"From an acclaimed archaeological writer, a worldwide history of hunting
Hunting is one of humanity's most ancient and universal activities. It has been embedded in every facet of our lives, shaping social bonds, power hierarchies, and interactions with the spirit world. This book tells the story of how hunting evolved from a means of survival practiced with clubs and spears to a genteel display of royal power, and how it has become, in today's world, complicated and hotly contested.
In this wide-ranging study, Brian Fagan discusses how Neanderthals stalked prey and killed at close range, how hunting evolved as a political spectacle, and how commercial and trophy hunting precipitated an ecological crisis. He invites us to hunt with Charlemagne, explains how there was more to the demise of North American bison herds than rifles, and describes how influential figures such as John Muir, George Bird Grinnell, and Theodore Roosevelt fought for conservation during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Filled with lively stories, fascinating discoveries, and compelling characters, Fagan's exploration of hunting―a companion to his Fishing―offers an informed and entertaining history of an essential human pursuit."
"Pulling back the covers on the fascinating, yet often forgotten, history of the bed
Louis XIV ruled France from his bedchamber. Winston Churchill governed Britain from his during World War II. Travelers routinely used to bed down with complete strangers, and whole families shared beds in many preindustrial households. Beds were expensive items—and often for show. Tutankhamun was buried on a golden bed, wealthy Greeks were sent to the afterlife on dining beds, and deceased middle-class Victorians were propped up on beds in their parlors.
In this sweeping social history that covers the past seventy thousand years, Brian Fagan and Nadia Durrani look at the endlessly varied role of the bed through time. This was a place for sex, death, childbirth, storytelling, and sociability as well as sleeping. But who did what with whom, why, and how could vary incredibly depending on the time and place. It is only in the modern era that the bed has transformed into a private, hidden zone, and its rich social history has largely been forgotten."
"The scandalous rape of Ancient Egypt is a historical vignette of greed, vanity, and dedicated archaeological research. It is a tale vividly told by renowned archaeology author Brian Fagan, with characters that include the ancient historian Herodotus; Theban tomb robbers; obelisk-stealing Romans; Coptic Christians determined to erase the heretical past; mummy traders; leisured antiquarians; major European museums; Giovanni Belzoni, a circus strongman who removed more antiquities than Napoleon’s armies; shrewd consuls and ruthless pashas; and archaeologists such as Sir Flinders Petrie who changed the course of Egyptology.
This is the first thoroughly revised edition of The Rape of the Nile—Fagan’s classic account of the cavalcade of archaeologists, thieves, and sightseers who have flocked to the Nile Valley since ancient times. Featured in this edition are new accounts of stunning recent discoveries, including the Royal Tombs of Tanis, the Valley of Golden Mummies at Bahariya, the Tomb of the Sons of Ramses, and the sunken city of Alexandria (whose lighthouse was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World). Fagan concludes with a clear-eyed assessment of the impact of modern mass tourism on archaeological sites and artifacts."
"The Little Ice Age tells the story of the turbulent, unpredictable, and often very cold years of modern European history, how climate altered historical events, and what they mean in the context of today’s global warming.
Only in the last decade have climatologists developed an accurate picture of yearly climate conditions in historical times. This development confirmed a long-standing suspicion: that the world endured a 500-year cold snap, a little ice age, that lasted roughly from AD 1300 until 1850.
With its basis in cutting-edge science, The Little Ice Age offers a new perspective on familiar events. Renowned archaeologist Brian Fagan shows how the increasing cold affected Norse exploration; how changing sea temperatures caused English and Basque fishermen to follow vast shoals of cod all the way to the New World; how a generations-long subsistence crisis in France contributed to social disintegration and ultimately revolution; and how English efforts to improve farm productivity in the face of a deteriorating climate helped pave the way for the Industrial Revolution and hence for global warming.
This is a fascinating, original book for anyone interested in history, climate, or the new subject of how they interact."
"For more than a century we’ve known that much of human evolution occurred in an Ice Age. Starting about fifteen thousand years ago, temperatures began to rise, the glaciers receded, and sea levels rose. The rise of human civilization and all of recorded history occurred in this warm period, known as the Holocene. Until very recently we had no detailed record of climate changes during the Holocene.
Now we do. In this engrossing and captivating look at the human effects of climate variability, Brian Fagan shows how climate functioned as what the historian Paul Kennedy described as one of the “deeper transformations” of history—a more important historical factor than we understand."
"A thirty-thousand-year history of the relationship between climate and civilization that teaches powerful lessons about how humankind can survive. Man-made climate change may have began in the last two hundred years, but humankind has witnessed many eras of climate instability. The results have not always been pretty: once-mighty civilizations felled by pestilence and glacial melt and drought. But we have one powerful advantage as we face our current crisis: history. The study of ancient climates has advanced tremendously in the past ten years, to the point where we can now reconstruct seasonal weather going back thousands of years, and see just how civilizations and nature interacted. The lesson is clear: the societies that survive are the ones that plan ahead. Climate Chaos is thus a book about saving ourselves. Brian Fagan and Nadia Durrani show in remarkable detail what it was like to battle our climate over centuries, and offer us a path to safer and healthier future."
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