronicle about our life on earth, and our
ongoing quest to understand it."
When I have the opportunity I intend to buy both of these.
Andrew