Relic Hunters

Relic Hunters

Author: James E. Snead

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2018-08-30

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 0191055891

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Relic Hunters is a study of the complex relationship between the people of 19th century America with the material antiquities of North America's indigenous past. As scholars struggled to explain their existence, farmers in Ohio were plowing up arrowheads, building their houses atop burial mounds, and developing their own ideas about antiquity. They experienced the new country as a "place with history" reflected in material traces that became important touch points for scientific knowledge, but for American cultural identity as well. Relic Hunters traces the encounter with American antiquities from 1812 to 1879. This encompasses the period when archaeology took root in the United States: it also spans the "deep settlement" of the Midwest and sectional strife both before and after the Civil War. At the center of the story is the first iconic find of American archaeology, known as "the Kentucky Mummy." Discovered deep in a cavern, this dessicated burial became the subject of scholarly competition, traveling exhibitions, and even poetry. The book uses the theme of the Kentucky Mummy to structure the broader story of the public and American antiquities, a tour that leads through rural museums, mound excavations, lecture tours, shady deals, and ultimately into the famous attic of the Smithsonian Institution. Ultimately, Relic Hunters is a story of the American landscape, and of the role of archaeology in shaping that place. Derived from letters, memoranda, and reports found in more than a dozen archives, this is a unique account of a critical encounter that shaped local and national identity in ways that are only now being explored.


End of Story

End of Story

Author: Elizabeth Spann Craig

Publisher: Elizabeth Spann Craig

Published: 2023-07-25

Total Pages: 199

ISBN-13: 1955395268

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A novel way to die. When Ann's boyfriend Grayson inherits a surprise legacy, the couple heads to historic Charleston for a much-needed vacation. Not only does Grayson adore the city, but Ann's college roommate, now a librarian, has extended an invitation for them to stay with her. As they explore the picturesque streets and soak in the rich culture, Ann and Grayson couldn't be happier. But their idyllic getaway takes a turn for the worse when her former roommate's brother is found dead in the library. Determined to uncover the truth and bring the killer to justice, Ann sets out to investigate. With Grayson's help, Ann unearths clues and unravels a web of deception. Will she be able to solve the mystery before someone else is booked for murder?


The Historical Archaeology of Military Sites

The Historical Archaeology of Military Sites

Author: Clarence Raymond Geier

Publisher: Texas A&M University Press

Published: 2010-12-15

Total Pages: 294

ISBN-13: 1603442073

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The recent work of anthropologists, historians, and historical archaeologists has changed the very essence of military history. While once preoccupied with great battles and the generals who commanded the armies and employed the tactics, military history has begun to emphasize the importance of the “common man” for interpreting events. As a result, military historians have begun to see military forces and the people serving in them from different perspectives. The Historical Archaeology of Military Sites has encouraged efforts to understand armies as human communities and to address the lives of those who composed them. Tying a group of combatants to the successes and failures of their military commanders leads to a failure to understand such groups as distinct social units and, in some instances, self-supporting societies: structured around a defined social and political hierarchy; regulated by law; needing to be supplied and nurtured; and often at odds with the human community whose lands they occupied, be they those of friend or foe. The Historical Archaeology of Military Sites will afford students, professionals dealing with military sites, and the interested public examples of the latest techniques and proven field methods to aid understanding and conservation of these vital pieces of the world’s heritage.


They Called Him Wild Bill

They Called Him Wild Bill

Author: Joseph G. Rosa

Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press

Published: 2012-11-28

Total Pages: 418

ISBN-13: 0806179546

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His contemporaries called him Wild Bill, and newspapermen and others made him a legend in his own time. Among western characters only General George Armstrong Custer and Buffalo Bill Cody are as readily recognized by the general public. In writing this biography, Joseph G. Rosa has expressed the hope that "Hickok emerges as a man and not a legend." For this comprehensive revision of his earlier biography of Wild Bill the author was allowed to work from newly available materials in the possession of the Hickok family. He also discovered new material pertaining to Wild Bill’s Civil War exploits and his service as a marshal and found the pardon file of his murderer, John McCall. Additional, rare photographs of Wild Bill are published here for the first time. The results of Rosa’s additional research make this second edition the best biography of Wild Bill likely to be written for years to come.


The Relic Master

The Relic Master

Author: Christopher Buckley

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2015-12-08

Total Pages: 400

ISBN-13: 1501125788

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Christopher Buckley’s “hilarious, bawdy, and irreverent frolic of a tale” about a sixteenth-century relic hunter and the artist Albrecht Dürer who conspire to fabricate Christ’s burial shroud reads “like Indiana Jones gone medieval” (USA TODAY). The year is 1517. Dismas is a relic hunter who procures “authentic” religious relics for wealthy and influential clients. His two most important patrons are Frederick the Wise and soon-to-be Cardinal Albrecht of Mainz. While Frederick is drawn to the recent writing of Martin Luther, Albrecht pursues the financial and political benefits of religion and seeks to buy a cardinalship through the selling of indulgences. When Albrecht’s demands for grander relics increase, Dismas and his artist friend Dürer fabricate a shroud to sell to the unsuspecting noble. Unfortunately Dürer’s reckless pride exposes the trickery, so Albrecht puts Dismas and Dürer in the custody of four mercenaries and sends them all to steal Christ’s burial cloth (the Shroud of Chambéry), Europe’s most celebrated artifact. On their journey to Savoy where the Shroud will be displayed, they battle a lustful count and are joined by a beautiful female apothecary. It is only when they reach their destination they realize they are not alone in their intentions to acquire a relic of dubious legitimacy. “A rollicking good time, Christopher Buckley has transported his signature wit and irreverence from the Beltway to sixteenth-century Europe in The Relic Master” (GQ). This epic quest, “as rascally and convivial as any that Mr. Buckley has written” (The Wall Street Journal), is filled with fascinating details about art, religion, politics, and science; Vatican intrigue; and Buckley’s signature wit “holds the reader till the very last page” (The New York Times Book Review).


Princess of Blood

Princess of Blood

Author: Tom Lloyd

Publisher: Gollancz

Published: 2017-07-27

Total Pages: 459

ISBN-13: 1473213223

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There's a new Card in the Mercenary Deck - one Lynx isn't sure if he's happy to see or not. The assassin Toil now wears the Princess of Blood on her jacket and even Lynx would admit she's a woman cloaked in chaos and bloodshed. Their new mission is to escort a dignitary to the pious and ancient city of Jarrazir - beneath which lies a fabled labyrinth. Having barely survived their last underground adventure the mercenaries aren't keen for another, but Toil has other plans. Under threat of siege and horrors rising from the labyrinth, even the Mercenary Deck may have to accept that Jarrazir's prohibition laws aren't their biggest problem.


The Day Parliament Burned Down

The Day Parliament Burned Down

Author: Caroline Shenton

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2013-08-29

Total Pages: 373

ISBN-13: 0199677506

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This is the thrilling but largely unknown story of the day that the 800 year-old Houses of Parliament burnt down. Today it is a largely forgotten event, but in 1834 it was as shocking and significant to contemporaries as the death of Princess Diana was to us at the end of the 20th century. Out of the fire rose not just the new Houses of Parliament, but masterpieces by Turner and Dickens, the first Public Record Office and a new Metropolitan Fire Brigade. It is afascinating tale, never previously told in a full-length book. Written by the head of the Parliamentary Archives at Westminster, it will appeal to any readers interested in the Georgian and Victorianperiods, the history of London, and the story of Parliament.