This is an important, enlightening and, in many ways, ground-breaking book on the intersection of sex and gender with violence in past societies, as investigated through a range of data sources including archaeological contexts, archival and textual data, as well as iconography and art. Each chapter and case study is thoroughly theorised, drawing from a large body of critical intellectual approaches in the study of gender. The introductory chapter is stellar, one of the best overviews of gender and violence that I have seen. Jenson and Matic ask the question of why we need archaeologies of gender and violence and why is it the right time to interrogate and open up the way that we ‘see’ sex and gender in the archaeological record? The answers are both compelling and veracious in clarifying the importance of a wide variety of datasets for understanding intersectionalities of violence and gender in relation to other variables such as status, history, subsistence and religion. Drawing from a persuasive tableau of theories and case studies, this opening chapter sets the stage for the rest of the volume by pointing out how various approaches can preserve nuance by not minimising variability and the more subtle aspects of the ways that violence and gender intersect.

In this volume, gender is not privileged over violence; rather, both are kept in dialogue with each other in ways that invite the reader to keep them in mind. The authors likewise have done a terrific job covering new ground in their case studies. This is one of the few volumes where it is acknowledged over and over again that violence is culturally specific, historically contingent and socially meaningful, just as is gender, kinship, religion, politics and all other societal constructions. Violence in other works is often treated as if it is an anomalous and deviant behaviour that shows up during times of stress, as opposed to being something that sits perennially within social structures and processes just as other human behaviours do.

To some extent, a second introduction is provided by Koerner (Chapter 2) who discusses the myth of matriarchy and contingency, and how we need to construct new paths forward without being chained to past theoretical and epistemological limitations. This chapter is quite dense, and will probably need to be read several times (but it is well worth it) before seeing that this is an emphatic call for new kinds of scholarship, especially in light of developments in global politics and movements backward to old patterns of thinking.

Spatzier (Chapter 3) presents both burial data and archaeological context from a Neolithic site in Germany. Through a detailed and nuanced analysis, he demonstrates how burials reflect social order. In this case, young males who died in warfare were found in conjunction with females who were sacrificed in their honour. The work presented here shows that violence is intricately bound up with social structures and strict notions about gender. Drawing on theoretical approaches to ritualised violence, the chapter impressively integrates empirical data analysis and social theory, revealing how violence resonates throughout social processes.

One of my favourite chapters is by Skogstrand (Chapter 4) on the ways that violence is used to produce and reproduce identities for males. Using a poetics approach, she demonstrates the rich meaning and cultural logic underlying acts of violence as males negotiate status using forms of violence to create their masculine identities. This counters the usual, more superficial, approach that likens violence to chaos and disruption, and often attributes it (simplistically) to male tendencies. In her use of a Scandinavian dataset from the Late Bronze Age and Roman periods, she shows how the development of the warrior identity and violence came to be entwined. Warfare was often used as a test of manliness as well as underwriting professional warrior status.

Several case studies explore alternative approaches to the interpretation of artwork, texts, iconography and images. All of these reframe the potential interpretive power of such works by viewing them through a more multivalent lens. Matic (Chapter 5) takes on historical approaches and shifting interpretations regarding the images of Queen Nefertiti, and Dexhamkhooy and Yazdi (Chapter 9) undertake a similar deconstruction and fresh analysis of Persian Sassanid art (and literature). Hue-Arcé (Chapter 7) provides a critical reanalysis of violence against women in Graeco-Roman Egypt through Demotic (vs Greek) textual sources. Moraw (Chapter 8) re-examines Late Antique Roman art of young females as a way to situate how identities were formed through violence-based images in the popular artwork of the day. These can be used as a ‘best practices’ for current ways to integrate questions about gender and violence using a wide variety of sources. Jensen (Chapter 10) relies on texts and artwork as well, but uses a form of practice theory to interrogate the narratives about Viking males and revenge. His analysis shows that what people were actually doing in their daily practice was locally negotiated and far less restrictive and rigid than as portrayed in the texts and iconography. Whitehouse (Chapter 11) examines the roles of women in warfare in Anglo-Saxon England through an interrogation of weapons and graves as reflective of social status and identity. Working within a broad regional survey of mortuary, osteological and funerary data, she provides some sense of what the signature of warrior women would look like in the archaeological record. These chapters work to challenge older notions of Viking and Anglo-Saxon male-female roles, and provide a much more nuanced and comprehensive snapshot of the complexities and contingencies that underwrote those gendered roles.

While much has been written about Moche warfare in ancient Peru, there has been very little information on female livelihood and roles during warfare. Using the theoretical framework of structural violence to investigate male and female patterns of trauma and violence, Farnum (Chapter 12) demonstrates that while warfare was a strong and central feature of Moche cosmology, cultural structures that defined class and status enacted a more hidden form of violence upon females and others. This chapter begins the hard work of figuring out the effects of war culture on non-combatants and civilians (in this case, females and children), which has been entirely unexamined up to now. Finally, Hitchcock (Chapter 13) provides a lively and engaging overview of where the gaps and challenges lie in approaches to sex/gender in archaeological populations. She lays out the themes that unite the chapters as well as the places where authors present specific and quite different interpretations. In sum, this is a wonderfully satisfying book for those deeply embedded in gender and violence theory, as well as for newcomers to the field.