Books with author L Cottrell

Of all the great ancient civilizations, Egypt has provided the world the most alluring portraits of women. Here, from author Leonard Cottrell, are the fascinating stories of those women - from the legendary beauty, Nefertiti, and Nefertari, the favorite wife of the great Ramesses II; to Tiye, wife of the uxorious, luxury-loving Amenophis III, and the formidable Hatsepshut, the only queen of Egypt to rule as a divine pharaoh in her own right.

More than 3,000 years ago, a young man of seventeen named Tutankhamen became pharaoh of Egypt. His reign came toward the end of a vital period in Egypt's history when Thebes was the wealthiest and most splendid city in the world. Great temples soared into the sky, and in the temple workshops, hundreds of craftsmen labored to turn the riches of Egypt into magnificent garments, furniture and houses, ornaments, and weapons for all their heavenly gods and for their earthly god, the pharaoh.In 1922, Howard Carter, after twenty years of searching, unearthed Tutankhamen's tomb. In it were the glorious artifacts that had been made for him and that he would need in the afterlife.In this book, award-winning historian Leonard Cottrell vividly recreates Carter's discovery of the treasures that have yielded invaluable knowledge about the lives of the pharaohs as well as ordinary Egyptians.

After the passing of her parents, Lyra has been living with her selfish and uncaring aunt, uncle, and cousin. When a camping trip goes horribly wrong, she flees from the miserable life she once lived and enters a place that no other person could in the deepest, unknown part of the woods. She finds herself surrounded by unusual clans of people with different purposes, creatures that were once believed to be fairytales, and the great wonders of sorcery. As she begins her new life in this new world, secrets unfold and enemies are battled.

This collection of original and traditional stories really is by the people, for the people. Imagine trekking across field after field under an intense African sun following a group of total strangers and hoping against hope that your old fashioned recording machine will work. Imagine then the joy when it all happens even though you do not understand a word of what is being said. This book gives an insight into each unique storyteller. Two and a half awe-inspiring hours spent with 84 year old Mr Nutsugah where one story flowed seamlessly into another. A day recording the fishermen in Anyako, as goats jumped up to eat bananas on the table, wide-eyed children wandered in and out, cocks crowed, men sawed and hammered just a few feet away. In Have, a wonderful and unexpected reception was given as the storytellers moved towards us, singing a welcome. Equally unexpected was the gift of bananas, coconuts and avocado pears when we finished. All the money made from this book goes to the storytellers as we identify projects which will help raise their standard of living. This book is thus an expression of so much, of long tradition, of beliefs, of faith in the past and of hope for the future.

This is the story of two of the most heroic, and controversial, figures in archaeology: Heinrich Schliemann, who discovered the remains of Troy, and Arthur Evans who unearthed the great city of King Minos. Ranking alongside Carter's discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb, these discoveries at Troy and Knossos enabled a new understanding of Prehistoric Greece. They also proved that what until then had only been myths and daydreams of achaeologists and historians were historically real. The Cretans did indeed worship the cult of the bull. Achilles and Agamemnon really did live. Replete with drama and adventure, The Bull of Minos tells of the 3,000-year old civilizations that were revealed in their full glory, of the extraordinary men who toiled in their dusty ruins, and of the magic and mystery of life in an ancient world of gods and warriors.