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 Encyclopedia of Ancient Asian Civilizations.
Encyclopedia of Ancient Asian Civilizations.
Author: Charles F.W.Higham
Encyclopedia of Ancient Asian Civilizations.
Facts On File
2004 г.
Format: PDF
Size: 5 mb

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 Egypt's Making: The Origins of Ancient Egypt 5000-2000 BC
Egypt's Making: The Origins of Ancient Egypt 5000-2000 BC
Egypt's Making: The Origins of Ancient Egypt 5000-2000 BC
Author: Michael Rice
Routledge
2003
Pages: 312
ISBN: 0-415-26874-5; 0-415-26875-3
Format: PDF
Quality: Good
Language: English
Size: 9,18 mb

Examines Egyptian history from c.5000 BC to c. 2000 BC down to the collapse of the old kingdom, showing in particular how the art of the period throws light on the psychology of the people and explores the essentially African nature of Egyptian society, institutions, and art.

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 Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt
Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt
Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt
Author: Emily Teeter
Cambridge University Press
2011
ISBN: 9780521848558
Pages: 285
Language: English
Format: PDF (e-book)
Size: 38 MB

This book is a vivid reconstruction of the practical aspects of ancient Egyptian religion. Through an examination of artifacts and inscriptions, the text explores a variety of issues. For example, who was allowed to enter the temples, and what rituals were preformed therein? Who served as priests? How were they organized and trained, and what did they do? What was the Egyptians' attitude toward death, and what happened at funerals? How did the living and dead communicate? In what ways could people communicate with the gods? What impact did religion have on the economy and longevity of the society? This book demystifies Egyptian religion, exploring what it meant to the people and society. The text is richly illustrated with images of rituals and religious objects.

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 Delphi: A History of the Center of the Ancient World
Delphi: A History of the Center of the Ancient World
Author: Michael Scott
Delphi: A History of the Center of the Ancient World
Princeton Univepsity Press
2014
ISBN: 0691150818
Format: EPUB
Size: 5,7 МБ
Language: English
Pages: 448
The oracle and sanctuary of the Greek god Apollo at Delphi were known as the "omphalos"--the "center" or "navel"--of the ancient world for more than 1000 years. Individuals, city leaders, and kings came from all over the Mediterranean and beyond to consult Delphi's oracular priestess; to set up monuments to the gods in gold, ivory, bronze, marble, and stone; and to take part in athletic and musical competitions. This book provides the first comprehensive narrative history of this extraordinary sanctuary and city, from its founding to its modern rediscovery, to show more clearly than ever before why Delphi was one of the most important places in the ancient world for so long.
A unique window into the center of the ancient world, Delphi will appeal to general readers, tourists, students, and specialists.

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 Roman Portraits
Roman Portraits
Roman Portraits
Author: Jiri Frel
J. Paul Getty Museum
1981
ISBN: 0866590048
Pages: 144
Language: English
Format: PDF
Size: 11 MB

Portraits, sometimes crude in their realism or gripping in the sense of a living person, were one of the great achievements of Roman Art. The collection of one hundred portraits in the Getty Museum is one of the largest in the world. Dr. Frel surveys the history of Roman portrait art in an often controversial introduction on the purpose of portraits in Roman life and society, continuing his arguments through the catalogue analyses of the individual pieces. The occasion for the book was a loan exhibition of the portraits to the Philbrook Art Center in Tulsa. This lavishly illustrated book presents a discussion of the principal views and the uses of the portrait in ancient times. The photographs include unusual views of the back and profiles of many portraits to show the care with which they were created and their damage and reworking over the centuries. The catalogue also includes five portraits that are late evocations of the antique and outright forgeries.

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 The Magnificent Maya
The Magnificent Maya
Author: Collective
The Magnificent Maya (Lost Civilizations Series)
Time-Life Books
1993
Format: PDF
Pages: 176
Language: English
Size: 25.6 MB

The Magnificent Maya is one of twenty-four volumes in the Time-Life book series Lost Civilizations. This series explores the worlds of the past, using the finds of archaeologists and other scientists to bring ancient peoples and their cultures vividly to life. This volume presents the history and archaeology of Mayan civilization between 1000 B.C. and A.D. 1500.

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 The Greek and Persian Wars 500-323 bc
The Greek and Persian Wars 500-323 bc
Author: Jack Cassin-scott
The Greek and Persian Wars 500-323 bc (Men-at-Arms 69)
Osprey Publishing Ltd
1977
Format: Pdf
Size: 50 Mb
Language: English

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 Great Ages of Man - African Kingdoms
Great Ages of Man - African Kingdoms
Author: Basil Davidson
Great Ages of Man - African Kingdoms
Time-Life Books
1973
Format: PDF
Pages: 198
Language: English
Size: 26.3 MB

This belongs to that glorious Time-Life series of books from the mid-'60s called the Great Ages of Man. It is a good place to start for the beginner who wants to get a basic grasp of African history and culture. African Kingdoms definitely does a good job at giving the reader a good strong impression of African life, particularly in the pre-colonial era (although the last chapter does touch on colonialism). Impression of African life leaves you with gives you a good foundation from which to launch onwards to something more detailed and comprehensive. The illustrations and photos are wonderful, and really add to the book.

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 The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium
The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium
Author: Alexander P. Kazhdan
The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium (Volume 3)
Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0195046528
1991
Format: PDF
Size: 69,0 МБ
Language: English
Pages: 2366
The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium is a three-volume, comprehensive dictionary of Byzantine civilization. The first resource of its kind in the field, it features over 5,000 entries written by an international group of eminent Byzantinists covering all aspects of life in the Byzantine world. According to Alexander Kazhdan, editor-in-chief of the Dictionary: "Entries on patriarchy and emperors will coexist with entries on surgery and musical instruments.

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 And Man Created God: Kings, Cults and Conquests at the Time of Jesus
And Man Created God: Kings, Cults and Conquests at the Time of Jesus
Author: Selina O'Grady
And Man Created God: Kings, Cults and Conquests at the Time of Jesus
ATLANTIC BOOKS
2012
Format: epub/pdf
Size: 5.3 Mb
Language: English

At the time of Jesus’ birth , the world was full of gods. Thousands of them jostled, competed and merged with one another. In Syria ecstatic devotees castrated themselves in the streets to become priests of Atargatis In Galilee, holy men turned oil into wine, healed the sick, drove out devils, and claimed to be the Messiah. Every day thousands of people were leaving their family and tribes behind them and flocking into brand new multi-ethnic cities. The ancient world was in ferment as it underwent the first phase of globalisation, and in this ferment rulers and ruled turned to religion as a source of order and stability. Augustus, the first emperor of Rome (though he never dared officially to call himself so) was maneuvering his way to becoming worshipped as a god – it was one of the most brilliant makeovers ever undertaken by a ruler and his spin doctors. In North Africa, Amanirenas the warrior queen exploited her god-like status to inspire her armies to face and defeat Rome. In China the usurper Wang Mang won and lost his throne because of his obsession with Confucianism.

To explore the power that religious belief has had over societies through the ages, Selina O’Grady takes the reader on a dazzling journey across the empires of the ancient world and introduces us to rulers, merchants, messiahs, priests and holy men. Throughout, she seeks to answer why, amongst the countless religious options available, the empires at the time of Jesus ‘chose’ the religions they did? Why did China’s rulers hitch their fate to Confucianism, a philosophy more than a religion? And why was a tiny Jewish cult led by Jesus eventually adopted by Rome’s emperors rather than the cult of Isis which was far more popular and widespread? The Jesus cult , followed by no more than 100 people at the time of his death, should, by rights, have disappeared in a few generations. Instead it became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Why did Christianity grow so quickly to become the predominant world religion? What was it about its teachings that so appealed to people? And Man Created God looks at why and how religions have had such an immense impact on human history and in doing so uncovers the ineradicable connection between politics and religion - a connection which still defines us in our own age. This is an important, thrilling and necessary new work of history.

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 The Ancient Giants Who Ruled America: The Missing Skeletons and the Great Smithsonian Cover-Up
The Ancient Giants Who Ruled America: The Missing Skeletons and the Great Smithsonian Cover-Up
Author: Richard J. Dewhurst
The Ancient Giants Who Ruled America: The Missing Skeletons and the Great Smithsonian Cover-Up
Bear & Company
2013
Format: epub/pdf
Size: 16.1 Mb
Language: English

A study of the substantial evidence for a former race of giants in North America and its 150-year suppression by the Smithsonian Institution
- Shows how thousands of giant skeletons have been found, particularly in the Mississippi Valley, as well as the ruins of the giants’ cities
- Explores 400 years of giant finds, including newspaper articles, first person accounts, state historical records, and illustrated field reports
- Reveals the Stonehenge-era megalithic burial complex on Catalina Island with over 4,000 giant skeletons, including kings more than 9 feet tall
- Includes more than 100 rare photographs and illustrations of the lost evidence
Drawing on 400 years of newspaper articles and photos, first person accounts, state historical records, and illustrated field reports, Richard J. Dewhurst reveals not only that North America was once ruled by an advanced race of giants but also that the Smithsonian has been actively suppressing the physical evidence for nearly 150 years. He shows how thousands of giant skeletons have been unearthed at Mound Builder sites across the continent, only to disappear from the historical record. He examines other concealed giant discoveries, such as the giant mummies found in Spirit Cave, Nevada, wrapped in fine textiles and dating to 8000 BCE; the hundreds of red-haired bog mummies found at sinkhole “cenotes” on the west coast of Florida and dating to 7500 BCE; and the ruins of the giants’ cities with populations in excess of 100,000 in Arizona, Oklahoma, Alabama, and Louisiana.

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 A Journey Through Ancient China. From the Neolithic to the Ming
A Journey Through Ancient China. From the Neolithic to the Ming
Author: Wang Fangzi and Nebojsa Tomasevic
A Journey Through Ancient China. From the Neolithic to the Ming
Gallery Books
1985
Format: PDF
Pages: 284
Language: English
Size: 54 MB

A Journey Through Ancient China takes the reader on a voyage of discovery from the Neolithic Age to the Ming Dynasty of the seventeenth century. It is the most lavishly illustrated book to be published on the wonders of Chinese archeology. It reveals and illustrates the ten most remarkable archeological sites unearthed in China since 1949. Spectacular exhibitions of some of these discoveries have circled the globe in the past few years, displaying the unbelievably rich heritage of the oldest continuous civilization on earth-but here in one volume are the most remarkable of these works of art together with those never publicly exhibited.

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 Alexander to Constantine: Archaeology of the Land of the Bible, Volume III
Alexander to Constantine: Archaeology of the Land of the Bible, Volume III
Author: Eric M. Meyers, Mark A. Chancey
Alexander to Constantine: Archaeology of the Land of the Bible, Volume III (The Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library)
Yale University Press
2014
Format: PDF
Size: 12.1 Mb
Language: English

This comprehensive and richly illustrated book explores the archaeological record of the land of the Bible from its conquest by Alexander the Great in the fourth century B.C.E. until the reign of the Roman Emperor Constantine in the fourth century C.E. Unique in its focus on the region's archaeology during the crucial Graeco-Roman era, the book offers an excellent overview of a tumultuous period in world history. It also presents new insights into the evolution of Judaism and Christianity, drawing on the most recently uncovered archaeological evidence and ancient literary sources. Eric M. Meyers and Mark A. Chancey describe Hellenism as the main vehicle for the transformation of early Judaism and early Christianity in material culture and sacred traditions. The authors provide detailed discussions of the emergence of the two as sister religions, indistinguishable in many respects for centuries, then discuss how Judaism and Christianity developed in separate ways, especially after the rise of imperial Christianity with Emperor Constantine. A treasury of information coupled with brilliant insights, this book has much to offer scholar, student and general reader alike.

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 The Roman Revolution of Constantine
The Roman Revolution of Constantine
Author: Raymond Van Dam
Cambridge
2005
458
Format: pdf
Size: 5 mb
Language: english

The reign of the emperor Constantine (306–337) was as revolutionary for the transformation of Rome’s Mediterranean empire as that of Augustus, the first emperor three centuries earlier. The abandonment of Rome signaled the increasing importance of frontier zones in northern and central Europe and the Middle East. The foundation of Constantinople as a new imperial residence and the rise of Greek as the language of administration previewed the establishment of a separate eastern Roman empire. Constantine’s patronage of Christianity required both a new theology of the Christian Trinity and a new political image of a Christian emperor. Raymond Van Dam explores and interprets each of these events. His book complements accounts of the role of Christianity by highlighting ideological and cultural aspects of the transition to a post-Roman world.

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 Archaeology, Artifacts and Antiquities of the Ancient Near East
Archaeology, Artifacts and Antiquities of the Ancient Near East
: Archaeology, Artifacts and Antiquities of the Ancient Near East (Culture and History of the Ancient Near East)
Author : Oscar White Muscarella
Brill
: 2013
ISBN: 9789004236660
Pages: 1088
Format : PDF
Size : 21,4 MB
Language : English

Archaeology, Artifacts and Antiquities of the Ancient Near East" follows the evolution of Oscar White Muscarella s scholarly work and interests and is divided into several categories of interrelated fields.
“When asked by Jennifer Pavelko of Brill USA to compile a volume of my past articles, on the model of the two volumes of Irene Winter’s outstanding scholarship published by Brill, I was of course flattered. And then began the difficult task of decision making. Given the limitation of approximately forty articles to be selected by me, I had first to examine my curriculum vita and make a list of which to choose. When I reached fifty articles I was obliged to refocus my mind and eliminate ten of them. This exercise was fortunate, I believe, for it forced me not merely to focus on works that to my mind reflect a diachronic compendium of my decades of writing, but concomitantly, and as objectively as possible, to contemplate the very nature and thrusts of my work as a whole. The scope of my research and writing has widened from the “pure” archaeological work of excavation reports and artifact analyses to include a sharpened interest in the vast number of unexcavated antiquities—and, as I came to realize, of forgeries—as well as associated cultural phenomena that often run contrary to archaeological goals.”

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 The Trojan War: A New History
The Trojan War: A New History
Author: Barry Strauss
The Trojan War: A New History
Simon & Schuster
2006
Format: epub/pdf
Size: 3 Mb
Language: English

The Trojan War is the most famous conflict in history, the subject of Homer's Iliad, one of the cornerstones of Western literature. Although many readers know that this literary masterwork is based on actual events, there is disagreement about how much of Homer's tale is true. Drawing on recent archeological research, historian and classicist Barry Strauss explains what really happened in Troy more than 3,000 years ago.
For many years it was thought that Troy was an insignificant place that never had a chance against the Greek warriors who laid siege and overwhelmed the city. In the old view, the conflict was decided by duels between champions on the plain of Troy. Today we know that Troy was indeed a large and prosperous city, just as Homer said. The Trojans themselves were not Greeks but vassals of the powerful Hittite Empire to the east in modern-day Turkey, and they probably spoke a Hittite-related language called Luwian. The Trojan War was most likely the culmination of a long feud over power, wealth, and honor in western Turkey and the offshore islands. The war itself was mainly a low-intensity conflict, a series of raids on neighboring towns and lands. It seems unlikely that there was ever a siege of Troy; rather some sort of trick -- perhaps involving a wooden horse -- allowed the Greeks to take the city.
Strauss shows us where Homer nods, and sometimes exaggerates and distorts, as well. He puts the Trojan War into the context of its time, explaining the strategies and tactics that both sides used, and compares the war to contemporary battles elsewhere in the eastern Mediterranean. With his vivid reconstructions of the conflict and his insights into the famous characters and events of Homer's great epic, Strauss masterfully tells the story of the fall of Troy as history without losing the poetry and grandeur that continue to draw readers to this ancient tale.

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 New Perspectives on Ezra-Nehemiah: History and Historiography, Text, Literature, and Interpretation
New Perspectives on Ezra-Nehemiah: History and Historiography, Text, Literature, and Interpretation
Author: Isaac Kalimi
New Perspectives on Ezra-Nehemiah: History and Historiography, Text, Literature, and Interpretation
Eisenbrauns
2012
Format: PDF
Size: 11.6 Mb
Language: English

New Perspectives on Ezra–Nehemiah offers a range of fresh, current views among scholars on the biblical books of Ezra and Nehemiah (traditionally, “Ezra”). These books focus on two short periods in the history of Judah in the Persian era: one recounts the events from the Cyrus Decree in 538 b.c.e. until the inauguration of the Second Temple in 515 b.c.e.; the other relates the acts of the Judean spiritual and political leaders, Ezra and Nehemiah, roughly two generations later, under the rule of Artaxerxes I, king of Persia. Ezra/Ezra–Nehemiah certainly remains the most significant written source for the study of the religious, social, and political aspects of Judah (and to some extent Samaria) in the Persian age, even in light of other biblical prophetical, literary, and historical writings from the Persian period (for example, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, Chronicles, and Esther) and enlightening archaeological and epigraphical finds (for example, Elephantine and Wadi-Dalia papyri, short inscriptions, coins, seals, and bullae). Ezra–Nehemiah also presents unique instances of the literary genre memoir, late biblical historiography, and late Hebrew language.

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 Royal Annals of Ancient Egypt
Royal Annals of Ancient Egypt
Author: Wilkinson, Toby A. H. Wilkinson
Royal Annals of Ancient Egypt
Routledge
ISBN: 0710306679
2000
Format: PDF
Size: 20,7 МБ
Language: English
Pages: 320
The kings of ancient Egypt's first five dynasties were responsible for the creation of a unique and enduring civilisation, epitomised by its most impressive monuments, the pyramids. Yet what do we know about the reigns of these kings?
Excavations have revealed much; but Egyptology has always been blessed with another rich source of information, the written texts and inscriptions composed by the ancient Egyptians themselves.
For the history of the first five dynasties, one particular series of inscriptions has always been of prime importance. This is the collection of inscribed, stone fragments known as the royal annals. Now divided between museums in Palermo, Cairo and London, these documents from ancient Egypt have been the focus of countless studies in the century or so since they first came to light. For they seem to record the reigns of Egypt's early kings on a reign-by-reign, year-by-year basis. The information they contain has been translated, interpreted and re-interpreted by generations of Egyptologists, in the hope of achieving a better understanding of the first great period of ancient Egyptian history. And yet amazingly for such crucial documents, no complete edition of all seven surviving fragments has ever been published. Royal Annals fills this gap. The text is accompanied by specially-commissioned, detailed line-drawings of all the fragments.

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 The Inventions of Leonardo da Vinci
The Inventions of Leonardo da Vinci
Author: Charles-Gibbs Smith
The Inventions of Leonardo da Vinci
Charles Scribner's Sons
1978
Format: PDF
Pages: 116
Language: English
Size: 71 MB

As an inventor Leonardo was an astonishing genius. Although he lived over 450 years ago he foresaw the coming of advanced technology , and filled his notebooks with thousands of drawings for new machines and weapons, many of which anticipate twentieth-century engineering techniques. We see him designing armoured tanks, steam guns, ballistic missiles, flying machines, parachutes, helicopters, underwater diving suits, water turbines, movable cranes, lifting jacks, gearboxes. Each of his inventions is a continuous source of wonder and excitement, displaying both Leonardo's awesome intelligence and an incredible anticipation of the future. An expert commentary by Charles Gibbs-Smith and Gareth Rees, who wrote many of the captions, guides us to a fuller understanding of the design ideas behind the inventions, and the clarity and enthusiasm of their text make this an ideal reference book for the historian of technology or the would-he inventor. Also included in this book are some of Leonardo's beautiful drawings from nature.

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