The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taught himself cuneiform script, and joined the British Museum as a 'repairer' or matcher of broken cuneiform tablets. Promotion followed, and after one of Smith's most significant discoveries among the material sent to the Museum - a Babylonian story of a great flood - he was sent to the Middle East, where he found more inscriptions which contained other parts of the epic tale of Gilgamesh. In this 1875 work, a bestseller in its day, Smith...
The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taug...
The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taught himself cuneiform script, and joined the British Museum as a 'repairer' or matcher of broken cuneiform tablets. Promotion followed, and after one of Smith's most significant discoveries among the material sent to the Museum - a Babylonian story of a great flood - he was sent to the Middle East, where he found more inscriptions which contained other parts of the epic tale of Gilgamesh. In 1876, shortly before his early death, Smith published...
The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taug...
The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taught himself cuneiform script, and joined the British Museum as a 'repairer' of broken cuneiform tablets. Promotion followed, and after one of Smith's most significant discoveries among the material sent to the Museum - a Babylonian story of a great flood - he was sent to the Middle East, where he found more inscriptions which contained other parts of the epic tale of Gilgamesh. Before his early death in 1876, he was writing a history of Babylonia...
The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taug...
The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taught himself cuneiform script, and joined the British Museum as a 'repairer' of broken cuneiform tablets. Promotion followed, and after one of Smith's most significant discoveries among the material sent to the Museum - a Babylonian story of a great flood - he was sent to the Middle East, where he found more inscriptions which contained other parts of the epic tale of Gilgamesh. In 1875, he published a history of Assyria for the 'Ancient History...
The Assyriologist George Smith (1840-76) was trained originally as an engraver, but was enthralled by the discoveries of Layard and Rawlinson. He taug...
After the death of his wife, antiquarian Sir Richard Colt Hoare (1758 1838) left his only child in England and embarked on a series of journeys through continental Europe in pursuit of 'novelty, pleasure and information' in order to assuage his grief. At the end of the 1780s he deliberately diverged from the more conventional tourist trail in favour of a route through the then less-documented areas of Italy and down into Sicily, using classical authors as his guides. This work, first published in 1819, draws heavily on his daily journal entries to elucidate areas and points of interest that...
After the death of his wife, antiquarian Sir Richard Colt Hoare (1758 1838) left his only child in England and embarked on a series of journeys throug...
The decipherment of the ancient cuneiform scripts was one of the major breakthroughs in nineteenth-century archaeology and linguistics. Among the scholars working on Old Persian was Christian Lassen (1800-76), professor of Sanskrit at Bonn. Lassen's book on cuneiform inscriptions from Persepolis appeared in 1836, a month before his friend Eugene Burnouf independently published very similar conclusions. Lassen's account gives vivid insights into the detective work involved, as he painstakingly compares individual words and grammatical forms with their Avestan and Sanskrit equivalents, and...
The decipherment of the ancient cuneiform scripts was one of the major breakthroughs in nineteenth-century archaeology and linguistics. Among the scho...
First published in 1882, this clearly written account, accessible to non-specialists, is one of the principal works of the pioneering Celtic scholar Sir John Rhys (1840 1915). The son of a Welsh farmer and lead miner, Rhys went on to become the first professor of Celtic at the University of Oxford, principal of Jesus College, and a fellow of the British Academy. Knighted in 1907, Rhys had by then made significant contributions to the study of Celtic languages, travelling widely and examining many inscriptions at first hand. Here he covers Celtic etymology, ethnology and history in Britain...
First published in 1882, this clearly written account, accessible to non-specialists, is one of the principal works of the pioneering Celtic scholar S...
Following in the footsteps of his father, George Petrie (1790 1866) devoted his early life to art. However, as he toured Ireland and painted historic monuments, his interest in his country's antiquities began to grow, and his research into the origin and uses of Irish round towers would help cement his reputation as a founding father of Irish archaeology. This second edition of his major work appeared in 1845, the same year as the first. It expands on his earlier essay on the same topic, which had won him a gold medal from the Royal Irish Academy in 1833. Petrie's illustrated study refuted...
Following in the footsteps of his father, George Petrie (1790 1866) devoted his early life to art. However, as he toured Ireland and painted historic ...
Born in Italy, Luigi Palma di Cesnola (1832 1904) settled in the United States and fought for the North in the American Civil War, becoming a cavalry colonel. Appointed by Abraham Lincoln, he then served as consul to Cyprus from 1865 to 1877. As an amateur archaeologist, he directed excavations throughout the island. In this 1877 publication, including maps and illustrations, Cesnola gives a useful sketch of Cypriot history and contemporary customs in addition to providing an important record of his archaeological practices and discoveries. He covers a number of ancient settlements where...
Born in Italy, Luigi Palma di Cesnola (1832 1904) settled in the United States and fought for the North in the American Civil War, becoming a cavalry ...
Alessandro Palma Di Cesnola (1839 1914) travelled to Cyprus in 1873 to take up an honorary post secured by his brother Luigi, who was the American consul there and also an amateur archaeologist. Obtaining funding from the British financier Edwin Lawrence, Alessandro carried out his own excavations, chiefly around Salamis. Replete with more than 700 illustrations, this 1882 publication records the most notable artefacts from the Lawrence Cesnola collection, including gold jewellery, ivory objects, engraved gems, coins, and terracotta statuettes. The book sheds considerable light on the ancient...
Alessandro Palma Di Cesnola (1839 1914) travelled to Cyprus in 1873 to take up an honorary post secured by his brother Luigi, who was the American con...
