Europe Between the Oceans: 9000 BC-AD 1000 (original 2008; edition 2011)

Barry Cunliffe takes a look at the long-term history of the Asian peninsula we call Europe in the 10,000 years from 9000 BC to AD 1000.

Fascinating. Obviously relies on archaeological discoveries for the first 8500 years, and I always find archaeology heavier going than history, but I'm glad I persevered. Certain themes, such as the movement of peoples from East to West and North to South, and the persistence of certain geographically defined regions (the Mediterranean shores, the Atlantic shore, the North Sea and Baltic shores, and the Central areas), which become interlocking cultural areas as well. ( )

I'm not an expert on prehistory but for the layman this is probably the definitive book on European history from 10,000 BC to about 2,000 BC. It's a period I knew almost nothing about, and even thought there wasn't much to know. The Germanic "barbarians" before the Romans were a mystery that was forever lost. But the amount of detail we know through archaeological evidence is amazing, it's not at all a dark period, it's a huge stretch of history that is beginning to open up and become more clear.

Cunlife looks at big common themes reoccurring through the millennium driven by geography, themes as common today as they were in 6000 BC, and will be in the future. The different zones of culture, the axis of communication and movement of goods (north-south and east-west), the axis of movements of people. Rivers and mountains, oceans and peninsula's carve and divide Europe, along and around which flow people and goods, creating cognitive geographies that further shape culture.

As I was nearing the end of the book, events felt strangely repetitive. By the time written history begins, the patterns of the modern world had already solidified. This perspective is very different from the traditional view of early history as the "new" and beginning, not towards the end of something larger that came before. The book opens new perspectives on the development of civilization in Europe. A wonderful book that has greatly peaked my interest in the "prehistory" of Europe, but also changed my perspective on Europe as a whole.

--Review by Stephen Balbach, via CoolReading (c) 2011 cc-by-nd ( )

Cunliffe does geographical anthropology, looking at how land and water shaped European civilization. Fascinating, and definitely accessible to the non-specialist (e.g., me). ( )

Early European history is a hobby of mine, and the period from 9000 BCE to about 1000 BCE is one of my favorite periods to learn about. Cunliffe's Europe Between The Oceans offers a good introduction to Europe and the Mediterranean regions of Africa and Asia Minor, not so much in the historical sense of studying individuals and particular events, but on a grander scale. The role of geography and climate, the mass movements of people and goods, and adaptations of cultures as they learned from others are the themes here. I especially liked the many maps showing pretty much every aspect of Cunliffe's discussion, especially distribution of archaeological finds, etc.

So what did I get out of this? First, that Europe was much more connected earlier than I thought. The record clearly indicates that people traveled and that goods were traded from the very start and that this flow affected nearly every culture and group. Also, people seem to have many of the same motivators today that they had then - exploration, prestige and influence over others, the desire to improve their situation for example. and how population and food production drove much of the push into new territories and much of the technological innovation.

All in all, this is a pretty good book. It's at what I consider an introductory level - which means that it's well outside my areas of expertise and I was still able to follow just fine. I did get a little mixed up with the dating terminology and some of the cultural names, but Cunliffe was able to keep me straight. I'd recommend it to anyone wanting to get a sense of the state of the art in European archaeological thinking. ( )