Gods, Graves & Scholars: The Story of Archaeology

C.W. Ceram

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, Jan 18, 2012 - Social Science - 536 pages

C.W. Ceram visualized archeology as a wonderful combination of high adventure, romance, history and scholarship, and this book, a chronicle of man's search for his past, reads like a dramatic narrative. We travel with Heinrich Schliemann as, defying the ridicule of the learned world, he actually unearths the remains of the ancient city of Troy. We share the excitement of Lord Carnarvon and Howard Carter as they first glimpse the riches of Tutankhamen's tomb, of George Smith when he found the ancient clay tablets that contained the records of the Biblical Flood. We rediscover the ruined splendors of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the wonders of the ancient wold; of Chichen Itza, the abandoned pyramids of the Maya: and the legendary Labyrinth of tile Minotaur in Crete. Here is much of the history of civilization and the stories of the men who rediscovered it.

Illustrated with drawings, maps, and photographs

Contents

• THE BOOK OF THE STATUES Pompeii Troy Mycenae Crete: 1
• From Her Garden to Pompeii: 3
• The Birth of a Science: 11
• Why Search for the Past?: 18
• A Merchant Digs for Trojan Gold: 30
• The Mask of Agamemnon: 46
• Conflict with the Scholars: 55
• Mycenae Tiryns and Crete: 63
• Crete and the Minotaur: 68
• THE BOOK OF THE PYRAMiDS The Empires of Egypt: 83
• In the Land of the Pharaohs: 85
• The Mystery of the Rosetta Stone: 100
• Treason and Hieroglyphics: 113
• Life in Ancient Egypt: 133
• The Tomb of Amenemhet: 155
• Robbers in the Valley of the Kings: 173
• Mummies: 185
• The Tomb of Tutankhamen: 201
• The Curse of the Pharaohs: 217
• ill THE BOOK OF THE TOWERS The Kingdoms of Assyria Babylonia and Sumeria: 239
• Botta Finds Nineveh: 241
• A Schoolteacher Deciphers Cuneiform: 254
• Nebuchadnezzars Dictionary in Clay: 268
• A Dilettante Outwits a Pasha: 276
• The Story of the Flood: 301
• The Tower of Babel: 317
• The Oldest Culture in the World: 337
• THE BOOK OF THE TEMPLES: 363
• The Beheaded Culture: 378
• John Lloyd Stephens Buys a Jungle City: 393
• 28 intermezzo: 414
• ChichénItzá: 439
• Whence Did They: 458
• BOOKS THAT CANNOT YET BE WRITTEN: 473
• Bibliography: 489

About the author

C. W. Ceram (January 20, 1915 – April 12, 1972) was a German journalist and author. His most notable work, Gods, Graves and Scholars: The Story of Archaelogy – was published in 28 languages and had over 5 million copies in circulation. The Ceram Prize in archaeology is posthumously named after him.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Gods, Graves & Scholars: The Story of Archaeology
• Author: C.W. Ceram
• Edition: reprint
• Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2012
• ISBN: 0307814270, 9780307814272
• Length: 536 pages
• Subjects: History / Ancient / General; History / Social History; Social Science / Archaeology