archaeologists-from-england

"Why, yes, of course I wrote all the Arab of Mesopotamia. I've loved the reviews which speak of the practical men who were the anonymous authors, etc. It's fun being practical men, isn't it."

"Nobody is such a fool as to moider away his time in the slip-slop conversation of a pack of women."

"A poor gentlewoman, doctor, is the worst thing in the world"

"I shall not allow the pension… to be stopped by force: I shall resign it,"

"I shall go on making sublime and philosophical discoveries, and employing myself in deep, abstract studies."

"I have nothing to fear… I am the sun, the stars, the pearl, the lion, the light from heaven."

"It is only the vulgar who are always fancying themselves insulted. If a man treads on another's toe in good society, do you think it is taken as an insult?"

"The memories of men are too frail a thread to hang history from."

"The , as it is sometimes called, lives in damp woods, where it can find plenty of insects. It catches them on the wing, as well as picking them off plants and trees. Its colouring is grey above with black streaks on its head; its breast is yellow, with a row of black marks across it, set like a ’s . Its song is louder than that of most s, but very sweet and clear."

"Occasionally, some tropical bird may perhaps be tempted north in search of food. Among these are the lovely little yellow-breasted s, which are met with in , and, I believe, have sometimes been seen as far north as . s are visitors on the Nile, and brilliant s, too, we saw in the , going to their more Northern homes in Syria, Spain, and Italy. The low sand banks in the river, or some lonely place in the desert, are nightly chosen as resting-places for the s, which are only travellers in the land."

"The Egyptians possessed much interesting literature, of which poetry formed an important part. The hymns to , , and , and that of , are all beautiful specimens; and so, likewise, is the epic poem to , known as the ".""

"There are curious remains near Cairo of a , where portions of trees have been found measuring 60 to 90 feet in length and 3 feet in diameter. It is said to have been formed by a deposit of sand and water which in the course of ages petrified the wood. But although there is little doubt that primeval forests existed in Egypt, they must have disappeared at a very early date, as no special mention of them occurs, either in the oldest monuments or writings."

"Civilization in its higher form today, though highly complex, forms essentially a unitary mass. It has no longer to be sought out in separate luminous centers, shining like planets through the surrounding night. Still less is it the property of one privileged country or people. Many as are the tongues of mortal man, its votaries, like the Immortals, speak a single language. Throughout the whole vast area illumined by its quickening rays its workers are interdependent and pledged to a common cause."

"The (certainly one of the most exquisitely delicious of all our fungi) is generally neglected, or regarded with great suspicion. Under the name of 'champillion,' however, it is well known to the weavers and labouring men of the , who may be seen gathering it in considerable numbers any autumn day amongst the short grass of ."

"The mere barbarians, the chippers of rude weapons and tools of stone, who lived in North Britain at the time of the Roman conquest, — the men who had been driven north, ages before the Roman occupation, by from the mainland of Europe, are quite recent as compared with the far-off time when primeval savages lived in what is now Britain. The barbarians who preceded the ancient civilisations of , , and are modern as compared with the remote antiquity of the savages whose bones, weapons, and tools are here described and sketched."

"Worthington Smith was an important member of the group of archaeologists whose work established as a discipline in Britain. He observed, meticulously recorded and published traces of some of the best sites ever to come to light in England. While his overview of the period has inevitably not stood the test of time, his publications remain of great value for the factual information they contain, and for his fine illustrations. Most of his artefact collections also survive, well-documented in spite of the loss of many of his written notes, and these too are important."

"When potatoes are destroyed by parasitic in the autumn, it does not always happen that the parasite is the dreaded putrefactive fungus of the murrain, named ' Another highly destructive fungus, named ', , is sometimes equally damaging to potatoes with the Peronospora itself. The name Fusisporium refers to the spindle-shaped crescent form of the spores,—fusus a spindle ; Solani of course, refers to the genus to which the potato belongs."

"The first stage coach passed through on Monday, April 12th, 1742. ... , presented great difficulties for coaches, seven or eight horses were required to take the coach from Brewer's Hill Road to the top of the hill."

"Mr. Worthington Smith has devoted himself for many years to a study of the localities near London where implements have been found, and has described the various floors with great minuteness, and illustrated them with great artistic skill. In this book he brings all his previous discoveries together, and groups them round his last work at , near , on the borders of and . He has presented to us a monograph on palæolithic camping-places, rather than a general treatise on Man, the Primeval Savage."

"Europe was only after all a peninsula of Africa and Asia"

"Mud, muck, ooze upon the floor, torn tents and thunder – all were forgotten as the sherry bottle was opened"

"j’aime mieux écrire que discuter de vive voix [I much prefer to write than discuss aloud]"

"You crawl on your stomach for hours … climbing up yawning abysses (lighted only by an acetylene lamp …) and get knocked on the head by stalactites and on the legs by stalagmites, and in the end arrive at all sorts of wonders; bison modelled in clay, and portraits of sorcerers, and footprints of Magdalenian man."

"A puzzle remained. Why had Dilmun used the standard weights of the Indus Valley? The Babylonians and Sumerians used a completely different system... Either the first commercial impulses to have reached Dilmun must have come not from Mesopotamia but from India, or else India was a far more important commercial connection with Dilmun than was Mesopotamia."

"The use of these two objects is as yet uncertain, but I suggest that they were writing-tablets. It would, of course, be difficult to inscribe anything upon their present very rough surfaces but these may once have been covered with some smooth preparation that would allow of writing or numbers being washed off when finished with. In shape these objects are exactly like the large wooden writing-boards that are used at the present day by children in the Punjab and elsewhere."

"Perhaps the most interesting of the model animals is the one that I personally take to represent a horse. Confirming this identification, Wheeler (1968: 92) observed: "One terracotta, from a late level of Mohenjo-daro, seems to represent a horse, reminding us that a jawbone of a horse is also recorded from the same site, and that the horse was known at a considerably earlier period in Baluchistan.""

"The archaeological record of Harappan decline in the Indus Valley itself has never revealed any obvious connection with the widely claimed origin for these Indo-European invaders in the Pontic steppes or central Asia. In my view, supported linguistically.. the Harappan decline had nothing whatsoever to do with any Indo-European arrival in Pakistan or India, since this language family had already been present there for several millennia beforehand. (Bellwood 2014, 156)"

"The existence of a group of people called Indo-Europeans or Vedic Aryans has achieved the status of received wisdom—it has been repeated so often that it is now accepted fact, despite there being no satisfactory archaeological evidence whatsoever to support the presence of an incoming group of such numbers as historical and archaeological explanations require."

"There is no evidence for an invasion or mass migration of new peoples from outside which destroyed the networks of the Integration Era. Instead, there is evidence in the form of both artefacts and structures which demonstrates that there was a degree of continuity, although the form, scale and patterns of human communities and their settlements altered; or as many researchers describe it, there was a distinct transformation…… Indeed, Sankalia’s statement of 1962 still remains valid, that despite almost a century of investigations, “we have not found anything “Aryan” on the ruins of the Indus Valley Civilisation” (Coningham and Young 2015)"

"His appointment as abbot may have been an excellent thing for the monastery, but it cannot be denied that it was a great misfortune for science."

"The existence of a group of people called Indo-Europeans or Vedic Aryans has achieved the status of received wisdom—it has been repeated so often that it is now accepted fact, despite there being no satisfactory archaeological evidence whatsoever to support the presence of an incoming group of such numbers as historical and archaeological explanations require."

"These interpretations suggest the simple equation that ‗material culture = people = language‘ ... Processual and post-processual developments in archaeological theory have surely enabled us to abandon such crude equations and to acknowledge that the dynamics of material culture, ethnicity and language are far more complex."

"There is no evidence for an invasion or mass migration of new peoples from outside which destroyed the networks of the Integration Era. Instead, there is evidence in the form of both artefacts and structures which demonstrates that there was a degree of continuity, although the form, scale and patterns of human communities and their settlements altered; or as many researchers describe it, there was a distinct transformation…… Indeed, Sankalia’s statement of 1962 still remains valid, that despite almost a century of investigations, “we have not found anything “Aryan” on the ruins of the Indus Valley Civilisation” (Coningham and Young 2015)"

"Whilst the seat of Semitic empire was still upon the Lower , and before the building, perhaps, either of Babylon or , that remarkable expedition to Palestine must have taken place, which is described in Genesis, and in which are found the vassal kings of and , ranged under the banners of , king of ."

"The Persia of to-day is not, it is true, the Persia of , nor even is it the Persia of ; but it is a country, which for good or for ill, may powerfully affect the fortunes of , and which requires, therefore, to be studied by our statesmen with care, with patience, and, above all, in a generous and indulgent spirit."

"The town of Zoháb has been usually considered the representative of the city of —but this is incorrect. The real site of Holwán, one of the eight primeval cities of the world, was at , distant about 8 miles south of the modern town, and situated on the high road conducting from Baghdád to . This is the of , ... and the of the Israelitish captivity. ... It gave to the surrounding district the name of , which we meet with in most of the ancient geographers. ... particularises the city, under the name of Chala, ... and the appears to allude to the same place as Kalchas. ..."

"The Memoir of Sir Henry Rawlinson affords a striking illustration of the powerful influence that early association with a master-mind may exercise on a man's career in life, and of what great things may be achieved if he takes full advantage of his opportunities, and sets out with a determination to make the most of his life and raise himself above his fellows. It may therefore be considered a piece of good fortune for a young cadet like Rawlinson, bound to India to seek his fortune, to find himself thrown as a fellow-passenger with Sir , , a distinguished soldier, an equally distinguished diplomatist, and an of no mean reputation."

"In spite of the fact that one knew it all beforehand as an Englishman would to whom India in picture and by hearsay was familiar from childhood, who had played with brass s and had broken gilt alabaster s and s and s (with dire corporeal results) before he donned , it was strange to me to realize the fact of the actual worship of Ganesa and Siva and Vishnu in their own land in the temples of their cults at , as strange as if I were to find and still venerated in some Egyptian temple such as or . Egypt and her gods and priests all alive, mixed up with London; with the , , , the , and the : that was the impression I gained of Bombay. There was no doubt of the specifically English (not merely European) impression, and the combination is extraordinary. I felt I loved better Egypt, where the old gods are safely dead and their lore can be studied by such as I without impossible modern contaminations and antinomies, where the ; now calls uncontradicted the simple praises of the One, where the clean desert air breathes health, not septic soddenness, and where one is not likely nowadays to find an - in one’s bed."

"The new discoveries of the earliest age of Greece are chiefly associated with the name of , and rightly so, as his work first revealed prehistoric Greece to us. But since his time a totally new face has been given to our knowledge by the Cretan discoveries of and , which has rendered out of date all books on the general subject published before 1902. The now prehistooric Greece is very different from the old one of the two decades succeeding Schliemann’s discoveries. He, however, was the pioneer, and his finds explained various ieolaied discoveries made before his time, chiefly of vases, which it had been impossible to bring into any intelligible relation with our knowledge of the relics of classical antiquity. Best known to us of these are perhaps the vases of in , presented to the by in 1870."

"The present energy of the archaeologist in Greece and the modern interest in early Greek archaeology date from and are a consequence of the epoch-making discoveries of the beginning of the XIXth century in the domain of Egyptian and Oriental archaeology. A new world was opened to us by these discoveries; the horizon of our knowledge of the ancient civilizations of the earth was widened indefinitely by them; and it was not long before classical students began, after much doubt and incredulity, to ask themselves how far this new knowledge might bear upon the early . But not all: many classical scholars were utterly unable to conform themselves to the new order of ideas. The keen intellect of , for instance, was unable to grasp the meaning of the new discoveries; he continued to the end of his days refusing to believe that anybody could read a single or interpret a single group of ."

"When sat on the throne of the Pharaohs and it became fashionable to inquire into the past history of the extraordinary country which had been brought willy-nilly within the pale of Hellenism, a learned priest named , "The Gift of " (Manethoth), or possibly "The Gift of " (Manutjo), of in the , was commissioned by to collect all that was known of the Egyptian annals and translate them into Greek as Αἰγυπτιαϰὰ. This was done, and until the discoveries of Manetho's work, half destroyed as it now is, imitated and garbled by generations of ignorant copyists, was, with the exception of the sketches by Herodotus and , the sole Egyptian authority on the history of Egypt. A similar rôle with regard to the history of Mesopotamia was played by the work of a Babylonian priest named , who is said to have been a contemporary of (250 B.C.). ... Like that of Manetho, his work is only known to us through the labours of copyists and compilers."

"The great religious works of the ns are known to us from documents which do not date from an earlier period than the seventh century In the palaces that were unearthed at , there were found, scattered throusjh the mounds of earth, thousands of s written in the , and in many cases with colophons bearing the name of and the statement that he had caused them to be included in his library. This monarch reigned from 669 to about 625, and, though one of the last kings to occupy the , he made strenuous efforts to preserve the ancient literature of and Assyria. His scribes visited specially the ancient cities and temples in the south, and made copies of literary compositions of all classes which they found there. These they collected and arranged in his palace at Nineveh, and it is from them that the greater part of our knowledge of is derived."

"The great n poem, or series of legends, which narrates the , was termed by the Assyrians and s , “When in the height,” from the two opening words of the text. The poem consisted of some nine hundred and ninety-four lines, and was divided into seven sections, each of which was inscribed upon a separate . ... The poem embodies the beliefs of the Babylonians and Assyrians concerning the origin of the universe; it describes the coming forth of the gods from chaos, and tells the story of how the forces of disorder, represented by the primeval water-gods and , were overthrown by and respectively, and how Marduk, after completing the triumph of the gods over chaos, proceeded to create the world and man. The poem is known to us from portions of several Assyrian and late-Babylonian copies of the work, and from extracts from it written out upon the so-called “practice-tablets,” or students’ exercises, by pupils of the Babylonian scribes. The Assyrian copies of the work are from the great library which was founded at by , king of Assyria from 668 to about 626; the Babylonian copies and extracts were inscribed during the period of the kings of the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods; and one copy of the Seventh Tablet may probably be assigned to as late a date as the . All the tablets and fragments, which have hitherto been identified as inscribed with portions of the text of the poem, are preserved in the . From the time of the first discovery of fragments considerable attention has been directed towards them, for not only are the legends themselves the principal source of our knowledge of the , but passages in them bear a striking resemblance to the cognate narratives in the Book of Genesis concerning the creation of the world."

"The greater part of our knowledge of early has been derived from the wonderfully successful series of excavations carried out by the late at , ... between 1877 and 1900, and continued for some months in 1903 by Captain (now Commandant) . These mounds mark the site of the city of , and lie a few miles to the north-east of the modern village of , to the east of the , and about an hour’s ride from the present course of the stream. It is evident, however, that the city was built upon the stream, which at this point may originally have formed a branch of the Euphrates, ... for there are traces of a dry channel upon its western side."

"}} has put Egypt in an epigram. " A donkey-ride and a boating-trip interspersed with ruins " does, in fact, sum up in a single line the whole experience of the Nile traveller. Àpropops of these three things—the donkey, the boat, and the ruins—it may be said that a good and a comfortable Dahabeeyah add very considerably to the pleasure of the journey; and that the more one knows about the past history of the country, the more one enjoys the ruins."

"Our knowledge of how men lived and thought in the Valley of the Nile five or six thousand years before the Christian era is ever on the increase. It keeps pace with the march of , and that march extends every year over a wider area. Each season beholds the exploration of new sites, and each explorer has some new thing to tell."

"Eager for conquest, and tempted by the rich pearls and tin mines for which the island was famous, but pretending only to punish the poor savages for having helped the Gauls, with whom he was at war, Julius Caesar came over from Italy with his ships and soldiers, plundered and killed in every direction round about , and made the first conquest of Britain. This happened just fifty-five years before Christ. Scarcely a hundred more had gone by when the came with fifty thousand men, and subdued it over again ( 43). It was during the reign of this emperor that , a patriot Briton, made the first effort to free his country from the Roman yoke. After nine years conflict he was taken prisoner ; but was afterwards released by the clemency of Claudius."

"Till the publication of 's Guide to the Eastern Alps in 1868, and the appearance of Messrs. Gilbert and Churchill's joint volume in 1864,—the was scarcely known even by name to any but scientific travellers. A few geologists found their way now and then to ; a few artists, attracted in the first instance to as the birthplace of , carried their sketch-books up the ; but there it ended."

"He found archaeology in Egypt a treasure hunt; he left it a science."

"From the ' diggers, I secured a lot of seventy-five Attic s in perfect condition, which served to show the accuracy of the mint in Athens, for most of the coins would have passed our own mint standard."