Stories from the Landscape: Archaeologies of Inhabitation

This book is principally about landscape archaeology, and how people experience the world around them. The authors of these highly original and varied 19 chapters/papers use the term landscape in its broadest possible sense to describe the entire material, spiritual and emotional world of people in the past. Thus, human artefacts such as tools or pottery vessels are as much part of landscapes as 'natural' features such as rocks and mountains, rivers and lakes. Buildings, towns and cities, trackways and roads, animals and plants – all of these form part of the human experience of landscapes, as do memories, myths, and stories. In fact, trying to define landscape archaeology can often prove as elusive as attempting definitions of landscape itself. Many archaeologists have argued for a much closer integration of artefactual, contextual and visual information within the text, and for ways of writing that transcend the limitations of conventional reports; the authors have therefore produced a different kind of archaeology book. Some of these papers are highly interpretative, but are based on solid, well-recorded empirical fieldwork carried out by the authors or others. Some papers are more experimental explorations of how landscapes are inhabited and viewed. Throughout the volume however, the contributors combine innovative ways of writing about the past with much greater and more integrated use of photographs and drawings. These images have a dynamic relationship with the text, and are themselves powerful statements of meaning, part of a dynamic dialogue. They do not merely supplement or complement the text, but are integral to our explorations of inhabitation and identity, space and place. Some images are meant to be challenging, or even unsettling, but we also hope that they will make the reading of this book a richer and more sensual experience as a result.