Even Briefer
Dead Tech: A Guide to the Archaeology of Tomorrow
Rolf Steinberg, translated by Michael Stone
(Sierra Club: San Francisco, 1983) 132 pp., $14.95
At last, we thought, here is a book that will tell us about the archaeology of the future. Here we will learn not only about the latest techniques being used today but also about the experimental and embryonic methods that will someday transform archaeology into a more exact science. Here the likely impact of modern technology on the archaeological enterprise will unfold before our very eyes.
Alas, the book is about automobile graveyards. It has nothing to do with archaeology. It is about the nonrecyclable waste of our technological society (the dead tech of the title), the rubber, plastic and broken glass we try unsuccessfully to bury. It is about the debris we will leave for future archaeologists to dig up as evidence of what we were like. What will they conclude? That we were an exotic, grotesque civilization? Perhaps some brash young archaeologist, departing from long-held interpretations, will conclude that the evidence indicates we were always in a great hurry and valued disposability above all.
Despite its subject matter, this is a beautiful book with superb photographs of industrial graveyards throughout the Western world. Some of the decayed hulks of our great feats of engineering resemble nothing so much as absurd mythical creatures. The book is not only beautiful, but is well written and exposes a serious problem. Well worth reading.
Handbook for Biblical Studies
Nicholas Turner
(Westminster Press: Philadelphia, 1982) 144 pp., $6.95 paper
Clergy and laypeople alike will find this recently published reference tool useful and accessible. The author emphatically denies that the book is designed to teach; its purpose is to help readers quickly identify proper names, places and terms when they confront them in Biblical studies. With its glossary of some 1,500 entries—many from Latin, German, Greek and Hebrew—the handbook provides simple and concise meanings for words that are not easy to find elsewhere, particularly by the novice to the field. Besides this extensive glossary, the Handbook for Biblical Studies contains charts and lists including: Archaeological Periods in Palestine, Dating of the Books [of the Bible], Examples of Ancient Scripts, Modern English Bibles and The Jewish Calendar. Interesting even to browse through casually, this volume is a useful addition to the Biblical reference workshelf.
Qaryat al-Fau—A Portrait of Pre-Islamic Civilization in Saudi Arabia
A. R. al-Ansary
(St. Martin’s Press: New York, 1982) 206 pp., $35.00
This is a lavish, stunning production, a 10” × 13” volume that contains 300 color plates, all of impeccable quality. Architectural remains, pottery, glass, jewelry, coins, metalwork, statues, wall paintings, and inscriptions discovered in ten years of excavations at Qaryat al-Fau are presented in separate sections. Strategically located on one of the major trade routes of southwestern Arabia, Qaryat al-Fau was occupied from the second century B.C. to the fifth century A.D. but lost its importance as a trade center with the advent of Islam. Beginning in 1972, a team led by Professor al-Ansary of the University of Riyadh excavated Qaryat extensively. In a brief introductory section, al-Ansary discusses Qaryat’s history and importance and the various finds that came to light there. The rest of the book is given over to the photographs. Plates from the architectural section are duplicated with Arabic captions at the end of the book, presumably because space limitations prevented English and Arabic captions from appearing together. All other sections have side-by-side captions in English and Arabic. One drawback to this otherwise superbly produced book is that notes to architectural floorplans appear only in Arabic. Perhaps this deficiency will be remedied when a planned volume devoted solely to architectural finds appears.
The Nimrud Ivories
Sir Max Mallowan
(British Museum Publications Limited:
London, 1978) 63 pp., $4.65 paper
The great mound of ancient Nimrud, excavated intermittently for more than a century, from 1849 to 1974, has yielded many treasures, none more spectacular than the massive collection of carved ivories. In this small volume, Sir Max Mallowan, famed British archaeologist and husband of novelist Agatha Christie, gives a concise history of the site, in modern Iraq on the Tigris River, which he excavated from 1949 to 1974. Mallowan describes the Assyrian, Phoenician and Syrian styles of these exquisitely crafted figures—some fanciful, some realistic—of humans and animals. The ivories, most of them low and high relief inlays from sumptuous furniture, comprise the largest collection ever found in an ancient city. Although only the cover and frontispiece photographs are in color, most of the 75 black and white illustrations show great detail and depth, making this book an excellent guide to the permanent display of Nimrud ivories in the British Museum.
From Ancient Tablets to Modern Translations
David Evert
(Zondervan Publishing House: Grand Rapids, 1983) 284 pp., $14.95
General introduction to the Bible, weaving the histories of the texts with the stories of the men and women who translated them, some of whom risked their lives to do so. Detailed discussions of more than two dozen English translations and a chapter on choosing among the many English versions.
Dead Tech: A Guide to the Archaeology of Tomorrow
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