As an archaeologist specialising in the British Iron Age it is often quite easy to forget that people are the principal focus of our enquiries. After all, in Britain we have practically no documentation of the presence of people in the art of the period and the physical reality of burial is largely absent, restricted to one atypical region in Yorkshire or to dismembered body fragments in settlements. It provokes a feeling of considerable jealously to consider the wealth of material that our continental colleagues have to deal with. Large cemeteries are relatively frequent discoveries and there are interesting fluctuations of cremations and inhumations which chart major chronological and spatial distinctions across the Continent. Many burials are lavishly accompanied by artefacts that served many functions, and range from the prosaic to the most extravagant pieces of art found in European prehistory. The interpretation of this material is unquestionably aided by the presence of realistic and interpretable depictions of men and women going about understandable tasks found in a variety of media.
Arguably, the late Hallstatt (Ha C-D) worlds of Central Europe possess the richest record for past individuals that European archaeology has to offer. Burials such as the Hochdorf (Baden-Württemberg, Germany) are acknowledged as one of the most spectacular discoveries that have been made in the last fifty years. It not only produced exceptional individual objects that merit the description of works of art, but was excavated to the highest standard and provides detailed information about the nature of religious practices in the first half of the first millennium bc. This is just one of a number of spectacular burials that have been found; the Vix princess (Burgundy, France) has many comparable objects of immense artistic significance, and burials such as the Hohmichele and Magdelenburg (Baden-Württemberg, Germany) would be regarded as incredibly rich in other regions.
Spectacular individual objects include the stone statue of a naked man originally placed on the barrow at Hirschlanden (Baden-Württemberg), with his neck ring, belt, dagger, and conical hat; the cloaked female statuette that crowns the Vix kratēr with her carefully arranged head scarf; the strange stick figures on the Hochdorf klinē (sofa), which are now seen as involved in a ritualised dumb-bell fight (pp. 238–39). There are also complex scenes such as that depicted in the ‘cult wagon’ of Strettweg (Austria), where numerous figures are involved in the ritual slaughter of a stag in the presence of a priestess or goddess (Fig. 6.4, Plate 8).
The freezes on the situla art of the eastern Hallstatt region are the most informative and spectacular of the material categories examined in this book and provide very valuable information on the sociality of the region. The Pieve d'Alpago situla (Belluno, Italy) has a narrative of courtship, sexual activity, and birth which is a caricature of life immediately understandable to any viewer. However, the details are fascinating (pp. 171–73). The sex scenes are being carefully observed, normally by woman, and stress the importance of inheritance and the assumption is that sex and procreation are linked and the basis for important alliances. The birth scene is unique and shows the use of a birthing bar and the presence of attendants that emphasise the status of the mother. Despite the overall familiarity of the narrative the scene still contains details which remain enigmatic: why do the observing matrons carry weapons in the sex scenes, including a large hammer? Surely this is more likely to reduce the possibility of a successful coupling rather than facilitate it. There are many other narrative scenes which provide informative details.
This book not only puts these spectacular discoveries into context but also offers the first synthetic, theoretically-informed account of the evidence for the human body in the Hallstatt C and D period of Central Europe. The book starts with a brief outline of the theoretical and methodological approach framing the study (Ch. 2), which scrutinises the human body through the lenses of personhood and identity. These are dimensions forged through relations and, consequently, the author attempts to explore them too through network theory and analysis (pp. 21–34). This chapter is followed by a swift but important introduction to the archaeology of the region (Ch. 3) that briefly summarises a complex area that is difficult for non specialists to understand. This section would have been improved by more illustrations as some of the locational information is difficult to follow if you do not have a detailed familiarity with the region. Chapter 4 follows with a survey of burial practices, including a detailed discussion on the relationship between cremation and inhumation (pp. 63–74). Cremation dominates initially but inhumation becomes increasingly important in the west and is closely associated with the development of high status burials beneath enormous mounds. This is a dramatic break with the past which Rebay-Salisbury relates to changes that are stimulated by contacts with Greece and by the establishment of the colony at Massalia (pp. 73–74). In contrast, the east provides a more diverse response. Many areas retain a conservative attachment to cremation which still lies at the centre of high status burial monuments, though some sub-regions, most notably in present-day Slovenia, develop their own distinctive inhumation traditions.
The following chapter (Ch. 5, ‘The Representation of the Body’) provides a theoretical consideration of the importance of art, including a discussion of human representations in terms of agency. This precedes a chapter (Ch. 6) examining the relationship between human images and objects and how images were ‘translated’ into different media through various technologies and how they moved across geographical space. Chapter 7, ‘The Hallstatt Body in Life and Death’, discusses a broad range of themes emerging from the analysis of the evidence provided by the two lines of evidence used in this study, funerary data and images. The analysis offered in Chapter 7 is based on a large database including more than 3,000 human images from 1,205 individual artefacts; there are 1,154 individuals on 204 vessels, an impressive record. As Chapter 7 reveals, these images provide a wide range of information on how the body was conceived; sex and gender distinctions; the significance of sex and procreation; attitudes to age, marriage and motherhood; violence and warfare; attitudes to animals, in particular horses, and the importance of work, such as weaving and ploughing. This is an invaluable insight into life in the region and it certainly illuminates many aspects that would otherwise be invisible to archaeologists.
Finally, Chapter 8 presents a brief account of the results of the network analysis exploring how the body was involved in long term cross-cultural communication between Central Europe and the Mediterranean. There are interesting examples of what the author calls ‘Chinese whispers’, how messages (images) are transformed through transmission (appropriation) ‘to the point that it becomes difficult or impossible to read for people outside the specific cultural context’ (p. 248). The web of connections revealed by images seems to correspond to a decentralised network including highly connected nodes with strong links to northern Italy and Slovenia (Fig. 8.1). Ultimately this work reveals human images as testimonies of late Hallstatt body worlds merging local idiosyncrasies with traits from the wider Mediterranean world.
The approach presented in this book is largely descriptive and analytical; and there is no attempt to provide a grand narrative or a theoretical overview that would provide a conclusion to the volume. This leaves a slight feeling of emptiness towards the end, but that is probably a failing of the reader rather than the author. One can't help feeling that the book could have been a much more attractive volume and also much more informative and exciting, if it had more illustrations of everything: distribution maps, site plans, histograms and, in particular, more pictures of the truly spectacular objects. The author does mention problems with copyright in the introduction; but, if Routledge had serious ambitions to sell this book, then I am sure they could have resolved these problems.
