A Little History of Archaeology - Brian.M.Fagan - Book Review

 

                    Archaeology and History have always fascinated me from a young age. Even back in my school days, I enjoyed reading about history. For me, archaeologists were adventurous individuals who dug up the earth to uncover entire cities, explore unknown structures, and discover fascinating artefacts. I was the only one in my class who wanted to become one growing up. Well! Life had different plans; but to date, I enjoy both history and archaeology through the books, and documentaries I have come across. Recently I encountered this book and jumped right in to see what it had to offer. 

                    This book talks about the history and evolution of archaeology. The book follows how long ago, this was about robbing artefacts and how the study became systematic to the field of study we see now. Brian, an archaeologist himself takes us to various parts of the world and talks about the ancient discoveries: Egyptian pyramids, Angor Wat, Stonehenge, Jamestown, Mayans, Pompeii, Greater Zimbabwe, Mohandejaro and more. When archaeology seemed a predominantly male-dominated field, there were been few very remarkable females who brought change to the way we see things. The book also introduces them along with some of the world-famous archaeologists who were game-changers in this field and changed the way things were done. Brian also traces the progress of development from shovels to underwater archaeology to state-of-the-art LIDAR technology and satellite imaging.

                    First of all, I simply loved the book. True that this is not a book for everyone. For interested people like me, the book just caters perfectly. To be clear, this book does not talk in-depth about the history behind all those sites. This book is about how archaeology evolved over time and the reader needs to be clear of that. The language was simple enough and the style engaging enough with not much-complicated lingo to hinder the flow. The book is not a quick read and it took me 2 months to finish the book. One cannot maybe finish this in a single read or a couple of them. I am a slow reader when it comes to such topics and did take my sweet time finishing it parallelly taking time to do some further reading or check videos on related topics. At around 290 or 300 pages, you are getting ample facts from the read. But do not expect exhaustive information which this book does not provide. I liked how he set the chapters in chronological order as per the growth of technology in the field. Also, I liked the last chapter which was sort of a quick run-through of what all were told in the book and how archaeology is shaping up in the future.

                    In short, a good book for people interested in the topic of archaeology and history. The book may not be exhaustive but provides a base for a good factual read.