Rating: 
Summary: A great book regarding early seekers of the past.
Review: A very interesting book regarding past finds. After reading the book I discovered why it has been reprinted so many times and why it is still read today. The book has just enough information in each chapter but not so detailed that it takes away from the story. It was my first book on the subject.
Rating: 
Summary: True to it's subtitle
Review: Although I'm not an archeologist (or even a history student), this book does give the reader a great amount of information regarding ancient civilizations and how we came to know all we know nowadays about them.It's written in plain english, and it seems the author was aiming for us archeology illetrates. Plus, true to it's subtitle, it's written in a way the reader feels it's almost a novel about archeology; and the investigators responsible for us knowing what we now know about ancient people are justly enough portrayed as heroes. This book is a little bit old, and I've heard for some friends who know a little bit more about archeology than me that some of it's statements are outdated. However, it's a precious introduction to a science we use to forget it even exists (or worse still, we use to compare it with Indy Jones) if it wasn't for books like this one. And it's a great and enjoyable read indeed!
Rating:
Summary: Still a good basic overview
Review: Despite the vast accumulation of information in the decades since this was first published, particularly in the Americas, this remains an excellent starting point. It gives a concise but inclusive account of most of the ancient cultures known today. p 402: ''Now, several of these pyramids located at different sites from Tula to Monte Alban have been discussed, yet one of the most important has yet to be mentioned. This is the Pyramid of Cuicuilco, which stands on a mound 22.4 feet high, situated at the southern limits of Mexico City. The Pyramid of Cuicuilco rises up out of a weird landscape of darkly stony aspect. At one time the volcanoes Ajusco and Xitli (perhaps only the latter) erupted. The god within the pyramid was apparently remiss in diverting the glowing flood of lava that flowed about the pyramid, for half the structure was drowned in bubbling muck. The archaeologists investigating this phenomenon called on colleagues from another faculty, the geologists, for help. How old is the lava, they inquired. The geologists, not realizing that their answer was knocking a world picture awry, answered: "Eight thousand years." ...Yet late research is more inclined to consider it false.''
Rating:
Summary: You'll find a treasure in this book
Review: Gods, Graves and Scholars didn't begin as a pleasure read, as it was required reading for an undergraduate archaeology class. The 482 pages seemed daunting, even for a small paperback. But, beginning with page three and continuing through to the end, I found this book a real page-turner. Ceram successfully and craftfully takes the reader through archaeology's history, captivates the reader with personal anecdotes, and is unpretentious with language and content. Place it on your reading list or in your home library if you haven't already--this is a keeper.
Rating:
Summary: You'll find a treasure in this book
Review: Gods, Graves and Scholars didn't begin as a pleasure read, as it was required reading for an undergraduate archaeology class. The 482 pages seemed daunting, even for a small paperback. But, beginning with page three and continuing through to the end, I found this book a real page-turner. Ceram successfully and craftfully takes the reader through archaeology's history, captivates the reader with personal anecdotes, and is unpretentious with language and content. Place it on your reading list or in your home library if you haven't already--this is a keeper.
Rating: 
Summary: Be warned
Review: I highly enjoyed this book. I have gone through three paperbacks of it and finally broke down and bought my hard copy. I've reread this great book numerous times, and I swear it gets better with every rereading. NOTE: A great companion to this volume is Ceram's "The First American," which covers the story of NORTH AMERICAN archeaology and is every bit as exciting to read as is "God's, Graves, and Scholars." (For instance, did you know that North America also has mummies!)
Rating:
Summary: An extremely readable popularization of archaeology
Review: I highly enjoyed this book. I have gone through three paperbacks of it and finally broke down and bought my hard copy. I've reread this great book numerous times, and I swear it gets better with every rereading. NOTE: A great companion to this volume is Ceram's "The First American," which covers the story of NORTH AMERICAN archeaology and is every bit as exciting to read as is "God's, Graves, and Scholars." (For instance, did you know that North America also has mummies!)
Rating:
Summary: Classic survey work, a standard, and easy to read
Review: The original edition was published in 1951 (translated from German), but has been updated from time to time. There are sections on a half dozen or so different civilizations. Each section has chapters about how those civilizations were discovered, what is known about them, and how their language was translated (or is being translated, in the case of the Maya). The last section pertains to what remains -- known civilizations about which nothing much is known apart from their sometimes extensive ruins. I read this book as a teenager, and recommend this title.
Rating:
Summary: Der Roman der Archaeologie
Review: This is one of the best books I ever read. Reading it with 14 for the first time I didn't know very much about archeology. Through this book I got so interested in Archeology that I read many more books about ancient Crete, Egytpt, Greece, Sumer, and the Mexican civilizations. Although anyone who really is looking for exact facts can easily find them, it is not just a simple heap of facts. Its purpose was never to be a sober school book, but Ceram himself wrote that it is intended to be a "novel of archeology that shows the suspence in reality, but lets imagination sparkle". Masterfully written this book pays it's respect not only to the masterfinds but also to the masterminds of archeology. This book will open anyone's mind to appreciate this fascinating science.
Rating:
Summary: Unveiling the Past.
Review: This wonderful book was first published in 1953. Fifty years of new archeological discoveries and theories had elapsed.
Nevertheless it stands, undiminished, as magnificent introduction to Archeology and the Worlds of the Past: Egypt, Sumeria, Greece and Yucatan.
Mr. Ceram (pen name of the author) writes passionately about his subject.
The reader starts a discovery travel going along with amazing characters: with Schliemann in his search of Troy; with Champollion in search of the key for reading Egyptian hieroglyphs; with Carter and Howard for the unearthing of Tutankhamen's tomb. The list continues jumping from one era to other; from one continent to a different and distant one. They constitute a heterogeneous bunch united by a burning desire for knowledge, wild imagination and undaunted persistence to make their dreams real.
I first read this work when I was seventeen and discovering Europe. It helped me a lot to understand and appreciate the archeological treasures of European museums and sites.
It also instilled in me an unstoppable desire to "be there". In my adult years, I was fortunate to visit some of those places and always before starting a journey I went back to reread "Gods, Graves and Scholars".
One more feature: at the end of the book you will find useful chronologies, maps and genealogic charts, which will aid the reader to visualize easily the events described.
A book to enjoy and start a romance with the origins of our culture.
Reviewed by Max Yofre.
|
