Oxbow Books

Oxbow Books is a leading publisher in the fields of archaeology, ancient history and medieval studies, with an international reputation for quality and affordability. Oxbow's archaeology publishing covers all periods from earliest prehistory through classical archaeology, the ancient Near East, Egyptology, the Middle Ages and post-medieval archaeology. They publish a wide variety of books including scholarly monographs, edited collections of papers, and excavation and research reports in related fields such as archaeological practice and theory, archaeozoology, and environmental, landscape and maritime archaeology.

Founded in Oxford in 1983 by academic and museum archaeologist, David Brown, Oxbow Books has evolved and expanded significantly over the years. Now celebrating their 40th anniversary, Oxbow remains dedicated to the quality of their publishing for readers, and the contribution their books bring to the scholarly and professional communities more broadly.

An Examination of Late Assyrian Metalwork Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 330
ISBN: 9781842175071
Pub Date: 31 Dec 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Description:
Although the Assyrian kingdom that dominated the Ancient Near East between the ninth and seventh centuries BC had a rich material culture, attested particularly by the distinctive stone wall reliefs and colossal gateway figures, practically nothing is known about Assyrian metalwork. There has been no previous survey of this subject, largely because most of the material was not accessible. This volume makes available for the first time a vast amount of previously unpublished metalwork, much of it from the Assyrian capital city of Nimrud, excavated first by Sir Henry Layard between 1845 and 1851 and then by the British School of Archaeology in Iraq between 1949 and 1963.
Archaeological Survey and the City Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 288
ISBN: 9781842175095
Pub Date: 31 Dec 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Series: University of Cambridge Museum of Classical Archaeology Monographs
Illustrations: 275 illus.
Description:
In the past 30 years archaeological field survey has become central to the practice of Classical Archaeology. During this time, approaches have developed from the systematic collection of artefacts to include the routine deployment of various geophysical and remote sensing techniques. The ability of archaeologists to reveal the topography of buried urban sites without excavation has now been demonstrated through a wide range of projects across the ancient world.
RRP: £36.00
Living with the Dead Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 208
ISBN: 9781842174937
Pub Date: 31 Dec 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: 75 colour & b/w illustrations,
Description:
Living with the Dead presents a detailed analysis of ancestor worship in Egypt, using a diverse range of material, both archaeological and anthropological, to examine the relationship between the living and the dead. Iconography and terminology associated with the deceased reveal indistinct differences between the blessedness and malevolence and that the potent spirit of the dead required constant propitiation in the form of worship and offerings. A range of evidence is presented for mortuary cults that were in operation throughout Egyptian history and for the various places, such as the house, shrines, chapels and tomb doorways, where the living could interact with the dead.
Well Built Mycenae Fascicule 34.1 Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 65
ISBN: 9781842175286
Pub Date: 31 Dec 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Series: Well Built Mycenae
Description:
Since 1890 when Sir Flinders Petrie first realised the importance of the Aegean pottery he had found in Egypt further discoveries of these wares have been noted with more than superficial interest. Early studies, however, right up to the mid 20th century, had to be based on stylistic, and thus often subjective, criteria. It is only more recently with the development of a range of scientific techniques that it has become possible to make serious attempts to ascertain the exact sources of this imported pottery.
RRP: £30.00
Journal of Roman Pottery Studies Volume 15 Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 288
ISBN: 9781842175002
Pub Date: 01 Dec 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Series: Journal of Roman Pottery Studies
Illustrations: 165 b/w + col illus.
Description:
This volume of JRPS carries a broad range of papers reflecting the detailed ongoing scholarship in the field of Roman pottery studies. There is a marked international dimension to the eleven papers. In part, this simply follows from the extensive geography of the Roman Empire and its influence, yet it also reflects the identification of the Journal of Roman Pottery Studies as a leading vehicle for the publication of quality research in Roman ceramics not only from Roman Britain but from the whole of the Roman Empire.
Rock Art Studies Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 398
ISBN: 9781842174821
Pub Date: 30 Nov 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: A4, b/w illustrations
Description:
This is the fourth in the five-yearly series of surveys of what is happening in rock art studies around the world. The aims are to present a synthesis of the status of rock art research in different regions of the world, provide information about recent projects, publications, prevailing research objectives and methods, and enable rock art researchers to relate their findings in a specific region to mainstream research results. As always, the texts reflect something of the great differences in approach and emphasis that exist in different regions, presenting examples from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the New World.
Embodied Knowledge Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 176
ISBN: 9781842174906
Pub Date: 30 Nov 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: 42 b/w illus
Description:
The body is the main forum for learning about how to do, think and believe and it is a starting point for the granting and forming of many forms of meaning. Fourteen papers explore the relationship between knowledge and the body through a series of historical and archaeological case studies. More specifically, it considers the concept of embodied knowledge by exploring some of the apparent diverse and yet shared forms of what may be called embodied knowledge.
RRP: £36.00
Rock Art and Seascapes in Uppland Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 124
ISBN: 9781842175132
Pub Date: 30 Nov 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Series: Swedish Rock Art Research
Illustrations: col illus
Description:
Rock Art and Seascapes in Uppland presents a fresh approach to the detailed study of a selection of over 80 rock art panels located close to the present coastline of Uppland, Sweden, which include some 2000 ship depictions among the varied figurative art. Using GPS measurement combined with detailed study of the terrain, topography and relative sea level data in order to present accurate maps of the panels, the location and significance of the original positioning of rock art images in relation to their contemporaneous coastline is demonstrated and modelled. The implications in terms of chronology, typology, landscape, social practice and iconography are discussed and new interpretations for the relationship between Bronze Age rock art, shore displacement, settlement and burial sites presented.
RRP: £25.00
Myth and History Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 496
ISBN: 9781842174784
Pub Date: 30 Nov 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w illus throughout
Description:
Our recent understanding of British history has been slowly unravelling thanks to new techniques such as DNA analysis, new archaeological data and reassessment of the literary evidence. There are considerable problems in understanding the early history of Britain; sources for the centuries from the first Roman invasion to 1000 AD are few and contradictory, the archaeological record complex and there is little collaboration or agreement between archaeologists, Roman and Anglo-Saxon historians. A common assumption concerning the development of the English language and, therefore British history, is that there was an invasion from northern Europe in the 5th century, the so-called Anglo-Saxon migration; a model based on the writings of Bede.
RRP: £29.95
Stories from Ancient Egypt Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 112
ISBN: 9781842175057
Pub Date: 31 Oct 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w illus
Description:
Some of the most interesting and entertaining myths and legends from Ancient Egypt are given a lively re-telling by Joyce Tyldesley. These include stories about the gods, such as The Creation of the World, Hathor and the Red Beer, and the myths about Osiris, Isis and Horus. Fairy stories and incredible adventures are represented by The Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor, The Adventures of Sinuhe and The Prince, the Dog, the Snake and the Crocodile, while good and bad behaviour are to be found in Three Magical Stories and The Story of Truth and Falsehood.
A Corridor Through Time Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 304
ISBN: 9781842174234
Pub Date: 30 Sep 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: col & b/w illus
Description:
This volume describes the results of a series of archaeological excavations undertaken in advance of the construction of a new dual carriageway, some 32 km long, across Anglesey. Five main sites and a series of prehistoric burnt mounds are discussed. The route encountered remains of Neolithic pit groups and a possible Late Neolithic ring-ditch; Bronze Age and Iron Age settlement features and a Bronze Age cremation cemetery; Romano-British settlements and a farmstead; an early medieval inhumation cemetery, medieval agricultural features and a corn-drying kiln.
RRP: £35.00
Visualising the Neolithic Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 304
ISBN: 9781842174777
Pub Date: 30 Sep 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Series: Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Papers
Illustrations: b/w illus
Description:
Prehistoric imagery is enigmatic and has been largely overlooked by archaeologists; it is only in the last two decades that it has garnered serious academic attention. This volume addresses this lacuna and discusses visual expression across Neolithic Europe. The papers in this volume result from a meeting of the Neolithic Studies Group on the topic of 'Neolithic visual culture' at the British Museum in November 2010.
Iron Age Ritual, a Hillfort and Evidence for a Minster at Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 184
ISBN: 9781842174845
Pub Date: 28 Sep 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w and colour illustrations
Description:
The excavation of an area within the grounds of the Prebendal, Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, adjacent to the parish church of St Mary's, showed that the town, which lies on a slight spur, is sited within a univallate Iron Age hillfort. Early-Middle Iron Age activity included the creation of a notable ritual area contaning the burials of four children and a young woman, most accompanied by animals; and a 'bone mass' containing animal bone, mostly disarticulated. Within a generation or so of the deposit's creation, within the first half of the 4th century BC, a univallate hillfort was constructed which did not continue into the later Iron Age.
Beyond the Dead Horizon Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 240
ISBN: 9781842174715
Pub Date: 10 Sep 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: 90 col & b/w illus
Description:
The new interdisciplinary study of modern conflict archaeology has developed rapidly over the last decade. Its anthropological approach to modern conflicts, their material culture and their legacies has freed such investigations from the straitjacket of traditional 'battlefield archaeology'. It offers powerful new methodologies and theoretical insights into the nature and experience of industrialised war, whether between nation states or as civil conflict, by individuals as well as groups and by women and children, as well as men of fighting age.
Cyprus: An island culture Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 256
ISBN: 9781842174401
Pub Date: 31 Aug 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w illus
Description:
This volume, introduced by Edgar Peltenburg, presents the results of latest research by young scholars working on aspects of Cypriot archaeology from the Bronze Age to the Venetian period. It presents a diversity excavation, material culture, iconographic and linguistic evidence to explore the themes of ancient landscape, settlement and society; religion, cult and iconography; and Ancient Cyprus and the Mediterranean.
The Crown of Arsinoë II Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 272
ISBN: 9781842174920
Pub Date: 30 Aug 2012
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w & colour illus
Description:
The Crown of Arsinoë II is a detailed study of a unique crown that was created for the Ptolemaic Egyptian Queen Arsinoë II which has important conclusions for ancient Egyptian history. Images of Arsinoë are represented in a broad spectrum of iconographic media, depicting this historical figure in a Greek as well as Egyptian cultural setting, and as queen and goddess alike, though her tomb has never been found. Based on detailed examination of reliefs, the aim is to identify and understand the symbolism that is embedded in each pictorial detail that together form the crown, as well as all contextual aspects of the relief scenes, and how this reflects the wearer's socio-political and religious positions.
RRP: £55.00