New discoveries at Durrington Walls in Wiltshire

An important new site hits the headlines.

British Archaeological Reports

To date, the British Archaeological Reports series can claim well over four hundred titles in its British series and almost 1,600 in its International guise. This month we pay tribute to BAR’s longevity and its ability to stick to, and achieve, its key aim of publishing scholarly works on all aspects of world archaeology in English, French, German, Spanish and Italian languages, and distribute them world-wide.

Damaged books aplenty

Yes, another selection of damaged goods for you to buy at knock-down prices...why can't we be more careful??

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

Roman Butrint: An Assessment
edited by Inge Lyse Hansen and Richard Hodges
Hardback. GB £30.00, GB £12.95

Butrint, ancient Buthrotum, has taken many forms in different ages, shaped by the near-constant interaction between the place, its lagoonal landscape and the Mediterranean. Though Butrint does not appear on any of the records of early Greek colonisation to identify it as a Corcyrean settlement, strong links must have existed between it and the metropolitan Corinthian colony of Corfu. Blessed with springs that possessed healing qualities, a small polis was created - extended to incorporate a healing sanctuary dedicated to Asclepius. Julius Caesar, harbouring at Butrint in urgent need of supplies to sustain his struggle against Pompey, must have viewed the sanctuary, ringed by largely dried-out marshland, as the perfect site to settle veterans as a colony.

It was an obvious cornerstone in controlling the passage from the Adriatic to the Aegean. The early settlers seem to have been limited in number and possibly mainly of civilian status. However, the political changes to the city's magistrature were immediate, and within a relatively short time-span fundamental changes to the physical make-up of the city were set in motion. Its new Roman status also located Butrint as a directly before the highest authorities in Rome, and within fifteen years or so, under Augustus's guidance following his victory at Actium, the city was refounded as a colony and awarded a pivotal role in Virgil's court-sponsored foundation epic, The Aeneid. Now linked to the Victory City of Nicopolis rather than in the shadow of Corfu, Butrint prospered. The urban fabric evolved, sometimes faltered, but was essentially sustained until the later 6th century A.D. This present volume is an assessment of the Roman archaeology, a compilation of studies and field reports that focuses upon the foundation and early history of the colony.

Horace's Odes and the Mystery of Do-Re-Mi
edited, with translation and commentary by Stuart Lyons
Paperback. GB £19.95, GB £6.95

Lyons's acclaimed verse translation of the Odes is here fully revised and included with revealing new material on Horace and the nature of his work. The book describes the life and times of Horace. It places his experiences and writings in the context of the civil wars and the Augustan Age, and explains how his literary career was bound up with the rise and fall of his sponsor Maecenas. It brings together compelling evidence that Horace composed and conducted the Carmen Saeculare for the Centennial Games of 17 BC, and that his odes were indeed carmina: songs. Horace was not just a superb literary craftsman, but a musician, songwriter and entertainer for the Roman elite, creating a new Latin idiom derived from Greek lyric song. A final chapter, "Horace, Guido and the Do-re-mi Mystery", the result of careful research and detective work, argues that Guido d'Arezzo, an eleventh-century Benedictine choirmaster, used the melody of Horace's Ode to Phyllis to invent the do-re-mi mnemonic, but applied it to an eighth-century Hymn to John the Baptist ("Ut queant laxis") by Paul the Deacon, keeping the true source secret. A musical comparison of the Horatian melody and Guido's version of "ut-re-mi" is included. Lyons' verse translation of the Odes was named a Financial Times Book of the Year (1996) and was welcomed as 'a wonderful rendering of one of the great, central poets in the European tradition.'