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Contents:

1 - Environment and people in prehistoric and early historical times; 2 - Climate change; 3 - Geomorphology and landscape change; 4 - Soils and their evolution; 5 - Vegetation change; 6 - Faunal change; 7 - The Mesolithic; 8 - The Neolithic; 9 - The Bronze Age; 10 - The Iron Age; 11 - The Roman Presence; 13 - The early historical period; 14 - The early Norse period; 14 - Environment and archaeology in Scotland: some observations.

Review:

The subtitle 'environment, archaeology and history 8000BC-AD1000' is the clearest indication of what to expect here. Despite the wide range of research material covering all aspects of Scotland's past there is a need for a general overview to help put individual events into perspective. The value of this sort of work is often overlooked but it is crucial that we give students (and others) an understanding of historical development. Although this perspective has been unfashionable for many years, recent developments in biodiversity development have shown that time is a crucial element.

It's one thing to consider a historical synthesis, it's quite another to get one which includes major aspects without losing some of the detail which actually makes the difference in terms of landscape ecology. Thus our opening chapter here is useful. Not only does it highlight some key areas (what was the actual population of the area) it also shows the general limitations of this sort of work. The next five chapters take a common theme - the development of the natural environment. Since Scotland was completely dominated by the Ice Age it seems reasonable to start with a theme of climate change. Given our current interest in the subject it seems appropriate to show how similar shifts made the area habitable. It's in work like this that the value of historical study comes to the fore. If we see what happened in the past we can extrapolate to current trends (or at least appreciate them!). Chapter three considers the changes left behind once the ice retreated whilst chapter four complements this by examining the development of the soil system. In both chapters we get a very good, broad overview with excellent maps helping to locate the key places. Chapter five, on vegetation, has some of the most difficult ground to cover. Human impact on the area has had a history not far short of the Ice Age itself and so there is the initial problem of separating human and natural changes. Here we have a good example of trying to find common patterns whilst still acknowledging the difficulty in data interpretation. The final chapter in this series deals with fauna divided into vertebrates, snails and insects although by far the greatest part is vertebrates. The next seven chapters divide Scottish history along conventional divisions e.g. Bronze Age etc. Since this work synthesises material in both archaeohistorical and environmental research traditions it seems useful to keep to a well-known division. Although these time periods can be specialist studies the writers have included a range of material (especially aerial photography) that seeks to give the key events of each era and so make the material accessible to a general audience. The final chapter gives a brief but fascinating overview of the range of data used to produce archaeological and environmental material. Far fom being even, it is often biased in certain directions from which, we assume, consistent generalizations can be drawn although perhaps there might be more interest if this were not the case.

Overall, this is a very fine text. If is difficult producing a text of a reasonable size and yet give comprehensive treatment whilst still keeping your audience. The range of data and illustrations provided here give make this an accessible work that can be used by students and general readers as well as for more specialist use. For those with an interest in Scotland, this makes an excellent purchase.