Alive and Kicking: New Biographies

The 'New Book Shelf' at Oxbow Books regularly features biographies of some monarch, conqueror or 14th-century English writer (to name no names) or other, but in the last week we have seen a little clutch of three books that stand out and demand to be read. All three are clearly targeted at a much wider and general readership than usual, a fact hinted at by the thought that has gone into their covers and lay out, but they also have a lot to offer those with a more specialised interest. So let me introduce the three subjects: Nefertiti, Catullus and, perhaps not a great surprise, Alexander the Great.

OUP and its DNB

Oxford University Press produces another landmark blockbuster when it publishes the new Oxford DNB .... the Dictionary of National Biography ... on Thursday, September 23rd. Sixty million words in sixty volumes occupying eleven feet of shelving in your front room and weighing ... the FAQ sheet doesn't tell me what it weighs! And I am not allowed to see it until publication, or if I was I wouldn't be able to tell you what I had seen! So here are some gleanings ...

Small is beautiful...some tiny gems from English Heritage

A friend of mine once remarked that I am drawn to "anything in miniature". In which case it is hardly surprising that I was so delighted by the arrival of six tiny fold-out guides to historic places and events.

Quirky Book of the Month... Parrot Culture!

If you're looking for a read that's perhaps a little off the beaten track...then look no further than this month's Quirky Book; Parrot Culture: Our 2500-Year-Long Fascination With the World's Most Talkative Birds...

Of all the new books that have passed over the desks of the Oxbow staff this month, these, for whatever reason, are the ones that grabbed their attention.

New Releases

Greek Ostraca from Kellis
by K.A. Worp
Hardback. GB £70.00, GB £20.00

This volume publishes 293 texts inscribed in Greek on potsherds excavated at Ismant el-Kharab, Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt. These texts date from the 2nd - 4th centuries AD, and they contain documentary evidence for a wide range of subjects such as taxation (in the form of tax receipts), private letters, lists and accounts, contracts, memoranda, school texts, and astrologica. The volume includes texts, translations, and commentaries for each ostrakon, as well as comprehensive indices and concordances. It also includes a chapter on the archaeology of Ismant el-Kharab and the context of the ostraka by Colin A Hope.

Egypt 1950: My first visit
edited by Emma Swan Hall
Hardback. GB £40.00, GB £9.95

Bernard V Bothmer was a leading Egyptologist and art historian of the mid-twentieth century. Born in Berlin, he emigrated to America in 1941, and soon become an assistant curator of Ancient Art at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. In 1950 Bothmer received a small grant to go to Egypt, to familiarize himself with the Cairo Museum and the archaeological sites, and to visit and study the places where the Harvard University-Museum of Fine Arts Egyptian Expedition had done its fieldwork before the War. It was his first visit to Egypt. In this book, his diary of the trip, Bothmer details all the places he visited, from Aswan in the south to Saqqara in the north, and the people he met along the way. He describes the events and experiences of everyday life, from trains and donkeys to the Hotel Luxor, and alludes to the political and social circumstances surrounding the practice of archaeology in Egypt in the middle of the 20th century.

The Ancient Egyptian Coffin Texts
by R O Faulkner
Hardback. GB £55.00

Faulkner's authoritative English translation of Middle Kingdom coffin texts is essential for all Egyptologists. This new edition reprints his whole work in one volume. Filling the gap between the `Pyramid' texts and the New Kingdom Book of the Dead, these writings were intended to supply the deceased with the speeches he would need to achieve a secure and important position in the next world. As such they supply valuable insights into Egyptian beliefs and mortuary practices. Concise textual notes are kept to a minimum, allowing the character of the texts to be experienced as a whole. Indexes cover divinities, localities, celestial bodies, selected Egyptian words in translation and also the parts of boats and sailing gear that figure prominently in some spells.

Catalogues

During the last month the catalogue department has produced Book News 61.

• Method, Theory, Conservation, Prehistory, Egypt, the Near East, and Asia (235 Kb)
• The Greek and Hellenistic Worlds, Etruscan Studies, Roman World (143 Kb)
• Early Medieval, Anglo-Saxon, Medieval and Post-Medieval (132 Kb)

• Bargains and Special Offers (63 Kb)

Conferences we will be attending

IXth International Congress of Egyptologists
Grenoble (France) (Monday 06 September, 2004 - Sunday 12 September, 2004)
Every 4 years the Egyptological community comes together for a gigantic scholarly event. This meeting follows on from Cairo and Cambridge and over 1000 Egyptologists are expected. The location is, for the first time in 10 years, in easy striking distance of Oxbow's van and, if the organizers permit it, we do hope to mount a second-to-none extravaganza of Egyptological books. Another interesting feature of this event, although most delegates may not realise it, is that the conference is being held at the same time as, and less than 60 miles away from, the European Association of Archaeologists. Perhaps a chance for cross-disciplinary fertilisation ...

European Association of Archaeologists (EAA)
Lyon (France) (Wednesday 08 September, 2004 - Sunday 12 September, 2004)
This is the 10th Annual Congress of the European Association of Archaeologists and the organizers have promised to make it a special event. Plans are already afoot to turn Lyon into a cultural wonderland, and Oxbow Books hopes to provide a specially good spread of books with plenty of cheap bargains to buy and take away.

The Egypt Exploration Society

Oxbow Books is very pleased to be distributing books on behalf of the Egypt Exploration Society. For a full list of their titles, ordered by series, please follow the link below.