Books with title Ancient Weapons in Britain

A groundbreaking study of the weaponry used in combat thousands of years ago. Few accounts of ancient warfare have looked at how the weapons were made and how they were actually used in combat. Logan Thompson's pioneering survey traces the evolution of weapons in Britain across three thousand years, from the Bronze Age to the Battle of Hastings in 1066. Insights gained from painstaking practical research and technical analysis shed new light on the materials used, the processes of manufacture, the development of the weapons, and their effectiveness. His account features new information about the weapons themselves and their origin and design—as well as a fascinating new perspective on the practice of early warfare.

Few accounts of ancient warfare have looked at how the weapons were made and how they were actually used in combat. Logan Thompson's pioneering survey traces the evolution of weapons in Britain across 3000 years, from the Bronze Age to the Norman conquest, and he investigates the performance of these arms in action. Insights gained from painstaking practical research and technical analysis shed new light on the materials used, the processes of manufacture, the development of the weapons and their effectiveness in battle. He assesses the swords, daggers, axes, javelins, spears, bows, helmets and shields that were used for aggression, defense and display throughout the period. His account features new information about the weapons themselves, their origin and design, and it offers a fascinating new perspective on the practice of early warfare. A minute examination of the earliest edged weapons that survive from the Bronze and Iron Ages is followed by an analysis of the simple Roman sword and javelin that were wielded so successfully by the highly disciplined and well-trained Roman army. The author considers the array of arms -especially swords, axes, throwing axes and daggers -that were used in Britain after the departure of the Romans. He describes the arms favored by the Vikings, especially the spear and the single- handed double-edged sword that played a key role in their raids and conquests. Later weapons, produced by the Anglo- Saxon and Norman armorers in the centuries before the Norman conquest, are assessed and placed in the long sequence of weapons' evolution that can be traced back into prehistory. The study culminates in a close analysis of the arms, the tactics and the experience of close combat during the Battle of Hastings in 1066. Logan Thompson's Ancient Weapons in Britain is the culmination of many years of intense research into early arms, armor and warfare. He has carried out extensive studies of weapons for British museums. He has also published widely in academic journals and military magazines -including History Today, Man at Arms (USA), British Army Review, Military fllustrated, Classic Arms & Militaria, Antique Arms and The Surrey Archaeological Collections Journal. He has written two books -Guns in Colour and Daggers and Bayonets: A History.

This book is an illustrated version of the original Ancient Man in Britain by Donald A. Mackenzie. “The physical characters of a series of skulls can give no reliable information unless their exact provenance and relative age are known. But the interpretation of the meaning of these characters cannot be made unless we know something of the movements of the people and the distinctive peculiarities of the inhabitants of the foreign lands from which they may have come. No less important than the study of their physical structure is the cultural history of peoples. The real spirit of a population is revealed by its social and industrial achievements, and by its customs and beliefs, rather than by the shape of the heads and members of its units. The revival of the belief in the widespread diffusion of culture in early times has, as one of its many important effects, directed attention to the physical peculiarities of the mixed populations of important foci of civilization throughout the world.”

This volume deals with the history of man in Britain from the Ice Age till the Roman period. The evidence is gleaned from the various sciences which are usually studied apart, including geology, archæology, philology, ethnology or anthropology, &c., and the writer has set himself to tell the story of Ancient Man in a manner which will interest a wider circle of readers than is usually reached by purely technical books. It has not been assumed that the representatives of Modern Man who first settled in Europe were simple-minded savages. The evidence afforded by the craftsmanship, the burial customs, and the art of the Crô-Magnon races, those contemporaries of the reindeer and the hairy mammoth in South-western France, suggests that they had been influenced by a centre of civilization in which considerable progress had already been achieved. There is absolutely no evidence that the pioneers were lacking in intelligence or foresight. If we are to judge merely by their skeletons and the shapes and sizes of their skulls, it would appear that they were, if anything, both physically and mentally superior to the average present-day inhabitants of Europe. Nor were they entirely isolated from the ancient culture area by which they had been originally influenced. As is shown, the evidence afforded by an Indian Ocean sea-shell, found in a Crô-Magnon burial cavern near Mentone, indicates that much has yet to be discovered regarding the activities of the early people...

In writing the history of Ancient Man in Britain, it has been found necessary to investigate the Continental evidence. When our early ancestors came from somewhere, they brought something with them, including habits of life and habits of thought. The story unfolded by British finds is but a part of a larger story; and if this larger story is to be reconstructed, our investigations must extend even beyond the continent of Europe. The data afforded by the "Red Man of Paviland", who was buried with Crô-Magnon rites in a Welsh cave, not only emphasize that Continental and North African cultural influences reached Britain when the ice-cap was retreating in Northern Europe, but that from its very beginnings the history of our civilization cannot be considered apart from that of the early civilization of the world as a whole. The writer, however, has not assumed in this connection that in all parts of the world man had of necessity to pass through the same series of evolutionary stages of progress, and that the beliefs, customs, crafts, arts, &c., of like character found in different parts of the world were everywhere of spontaneous generation. There were inventors and discoverers and explorers in ancient times as there are at present, and many new contrivances were passed on from people to people. The man who, for instance, first discovered how to "make fire" by friction of fire-sticks was undoubtedly a great scientist and a benefactor of his kind. It is shown that shipbuilding had a definite area of origin.The "Red Man of Paviland" also reveals to us minds pre-occupied with the problems of life and death. It is evident that the corpse of the early explorer was smeared with red earth and decorated with charms for very definite reasons. That the people who thus interred xi their dead with ceremony were less intelligent than the Ancient Egyptians who adopted the custom of mummification, or the Homeric heroes who practised cremation, we have no justification for assuming.At the very dawn of British history, which begins when the earliest representatives of Modern Man reached our native land, the influences of cultures which had origin in distant areas of human activity came drifting northward to leave an impress which does not appear to be yet wholly obliterated. We are the heirs of the Ages in a profounder sense than has hitherto been supposed.

In his Presidential Address to the Royal Anthropological Institute this year the late Dr. Rivers put his finger upon the most urgent need for reform in the study of Man, when he appealed for "the Unity of Anthropology". No true conception of the nature and the early history of the human family can be acquired by investigations, however carefully they may be done, of one class of evidence only. The physical characters of a series of skulls can give no reliable information unless their exact provenance and relative age are known. But the interpretation of the meaning of these characters cannot be made unless we know something of the movements of the people and the distinctive peculiarities of the inhabitants of the foreign lands from which they may have come. No less important than the study of their physical structure is the cultural history of peoples. The real spirit of a population is revealed by its social and industrial achievements, and by its vi customs and beliefs, rather than by the shape of the heads and members of its units. The revival of the belief in the widespread diffusion of culture in early times has, as one of its many important effects, directed attention to the physical peculiarities of the mixed populations of important foci of civilization throughout the world. Such inquiries have not only enabled the student of human structure to detect racial affinities where he might otherwise have neglected to look for them, but on the other hand they have been able to give the investigator of cultural diffusion evidence of the most definite and irrefutable kind in corroboration of the reality of his inferences.

In his Presidential Address to the Royal Anthropological Institute this year the late Dr. Rivers put his finger upon the most urgent need for reform in the study of Man, when he appealed for "the Unity of Anthropology". No true conception of the nature and the early history of the human family can be acquired by investigations, however carefully they may be done, of one class of evidence only. The physical characters of a series of skulls can give no reliable information unless their exact provenance and relative age are known. But the interpretation of the meaning of these characters cannot be made unless we know something of the movements of the people and the distinctive peculiarities of the inhabitants of the foreign lands from which they may have come. No less important than the study of their physical structure is the cultural history of peoples. The real spirit of a population is revealed by its social and industrial achievements, and by its customs and beliefs, rather than by the shape of the heads and members of its units. The revival of the belief in the widespread diffusion of culture in early times has, as one of its many important effects, directed attention to the physical peculiarities of the mixed populations of important foci of civilization throughout the world. Such inquiries have not only enabled the student of human structure to detect racial affinities where he might otherwise have neglected to look for them, but on the other hand they have been able to give the investigator of cultural diffusion evidence of the most definite and irrefutable kind in corroboration of the reality of his inferences.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

MacKenzie, Donald A. Ancient Man in Britain. Reprinted Edition. London, Senate, 1996. Octavo. XIII, 257 pages. Original Softcover. Very good condition with only minor signs of external wear. Donald Alexander Mackenzie (24 July 1873 – 2 March 1936) was a Scottish journalist and folklorist and a prolific writer on religion, mythology and anthropology in the early 20th century. Mackenzie was born in Cromarty, son of A.H. Mackenzie and Isobel Mackay. He became a journalist in Glasgow and in 1903 moved to Dingwall as owner and editor of The North Star. His next move, in 1910, was to the People's Journal in Dundee. From 1916 he represented the Glasgow paper, The Bulletin, in Edinburgh. As well as writing books, articles and poems, he often gave lectures, and also broadcast talks on Celtic mythology. He was the friend of many specialist authorities in his areas of interest. His older brother was William Mackay Mackenzie, Secretary of the Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland between 1913 and 1935. He died in Edinburgh on 2 March 1936 and was buried in Cromarty. In 1922, Mackenzie published Ancient Man in Britain, a work covering the history of Britain from Upper Paleolithic times, from a strong ethnological basis. The foreword of the book was written by Grafton Elliot Smith. The work covers the earliest settlement of Britain by the first modern humans from around 35,000 years ago during the Aurignacian (pp. 19–27). In the book, Mackenzie maintains that the Caucasoid Cro-Magnons who settled in Britain were dark haired and dark eyed, racially akin to the French Basques, Iberians and Berbers of North Africa (p. 25), who he theorised were one of the earliest representatives of the Mediterranean race. This indigenous proto-Mediterranean racial stock was later invaded by another variety of the Mediterranean race who initiated the Solutrean culture around 20,000 years ago (p. 50). (Wikipedia).