Eugénie Sellers Strong: Portrait of an Archaeologist
Stephen L. Dyson (London: Duckworth, 2004) 288 PP., $44.95
Eugénie Sellers Strong (1860–1943) parlayed her keen intelligence, drive and exquisite pre-Raphaelite beauty (Oscar Wilde called her “a young Diana”) into a distinguished career as a classical archaeologist. After graduating from Cambridge—one of the first women in England to receive a university degree—she went on to become the assistant director of the British School at Rome. She was among the first to champion Roman sculpture as more than a pallid reflection of Greek works. But Strong’s legacy has been clouded by her respect for Mussolini’s Fascist regime and its support of ancient Roman archaeology.
Breaking Ground: Pioneering Women Archaeologists
Getzel M. Cohen and Martha Sharp Joukowsky (Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press, 2004) 571 PP., $75
This book examines the lives of a dozen early 20th-century female archaeologists whose excavations ranged from Zimbabwe to Mesopotamia. Some of their names and digs are familiar—Dame Kathleen Kenyon at Jericho, Harriet Boyd Hawes at Minoan Gournia and Dorothy Garrod in the caves of Mount Carmel; others are lesser-known but intrepid scholars who explored sites where no Western woman had ever gone before. Each essay traces the career paths of these pioneering archaeologists and points out the many mentoring relationships that existed between them.
The Rape of the Nile: Tomb Robbers, Tourists, and Archaeologists in Egypt
Brian Fagan (Boulder: Westview Press, 2004) 303 PP., $16.95
Anthropologist Brian Fagan has revised his classic 1975 collection of essays about the adventurers, ruffians and archaeologists who flocked to the Nile to steal and study the wonders of ancient Egypt. Readers are entertained by the gossipy history of Egypt penned by the Greek historian Herodotus, tales of Islamic treasure hunters, and reports on the exploits of 19th-century circus strongman-adventurer Giovanni Belzoni. The author also traces the stirrings of an archaeological conscience along the Nile, detailing the scientific excavations of Sir Flinders Petrie, Auguste Mariette, Howard Carter and other archaeological luminaries.
Archaeologists: Explorers of the Human Past
Brian Fagan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003) 208 PP., $40
Do you want to know when archaeologist Gertrude Bell first shared cups of tea with desert chieftains in the Syrian Desert? Or the route followed by archaeological explorer Aurel Stein as he traveled the Silk Road in Central Asia? Now you can turn to this handy reference book that outlines the lives and achievements of more than 30 leading archaeologists. Black-and-white archival photos, drawings and maps accompany each biography, and a timeline of major archaeological events and a glossary of archaeological terms are appended at the end of the volume.
Eugénie Sellers Strong: Portrait of an Archaeologist
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