This work is among the best overviews of Neolithic life available. It's well written and covers a breadth of topics and ideas. Using the best evidence available, he breaks away from traditional approaches to reconstruct prehistoric society. Instead of stripping away modern elements to derive Neolithic life, Castleden builds the picture of that society from its basics. Opening with a portrayal of the Neolithic environment, he envisions how people would react to conditions then.

Environmental constraints and overuse of resources forced changes in lifestyle over the centuries. Neolithic peoples originally inhabited the fertile landscape as farmers. Their crops, however, quickly depleted the soil. Castleden cites a study in Denmark of Neolithic einkorn wheat reducing soil nutrients in only three seasons. Loss of fertility drove people to new locations or converted to a pastoral existence. In either case, the ommunities remained small and tightly integrated, with settlements only a few kilometres apart. The conditions also inhibited experimenting in farming or lifestyles. Maintenance of a secure life took precedence over trying the novel. The resulting conservatism led to a commonalty of thinking. We see evidence of that in the multitude of Neolithic religious sites. Stonehenge, Avebury,
Woodhenge, are distinct from each other in many ways, but their basic pattern is consistent.

Conservative rural life instilled fertility rituals dealing with crops and cattle breeding. Respect for surviving elders led to cults dealing with death. Castleden argues that it wasn't worship of the dead, but death itself that occupied their thoughts and practices. Burial rituals and cemetaries ultimately produced the great henges and stone monuments. Castleden acknowledges that the artefacts associated with the ditches, banks and the stone circles are the chief source of information we have in conceiving Neolithic life. One missing element, and he finds this highly significant, are structures for defence or other evidence of conflict. There are no large collections of arrowheads or spear blades found at the henge sites. From this he derives Neolithic society as essentially peaceful, with communities acting in relative harmony. Such an environment facilitated trade and information exchange. He traces the major likely trade routes across Southern Britain and across to Brittany in France. This view counters the long-held belief that these people were kept brutish and ignorant by being in a constant state of battle. He rightly argues that such a social milieu wouldn't have allowed the construction of such sites as Avebury or Stonehenge. He can't resist comparison with modern societies.

Castleden has enhanced a fluent presentation with numerous photographs, diagrams and maps. There is some presentation of contending views on various aspects of the topic. Perhaps the most surprising topic is the enigma of Stonehenge's source of the massive bluestones. Rejecting the "glacial erratics" position of Aubrey Burl, Castleden accepts the Presli Hills source. However, he proposes the most novel form of transport yet suggested.
Instead of the usual Presli to Severn Estuary route some propose, Castleden argues for an all-sea route around Land's End. He contends some form of trimaran would easily make the journey. Oxen-pulled sledges managed the final leg.

Although this book focuses on southern Britain of the era, the approach can be successfully applied elsewhere, even for other times. Castleden's easy prose and frank approach to the material makes this book useful and informative...

I love this chunky little book. While it is true that this hardcover fits in the palm of your hand, it contains 664 pages. I've lost track of the number of times that I've reached for my copy to not just check on a specific date or event, but to read through to get the feeling of a period. It is well organised sequentially by year (starting in 38,000 B.C.) The significant events of an entire year are covered in a paragraph of less then a page, with significant milestones in architecture, art, literature, and music set off with icons immediately afterwards. Moreover, there are very complete lists of rulers, discoveries and explorations, major wars, and inventors listed in convenient tables in the back. While the print is small , it is not ridiculously so- and there is ample room in the margins for your own notes.

For most of us the very word "Atlantis" conjures up the image of an ultra futuristic civilization fated to destroy itself and sink into the ocean. Sort of the Hollywood version. Certainly it is this version that inspires so many New Age thinkers to look for its remains throughout the world. A geologist would tell them that continents can't sink; they can be transgressed (by elevated sea levels) or depressed (by glaciers) but the density gradients among continental granites, oceanic basalts and the materials of the mantal prevent continents from sinking. For the historian working with Plato's tale, it represents a mystery. Mr. Castleden has followed the leads in this mystery and ultimately identified the island of Thera, modern Santorini, as the most likely candidate for the original inspiration for Plato's tale. Sometime during the 1500s BC (or according to others the 1700s BC) the volcano on this island is known to have collapsed causing an eruption that has been estimated by some to have been 100 times more violent than that on Krakatoa during the 19th Century AD. The civilization that was buried when much of the island was destroyed was quite advanced for the time. Although much of the data Castleden has amassed supports this identification, his ultimate thesis is that the story was reworked by Plato for his own purposes. Though it may have been a tale known to him from other sources, it became in Plato's hands, a parable. Castleden believes that Atlantis became a paradigm for the cities of Sicily and Athens during Plato's time. The book is an interesting and thorough treatment of the subject but can be tough going at times. I put it down several times before I really got into it enough to finish it--and kept checking to see how many pages were left to go!

Of all the books I've read on Atlantis, the most impressive (and the one with the most archaeological evidence) is Rodney Castleden's Atlantis Destroyed. Castleden also wrote The Making of Stonehenge, The Knossos Labyrinth, The Stonehenge People, Neolithic Britain, and Minoans: Life in Bronze Age Crete.

His basic argument is that Plato took a number of what he calls "pieces of identifiable proto-history" and wove them together into a contemporary commentary on the world. Castleden suggests that the basis of this is a faint memory of Minoan civilization. He points out what is often forgotten by those who take the Atlantis story literally, that for Plato it is Athens that is written about as a utopia, not Atlantis, Athens that is the "excellent land with well-tempered seasons."

He illuminates several puzzles that have misled many people, eg. Plato's comments about the Pillars of Hercules. This is often assumed to refer to the modern day features by that name, but in ancient Greece the term could have other meanings, eg it could refer to the two southward-pointing headlands on each side of the Gulf of Laconia. Thus the large island outside the pillars of Heracles would be Crete.

Castleden follows this with a very detailed discussion of the archaeology and geography of Minoan Crete and Thera and how that compares with Plato's tale. He goes into detail about how the story might have been transmitted to Plato and Plato's possible motives in writing the two essays. (He also mentions that there was a century older text by Hellanicus, of which only a small fragment survives, called 'Atlantis'!).

He suggests that the size of 'Atlantis' was distorted by a misreading of either Linear A or B numerals or hieratic or demotic copies made by Egyptian scribes sometime since the fifteenth century, multiplying dimensions by ten so that the Plain of Mesara, which would fit into Crete, became the size of the southern Aegean and Atlantis thus became too large to be in the Mediterranean. A similar problem changed the 900 years between the eruption of Thera and Solon's visit to Egypt to 9000 years. If this is the case it becomes much easier to reconcile the relatively accurate description Plato gives of bronze age Athens with the story of Atlantis (something usually ignored by those who take the Atlantis part of Plato's story literally).

What he is not arguing is that either Minoan Crete or Cyladic Thera was Atlantis. He is suggesting that instead Plato drew his story of Atlantis from proto-historical elements about both civilizations. He also suggests that Plato draws from Syracuse (eg the fortifications of Syracuse) and Sparta for both physical descriptions and some of his political commentary, writing circumspectly so as to avoid Socrates fate.

He provides a wealth of archaeological evidence and the book is generously sprinkled with sketches and photographs. He even goes into detailed points such as the fact that Santorini (destroyed by a massive volcanic eruption) has red, white and black rocks matching Plato's description of the building materials used in Atlantis.

Atlantis Destroyed is a must read for anyone interested in the possible historical background to the Atlantis story.

Now one may say that we do not have much evidence for life in the Bronze age, but surely we have more than what Castledon is using. Written for a more mainstream audience, I would not use as a text for undergraduates. Instead, read it to see if it pushes you to think differently about any "fact" from that most ancient time.

I read this book with deep interest and found that most of his impressions were right on the mark. I agree that to survive in the rough world of the Bronze Age the Minoans were very skilled fighters and raiders rather than flower sniffing pacifists pictured by Evans and other discoverers. But not every building was a temple. Each "palace" I agree was a temple in part. The west side of every major "palace" has been shown to have cultic significance since the time of Sir Arthur Evans. However, the east side of the central courts resemble Minoan residental architecture from all over Crete and from Thera. Is it not possible that the rulers (be they kings, priest kings, or a ruling priestess)still needed places to live! I feel that many of the so called villas in Knossos that Castledon calls temples are just very large homes with a home altar or a sacred room.

Still an interesting book with a lot of ideas that I feel will change our views on the Minoan civilization. However, I feel he could have balanced out his views with some good sense. A ruler has to live somewhere? Has Castledon ever come across these sites yet? He makes the argument that just like Egypt and Assyria, monumental temples existed on Crete and these are the so-called "palaces" However, every other major civilization in the Bronze Age had monumental structures that housed the rulers of the state, and why should Minoan Crete be any different there either. Could it be that the palaces of Minoan Crete served both purposes? I would appreciate other readers views on this matter.

Books about ancient cultures tend to be either slightly soft-focus and "fluffy" or dry and almost excessively scholarly; neither approach succeeds in bringing a culture to vivid life for the interested lay reader. This book, however, does just that. It has scholarly evidence in detail, but also fleshed-out conclusions, and unflinchingly looks even at evidence that doesn't "fit" our modern image of ancient peoples we want to like, in its quest to bring us a living, breathing image of the Minoans. (It also has illustrations in plenty; I feel a bit juvenile to admit this, but I very much appreciate illustrations, as no verbal description can quite convey the brushstrokes, the maze-like floor plans, the quality of line.)It's not a perfect book---I agree with another reviewer who complained that people probably had more houses and fewer temples than Mr. Castleden concludes ---but it is an excellent one, especially for an "armchair archaeologist".

"King Arthur - the Truth behind the legend" is not as bad as many books purporting to find the historical King Arthur. At least the suggestions for Arthur's location etc. are plausible.

However, it is not a work of scholarship. This became obvious in the second chapter "The documents" where Castleden makes the unbelievable howler of confusing the part of the Historia Brittonum (c. 800) concerning St Germanus with the "Life of Germanus" by Constantius (c. 470). You'd think he would have noted something wrong since he himself points out that the manuscript indicates 10 generations instead of one generation between the events described and the time of writing.

Obviously Castleden has not read the primary sources he quotes. He relies heavily on John Morris (as do many authors with similar books). Even though Morris is questionable sometimes in his interpretation, at least he knows his sources. As a reader, you are better of with Morris' "The Age of Arthur", or Alcock's "Arthur's Britain" or Snyder's "The Age of Tyrants".

Let me state up front that, yes, as another Amazon reviewer noted, Rodney Castleden did indeed mess up by confusing a passage from Nennius' 9th Century Historia Brittonum with the material in Constantius'5th Century Life of Germanus. I suspect the error lay in how Castleden assembled his notes, getting something in the wrong file, and it is disconcerting that the mistake was not picked up during the editing process. And I think that this error does highlight the fact that Castleden is something of an outsider in Arthurian matters, not a professional in the area like Ashe or Alcock or an amateur enthusiast such as those who reguarly churn out the latest "final answer" to the old mysteries. Rather, he is a writer on archaeological subjects asked by his publisher to write a book on this always intriguing subject. As such, he brings a fresh, albeit imperfect, eye to familiar ground, along with a certain degree of expertise.

Perhaps the most solid portions of "King Arthur: The Truth behind the Legend" are those where he is reviewing various books and theories on the subject, including quite a few from the last couple decades which produced "final answers" (none of them agreeing with one another, of course). At the same time, Castleden does present a good summary of the evidence (even if he does get that Nennius passage in the wrong place) and an even better tour of some of the major sites associated with Arthur.

Of course, Castleden has his own version of a "final answer". His Dumnonian Arthur, perhaps based in Killisbury/Kelliwic and Tintagel, falls in line with the theories of some who have come before him and is reasonably persuasive (always assuming, of course, that you start with the premise that there was a real Arthur), if not ironclad. His extension of Arthur's story beyond this, however, (that Arthur survived the Battle of Camlann and found refuge of a sort in a Galloway monastery seems to me to be something of a reach, more speculation than deduction.

I would recommend the book to persons strongly interested in the historical facts behind Arthur, not as a "final answer" but as a worthy enough attempt to supply at least some of the truth.

This book uses a detailed analysis of archaeological evidence and textual references in an attempt to reconstruct the world in which King Arthur would have lived and to try to determine if he really occupied it. Castleden constructs a plausible thesis: that Arthur was local king of Trigg in present-day Cornwall; that he became high king and war leader of the united Britonnic front against the Saxon conquest; that he was likely a first-generation Christian who retained some elements of Celtic and Roman influence; that his itinerant court occupied various castles including a site at Killibury in peacetime and the Tintagel stronghold in wartime and ceremonial occasions; that Tintagel's alternate name of Myrddin (sea-fort) was confused with a northern bard of the same name, leading to the legend of Merlin as Arthur's protector; that the battle of Camlan where Arthur's career ended was at the convergence of the Gamlan and Eden rivers, where he was attacked by the forces of Maelgwn, who succeeded him as high king; and that a crippled, defeated Arthur may have abdicated by retiring to a monastery, explaining the discrepancy in his reported death dates as well as the legend of his disappearance and inevitable return. It's a credible scenario, consistent with the evidence Castleden presents, and Castleden's grasp of that evidence is excellent. He shows some keen insights, for instance realizing that an contemporary reference seeming to state that Arthur bore a cross on his shoulders for three days and nights (a superhuman feat) was probably mistranslated, and that he actually bore the cross symbol on his shield. But his "biography" of Arthur can't be proven, and Castleden seems too willing to take it as fact, to the point of glossing over other theories. He mentions the possibility that Arthur was a composite of more than one figure, including an Arthmael whose wife was named Gwenhwyfar (Guinevere); but despite this compelling datum he dismisses the theory with a brief, unsatisfying argument. In the end, when he attempts to identify the specific site of Arthur's retirement and burial, he speculates much too far beyond the existing data. He spends much of the book out on a limb, but by this point his argument is hanging by a thread. Castleden is clearly far too convinced of his own thesis, and this damages his credibility. This work is a valuable contribution to the discussion of the historical Arthur, and raises many interesting questions which deserve to be debated; but it should by no means be taken as the "truth" its title asserts it to be.