The Oxford Illustrated History of Prehistoric Europe (Oxford Illustrated Histories)

Book Overview

When a melting Swiss glacier recently revealed the body of a hunter millennia old, the world sat up and took notice. Here, in his well-preserved arrows, tools, and leather garments (not to mention his own remains) was a rare glimpse of life in prehistoric Europe, and it captured the public imagination. Elsewhere more obvious remnants of the pre-classical past have long been objects of fascination: the megaliths of northwestern Europe, the palaces of Crete, the mysterious cave paintings of France. Now archeologist Barry Cunliffe and a team of distinguished experts shed light on this astonishing, long-silent world in a comprehensive and lavishly illustrated account.
Ranging from the earliest settlements through the emergence of Minoan civilization to the barbarian world at the end of the Roman Empire, The Oxford Illustrated Prehistory of Europe provides a fascinating look at how successive cultures adapted to the landscape of Europe. In synthesizing the diverse findings of archeology, the authors capture the sweeping movements of peoples, the spread of agriculture, the growth of metal working, and the rise and fall of cultures. They provide intriguing insight on the Minoan and the Mycenean past underlying classical Greek history, and on the disasters that destroyed Minoan civilization. They explore the increasingly sophisticated societies of northern Europe, revealing surprisingly far-reaching trade between different areas. The peoples of Bronze Age Denmark, for instance, sent amber to Germany in return for scarce metal, while new technologies spread widely across the continent. The book continues through the end of the Roman Empire, exploring the barbarian world beyond Rome's northern frontier.
For centuries, we knew little of the European civilizations that preceded classical Greece or arose outside of the Roman Empire, beyond ancient myths and the writings of Roman observers. Now the most recent discoveries of archeology have been synthesized into one exciting volume. Featuring hundreds of stunning photographs (many in full color), this book provides the most complete account available of the prehistory of European civilization.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0198143850
• ISBN13: 9780198143857
• Release Date: May 1994
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Length: 568 Pages
• Weight: 3.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.6" x 7.7" x 9.9"

Customer Reviews

Scholarly work

This book was written by a large team of authors, each of whom wrote a particular chapter. I assume, therefore, that they have special expertise in that particular period or subject, and although this work may be a little too dry and scholarly for some, I found it provided excellent coverage and that it was still readable. The book benefits from recent research which the chapter authors discuss, and the illustrations are excellent, with the many pictures of artifacts, works of art, and grave excavations that I hadn't seen before in other works being probably the most striking thing about the book. Also, I would like to compliment the author of the excellent and very detailed discussion of copper and bronze metallurgy, where he discusses the advantages of two-piece castings of hand-axes in the later Bell-Beaker culture using arsenical copper, which aids both hardness and castability, which was very interesting. And in general, the dicussions of archaeological finds relating to improvements in cultural artifacts such as pottery making, metallurgy, weapons, and building techniques are one of the major strengths of the book. Overall, a worthwhile read although possibly a little too dry and technical for many people, and actually, I would give it 4.5 stars if I could.

Very readable and thorough

I am on my second reading of this book as it contains too much info to absorb the first time around. Very good coverage of paleolithic environment and the impact on prehistoric peoples. However, there is virtually no mention of women throughout the entire book. There is almost a complete lack of description of female burials and burial objects, and lack of any attempt to document the role of women in prehistoric times.

Very thorough, very readable

I am only 3/4 of the way through this, but so far I've found it extremely well written and comprehensive. I suppose that professional archeologists or anthropologists might quibble with a few points made by the many contributors, but as a lay person I certainly am finding it a very readable overview of pre-historic humans. Well worth the twenty.

Well-written, beautiful photos and an all-over must read

Having read this book for a class at Indiana University, I found it to be very informative, well-written and accompanied by incredible photos. I throughly recommend it to any student or expert as a wonderful basic research book.

Excellent overview with glaring omissions

What distinguishes this book most is its careful discussion of environmental changes taking place as human society developed. Robert's _The Holocene_ is the only book that does a better job with the environmental history of pre-historic Europe.Cunliffe's collection suffers, however, from a chauvinism that has unfortunately dominated the study of pre-history for decades. He completely ignores the work of Marija Gimbutas, for example, and gives Alexander Marshack only one sentence. Marshack analyzed dozens of curiously marked and carved bones from the Pleistocine and concluded that they were lunar-calibrated time and record keeping devices. As it is impossible to prove this conclusion, the hyper-cautious editor merely alludes to it glancingly.However, the fact that Gimbutas and others excavated tens of thousands of goddess statuettes in Europe in the middle of this book's time frame receives no mention at all-- whhile one of the few statues of a man from this same time period is afforded a photograph and caption describing it as "reminiscent of Rodan's _Thinker_". Ignoring such a huge body of physical evidence makes no sense -- especially not if the editor is trying to stick close to easily provable conclusions, such as that pre-historic Europe worshipped a female diety. One is forced to conclude the editor chose to create history rather than report it.Unfortunately, to my mind, this revisionism calls into question the scholarship overall.