The Archaeology of Nostalgia: How the Greeks re-created their mythical past

London: Thames and Hudson, 2003. Book. Illus. by Illustrated. New. Cloth. First Edition. 4to. First edition. 4to. Cloth binding with impression of dolphin, 240 pp. illustrated throughout. Julius Caesar was warned to tread carefully in the long grass at Troy lest he step on Hector's ghost: the mythical geography of Greece shared the landscape of the real world. The Greeks drew upon their physical environment not just to illustrate the past but also in many ways to invent it, and their definitions of myth and history were fluid and overlapping. Massive fossil bones were the remains of giants; strange rocks were petrified heroines; Bronze Age walls and tombs were the work of titans; and artifacts from the past became Achilles' spear, Helen's necklace, or Hercules' cup. With black and white photos and drawings throughout, this book offers many insights into the making of myth and the exceptional imagination of a people building the first modern civilization out of the relics of the past. New in new dust jacket..