Ancient History & Civilisation

Gods, Graves and Scholars: The Story of Archaeology

Gods, Graves and Scholars: The Story of Archaeology

C.W. Ceram visualized archeology as a wonderful combination of high adventure, romance, history and scholarship, and this book, a chronicle of man's search for his past, reads like a dramatic narrative. We travel with Heinrich Schliemann as, defying the ridicule of the learned world, he actually unearths the remains of the ancient city of Troy. We share the excitement of Lord Carnarvon and Howard Carter as they first glimpse the riches of Tutankhamen's tomb, of George Smith when he found the ancient clay tablets that contained the records of the Biblical Flood. We rediscover the ruined splendors of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the wonders of the ancient wold; of Chichen Itza, the abandoned pyramids of the Maya: and the legendary Labyrinth of tile Minotaur in Crete. Here is much of the history of civilization and the stories of the men who rediscovered it.

Part I - THE BOOK OF THE STATUES: Pompeii, Troy, Mycenæ, Crete

Chapter 1. The Queen of Naples: From Her Garden to Pompeii

Chapter 2. Winckelmann: The Birth of a Science

Chapter 3. Interlude: Why Search for the Past?

Chapter 4. Schliemann (I): A Merchant Digs for Trojan Gold

Chapter 5. Schliemann (II): The Mask of Agamemnon

Chapter 6. Schliemann (III): Conflict with the Scholars

Chapter 7. Schliemann (IV): Mycenæ, Tiryns, and Crete

Chapter 8. Evans: Crete and the Minotaur

Part II - THE BOOK OF THE PYRAMIDS: The Empires of Egypt

Chapter 9. Napoleon: In the Land of the Pharaohs

Chapter 10. Champollion (I): The Mystery of the Rosetta Stone

Chapter 11. Champollion (II): Treason and Hieroglyphics

Chapter 12. Beizoni, Lepsius, and Mariette: Life in Ancient Egypt

Chapter 13. Petrie: The Tomb of Amenemhet

Chapter 14. Robbers in the Valley of the Kings

Chapter 15. Mummies

Chapter 16. Carter: The Tomb of Tutankhamen

Chapter 17. Carter: The Curse of the Pharaohs

Part III - THE BOOK OF THE TOWERS: The Kingdoms of Assyria, Babylonia, and Sumeria

Chapter 18. Botta Finds Nineveh

Chapter 19. Grotefend: A Schoolteacher Deciphers Cuneiform

Chapter 20. Rawlinson: Nebuchadnezzar’s Dictionary in Clay

Chapter 21. Layard: A Dilettante Outwits a Pasha

Chapter 22. George Smith: The Story of the Flood

Chapter 23. Koldewey: The Tower of Babel

Chapter 24. Woolley: The Oldest Culture in the World

Part IV - THE BOOK OF THE TEMPLES: The Empires of the Aztecs, the Mayas, and the Toltecs

Chapter 25. Cortés (I): The Treasure of Moctezuma

Chapter 26. Cortés (II): The Beheaded Culture

Chapter 27. John Lloyd Stephens Buys a Jungle City

Chapter 28. Intermezzo

Chapter 29. The Mystery of the Abandoned Mayan Cities

Chapter 30. Edward Herbert Thompson: Chiché-Itzá and the Sacred Well

Chapter 31. Aztecs, Mayas, and Toltecs: Whence Did They Come?

Part V - BOOKS THAT CANNOT YET BE WRITTEN

Chapter 32. New Searches in Old Empires

CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES, BIBLIOGRAPHY

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