The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World | 
 enlarge | Author: David W. Anthony
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $35.00
Buy New: $25.20
You Save: $9.80 (28%)
New (30) from $25.20
Avg. Customer Rating:  8 reviews
Sales Rank: 11846
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 566
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.1
Dimensions (in): 9.4 x 6.2 x 1.7
ISBN: 0691058873
Dewey Decimal Number: 950.1
EAN: 9780691058870
ASIN: 0691058873
Publication Date: November 19, 2007
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Roughly half the world's population speaks languages derived from a shared linguistic source known as Proto-Indo-European. But who were the early speakers of this ancient mother tongue, and how did they manage to spread it around the globe? Until now their identity has remained a tantalizing mystery to linguists, archaeologists, and even Nazis seeking the roots of the Aryan race. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language lifts the veil that has long shrouded these original Indo-European speakers, and reveals how their domestication of horses and use of the wheel spread language and transformed civilization. Linking prehistoric archaeological remains with the development of language, David Anthony identifies the prehistoric peoples of central Eurasia's steppe grasslands as the original speakers of Proto-Indo-European, and shows how their innovative use of the ox wagon, horseback riding, and the warrior's chariot turned the Eurasian steppes into a thriving transcontinental corridor of communication, commerce, and cultural exchange. He explains how they spread their traditions and gave rise to important advances in copper mining, warfare, and patron-client political institutions, thereby ushering in an era of vibrant social change. Anthony also describes his fascinating discovery of how the wear from bits on ancient horse teeth reveals the origins of horseback riding. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language solves a puzzle that has vexed scholars for two centuries--the source of the Indo-European languages and English--and recovers a magnificent and influential civilization from the past.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 3 more reviews...
 Well worth reading, but not worth reading ALL June 22, 2008
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
This book is sort of rare for me, who generally reads items cover to cover. Some chapters of it were a complete treat, such as the summary of the methods of comparative linguistics. Other chapters gave you a wonderful feel for the methods scientists use to explore our past, but were far too detailed to be read in full unless you are actually a graduate student in the field.
Loved it - but didn't read it all.
A Devil's Advocacy Review June 16, 2008
9 out of 10 found this review helpful
I'll play the Bad Guy here, offering a more critical review than the others. Not that I disagree with the favorable reviews -- but I think that readers should realize that the book is not quite as advertised.
It starts off great with Part I, which is an excellent explanation of the linguistic questions associated with Proto-Indo-European. Anthony offers the latest results clearly and thoroughly. Unfortunately, Part I is only 120 pages long. Part II, 340 pages long, is the real meat of the book. And while Part II has lots of merit, it's not at all what the title or the subtitle suggest. Part II is best summarized as "A thorough summation of the archaeological results from the areas thought to be the homeland of the Proto Indo-European peoples". Here the author departs substantially from the subject matter as suggested by the title, subtitle, and Part I. We are subjected to endless detailed descriptions of archaeological digs all over southern Russia and Siberia. We are told (many times) what the percentage of sheep/goat bones, cattle bones, and horse bones were at every site. We are told the direction in which the bodies were placed in burial, how many flint tools of each type were found, and other details that are surely appropriate for a compendium of archaeological results, but not for the larger synthesis promised by the title and subtitle.
I will concede that the author does thread a larger narrative through the endless site reports. There's a section, for example, on "The Economic and Military Effects of Horseback Riding", which explains the impressive idea that the real impact of horseback riding was that it made it possible for nomads to travel further from the river valleys while grazing their animals. Another example: "The First Cities and Their Connection to the Steppes", which describes the trading patterns that arose once cities appeared in Mesopotamia.
But these delightful sections are lost in the numbing freshet of details. Here's a quote, from page 293:
"The bronze tools and weapons in other Novosvobodnaya-phase graves included cast flat axes, sleeved axes, hammer-axes, heavy tanged daggers with multiple midribs, chisels, and spearheads. The chisels and spearheads were mounted to their handles the same way, with round shafts hammered into four-sided contracting bases that fit into a V-shaped rectangular hole on the handle or spear. Ceremonial objects included bronze cauldrons, long-handled bronze dippers, and two-pronged bidents (perhaps forks for retrieving cooked meats from the cauldrons). Ornaments included beads of carnelian from western Pakistan, lapis lazuli from Afghanistan, gold, rock crystal, and even a bead from Klady made from a human molar sheathed in gold (the first gold cap!)"
The author simply couldn't make up his mind what kind of book he wanted to write. Let me speculate on how this chimera of a book could have been written: the author, having spent years with Russian archaeologists accumulating a huge store of information about their work, approaches the publisher with a great idea for a book. "These Russians have been digging up all sorts of wonderful things", he says, "but here in the West we don't know much about their work. I'd like to write a book putting all their results together into a coherent story."
To which the publisher replies, "Sounds great, but what's the hook? We can't call this book 'A Summary of Results of Russian Archaeological Field Work Over the Period 1980 - 2000'. We need something sexier."
Anthony: "Well, their research certainly sheds a lot of light upon the beginnings of the Indo-European peoples."
Publisher: "Perfect! Let's make the book about how the Indo-European languages got started! That's always a good topic!"
So Anthony writes some extra chapters to slap up front, and we get two books for the price of one:
1. "Beginnings of the Indo-European Languages"
and
2. "A Summary of Results of Russian Archaeological Field Work Over the Period 1980 - 2000".
Now, there's nothing wrong with this. However, buyers should be aware of the fact that three quarters of the book consists of site reports and only one-quarter deals with Indo-European languages.
informative April 6, 2008
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
This is an excellent and informative book, if a bit dry for the ordinary reader.
 Up to date February 27, 2008
27 out of 32 found this review helpful
This is currently _the_ book on IE studies.
In addition to the superlatives used by the other reviewers, I would add that this work is up to date (2007)and includes previously unavailable materials from Russia, the Ukraine and Kazakhstan. The author spent a great deal of time in these areas and understands the cultural differences in the archaeologal and anthropological methods used by those from the old Soviet block. He is careful to explain these differences.
An enthralling book which will certainly be updated by future finds, but the broad conclusions are quite convincing.
Awesome Stuff February 17, 2008
18 out of 21 found this review helpful
This book is a great read. Ever since I watched an archeological documentary on burial cultures of the Eurasian steppes - in which the elaborate graves of the inhumed offer a glimpse of the power and wealth of a culture that lived more than two millennia BCE - I've come to believe that everything I was taught about the teeming masses of barbarians at the gates of Rome was bunk. Archeology and history, as related to us by Greek and Romans alike, simply do not jive. I do not know if Anthony has it right, but his effort at melding the distillation of ancient language development and the archeological evidence to develop a more compelling narrative is more satisfying to my layman tastes than the hunter-forager migration(s) explanation ever could offer. If you like this kind of stuff - you will love this book.
|
|
|
