Studies of empires have rarely lingered for too long on the effects of imperial power on either peripheral landscapes or rural societies. Where great attention has been paid to the ideologies of rule, to transformations within the metropolis or to the military, economic, and cultural patterns of expansion and subjugation, the traces of empire across its distant hinterlands have often been neglected. Inspired by recent comparative studies of empire (perhaps most obviously Burbank and Cooper's fine Empires in World History Princeton University Press, 2010), the present collection seeks to redress this imbalance through a wide range of archaeological case-studies. This does not claim to be an exhaustive survey of world empires, and is largely limited to the ‘old world’ of Eurasia and north-eastern Africa, but the extent of topics covered, and the intellectual frame of reference, remains impressive.
The volume is divided into three sections. The first, ‘The Transformation of Rural Societies and Landscapes’, looks specifically at the impact of imperial expansion in the hinterland. Particularly noteworthy are two chapters on the landscapes of Near Eastern empires: Bleda Düring discusses the consolidation of Assyrian rule in Mesopotamia and Daniele Morandi Bonacossi changes to the immediate hinterland of Nineveh – a region often obscured in discussions of the metropolis itself. Henry Colburn adds a fine study of the Achaemenid presence in Kharga oasis – a clear example of a remote colonial settlement that can be identified and discussed with confidence, but which has not previously received the attention it deserves. Peter Attema's account of the Greek impact revealed by field survey in the Crimea and Tesse Stek's account of Roman colonization in Abruzzo close out the section and reveal two very different forms of colonial landscape created by the Mediterranean powers.
The second section is concerned with ‘The Transformation of Peripheral Societies and Landscapes’. In the first article Lauren Ristvet provides a thoughtful interpretation of the violent landscape of the southern Caucasus in the iron age, framed in terms of almost fractal relationships with the military fringes of wider empires – principally Urartu and of Assyria. Anna Boozer (on Dakhla/Kharga and Lower Nubia) and Lidewijde de Jong and Rocco Palermo (on the north Mesopotamian steppe) examine the Roman imperial impact on some relatively neglected regions, and offer helpful overviews to the archaeology of each. The strongest article in this section is perhaps Joanita Vroom's discussion of Butrint in the middle Byzantine period. This is an exemplary use of a relatively small site to examine the wider processes of imperialism – in this case the fluctuating Balkan frontier of the Byzantine empire from the ninth century.
The final section contains just two articles: J. Daniel Rogers's discussion of ‘repertoires of empire’, which takes as its starting point discussion of the steppe empires of Inner Asian pastoral groups – a helpful reminder that not all empires were founded by settled societies, or revolved around focal capitals. Finally Bradley J. Parker adopts a consciously comparative and broad-brush approach, using material from Incan imperialism in the Andes to illuminate his understanding of his own principal area of study in the Neo-Assyrian empire.
The editors are to be commended for gathering together such a wide-ranging volume, and particularly for their introduction. This sets out the scope of this shared enquiry very well, and places all the contributions within a developing scholarly field. As a clear introduction to the changing archaeology of empire (and where the field might go from here), this is a welcome book indeed.
