A, A'

It is that time of the year again and even more books have arrived on the Book Review Editor?s desk but will, for one reason or another, not be reviewed in the European Journal of Archaeology.

Lynn Gamble (2008) The Chumash World at European Contact. Power, Trade and Feasting Among Complex Hunter-Gatherers. Berkeley etc: University of California Press. Hbk, 365pp., 50 figs, ISBN 978-0-520-25441-1. £29.95.

This book is about Native Californians at the time the Spanish explorers and missionaries arrived in 1769. Thomas Blackburn?s endorsement on the dust jacket is however so generic that it is worthless. He claims that this book ?is a major achievement that will be required reading and a fundamental reference in a variety of disciplines for years to come.? Maybe so…

Peter Hiscock (2008) Archaeology of Ancient Australia. London and New York: Routledge. Pbk, 338 pp., ca 100 figs. ISBN 978-0-415-33811-0.

Routledge writes: “The Archaeology of Ancient Australia demonstrates with an array of illustrations and clear descriptions of key archaeological evidence from Australia a thorough evaluation of Australian prehistory. Readers are shown how this human past can be reconstructed from archaeological evidence, supplemented by information from genetics, environmental sciences, anthropology, and history.”

Simon Esmonde Cleary (2008) Rome in the Pyrenees. Lugdunum and the Convenae from the first century BC to the seventh century AD. London and New York: Routledge. Hbk, 180pp., ca 40 figs., ISBN 978-0-415-42686-2. £60.

Oxbow writes: In this study the author draws on his own excavation work as well as that of others to trace the development of the small Roman town of Lugdunum (present day St-Bertrand-de-Comminges) in the Pyrenees from its foundation down to the Frankish siege of 585. The book is intended both as a general guide to the excavations to demonstrate what archaeology can tell us about a town, and as a case study for the development of a Roman town and its hinterland during this extended period. I write: For every one of the 180 pages of this little book Routledge charges approx 50 cent.