![]() ![]() On an island off of Cyprus, a team of archaeologists must scale a cliff every day just to reach the excavation site. Many of the stories Johnson reports have a cinematic glamor worthy of Indiana Jones. She also roams from Machu Picchu to South Dakota to Cyprus on her quest to study archaeologists and their work. Her story moves from the historical archaeology of the Caribbean (think ruined rum factories and archaeologists fleeing killer bees) to the hunters of the middle Paleolithic (picture a professor butchering a goat carcass with an obsidian blade to simulate ancient hunting practice). ![]() ![]() Both types of material prove fascinating, and she is a funny and garrulous guide to the terrain. Johnson’s book divides into sections with titles like “Boot Camp,’’ “The Classics,’’ and “Archaeology and War’’ and is simultaneously a crash course in basic archaeology and a sociological study of the various quirky subcultures of professional archaeologists. ![]()
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