The Story of English Banknotes
REVIEW BY KK This is a nice short book on the history of the English banknote, and is rather timely, with the era of the banknote seemingly coming to an end as
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Winchester: city of kings
REVIEW BY SIMON ROFFEY Winchester: city of kings presents an authoritative exploration of one of England’s most historic cities, and one that has been the subject of extensive archaeological research. Consequently, this
Landscape and Society in Dumnonia
REVIEW BY JACQUELINE A NOWAKOWSKI Diligent reporting of a dispersed hoard of more than 50 Roman coins by metal-detectorists to the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS) in 2009 led to a major landscape
Delta Reports 1: Research in the cultural history of the Ancient Egyptian Nile Delta
REVIEW BY SARAH GRIFFITHS ‘Without the Nile Delta, ancient Egyptian culture could not have emerged’. This bold statement begins the first of a new series of volumes that aims to publish more
Christianity and Monasticism in Upper Egypt – Volume 1: Akhmim and Sohag
REVIEW BY MICHAEL TUNNICLIFFE This is a paperback edition of a work following the Third International Symposium on Christianity and Monasticism in Upper Egypt. There is a particular focus on the life
Visualizing Egypt: European Travel, Book Publishing, and the Commercialization of the Middle East in the Nineteenth Century
REVIEW BY CAMPBELL PRICE This book takes as its subject a relatively unusual theme: books written about Egypt. But it is one that will probably interest Egyptophiles because many of us are
Threads of Contact: Tracing the relationship between Egypt and the Southern Levant through textile tools
REVIEW BY HILARY WILSON Spinning and weaving are among the earliest ancient technologies, and implements used in textile production turn up in archaeological excavations worldwide. Introducing this volume, part of Oxbow’s ‘Ancient
Ancient Egypt in 50 Discoveries: Highlights from the first century of the Egypt Exploration Society
REVIEW BY SARAH GRIFFITHS This new publication developed from the first Egypt Exploration Society online course, taught in 2020, and includes contributions from 26 international experts. The book presents a curated journey
Community, Technology and Tradition: a social prehistory of the Great Orme Mine
REVIEW BY PAUL T CRADDOCK This is a very thorough description of every aspect of the prehistoric copper mines on the Great Orme at Llandudno. It is also an attempt to recreate
Floreat Salopia: a celebration of Shropshire’s history and archaeology
REVIEW BY BRANDON BRAUN The Latin motto for Shropshire – Floreat Salopia, ‘may Shropshire flourish’ – has been used since at least the 17th century, so it is a fitting title for
Cat Tales: A History
REVIEW BY CH Dogs may be ‘man’s best friend’, but cats also share a long relationship with humans – a tale (tail?) that archaeologist Jerry Moore recounts in this absorbing overview, covering
Living and Dying in a Lancashire Cotton Town
REVIEW BY REBECCA GOWLAND The town of Blackburn in Lancashire was a key player in Britain’s industrial cotton boom, which saw a quadrupling of its inhabitants during the first half of the
Landscapes of Kingship in Early Medieval Ireland, AD 400-1150
REVIEW BY FINBAR McCORMICK This book is the first interdisciplinary analysis of early Irish kingship based on both historical and archaeological sources; it was formerly the preserve of just historians. This new
Defined by Stones: 50 extraordinary rocky places that connect our prehistoric ancestors to northern landscapes
REVIEW BY ROB IXER This is the second landscape book by Jackson to be published this year and is in many respects a prequel to his earlier Rocks on the Edge of
Reframing the ‘Desert Frontier’: studies in the ancient Near East and northern Arabia in honour of David Kennedy
REVIEW BY MATTHEW SYMONDS This volume honours Professor David Kennedy, a pioneering scholar of ancient Arabia and Rome’s eastern frontier, by bringing together 21 scholarly contributions examining both the archaeology of the
Ice Age art now
REVIEW BY OSCAR MORO ABADIA This publication was created to accompany the British Museum Partnership Exhibition Ice Age art now, held at Cliffe Castle Museum in summer 2025. The exhibition showcased the
Between Two Rivers: ancient Mesopotamia and the birth of history
REVIEW BY TIMOTHY MATNEY The academic world inhabited by Sumerologists and Assyriologists is highly specialised and largely inaccessible for even the hardiest lovers of history. The texts themselves are fragmentary, often pieced
Battle of the Arctic: the maritime epic of World War Two
REVIEW BY NICK HEWITT Developing a fresh interpretation for a well-charted subject area is always a challenge, as this reviewer knows only too well. I therefore approached Hugh Sebag-Montefiore’s reconsideration of the
Mavericks: empire, oil, revolution and the forgotten battle of World War One
REVIEW BY JONATHAN EATON Despite the vast literature on the First World War, there remain important aspects of the conflict that have yet to be fully explored. In recent years, a series
Soviet Secret Police Chiefs, 1917-1953: commissars of fear
REVIEW BY ANDRÉ VAN LOON To get straight to the point: the strength of Soviet Secret Police Chiefs lies in its weakness. It is an engrossing read and yet a partial historical