Archaeology Related Quotations
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Max Mallowan on Agatha Christie and Older Wives
A quote from archaeologist Max Mallowan, widely attributed to his mystery novelist wife Agatha Christie, is on of our favorite archaeology-related quotes.
Robertson Davies on Domestic Architecture
Novelist Robertson Davies wrote a very peculiar murder mystery called Murther and Walking Spirits, in which he comments on archaeologist tastes in houses.
T.S. Eliot on History's Cunning Passages
From T.S. Eliot's 1920 poem called Gerontion, comes Quote 159, on whispering ambitions of the past.
Bob and Ray's Tips on Keeping a Tidy Museum
From the outrageously silly humor of radio comedians Bob (hang from your thumbs) Elliot and Ray (write if you get work) Goulding, a salient tip on how to keep a tidy museum.
Octavia Butler on Letting the Past Go
From Octavia Butler's 1998 book Parable of the Talents, comes a quote from her book within a book, Earthseed: The Book of the Living, by Lauren Oya Olamina.
Paul Bahn on Multiple Theories in Paleolithic Art
This quote from archaeologist Paul G. Bahn is from his 1995/1996 article in Evolutionary Anthropology called "New developments in Pleistocene art."
Barbara Bocek on Rampant Rodents
From her classic article on the measured effects of burrowing animals on archaeological sites, Barbara Bocek describes her results in painful detail.
Douglas Adams on the Importance of Subsistence
An archaeology quote from Douglas Adams' classic Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, on the historical importance of a good diet.
James Joyce (Stephen Dedalus) on History's Nightmares
A quote from James Joyce's Ulysses on how Stephen Dedalus looks on the past.
Charles Darwin on Useful Observations
This quote was taken from an 1861 letter from Charles Darwin to Harry Fawcett; and it shows how the (r)evolutionary scholar contemplated his findings
Paul Bahn Bluffs his Way in Archaeology
A quote from Paul Bahn, from his hilarious 1989 book "Bluff your way in archaeology."
Keith Bassett on the New Intellectual
An archaeology-related quote from a 1996 article by geographer/economist Keith Bassett in Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, entitled Postmodernism and the crisis of the intellectual.
C. Loring Brace on Standardized Testing
Anthropologist C. Loring Brace explains why standardized tests are a bad idea
Alice Beck Kehoe on Tolerance for Ambiguity
A quote concerning a most crucial tool in an archaeologist's kit; from Alice Beck Kehoe's 1998 book The Land of Prehistory.
Howard Carter on the Good Old Days
This quote comes from the quintessential Egyptologist Howard Carter, who in 1920 discovered Tutenkhamen's tomb; from a technical report on the boy king's tomb.
Heinrich Harke and Bettina Arnold on Political Influences
The two fragments that make up this quotations come from an article in Current Anthropology by Heinrich Harke, and the response to that article by Bettina Arnold, disputing the effects of political influence on archaeology.
Jane Austen (Catherine Morland) on Real Solemn History
From one of Jane Austen's masterpieces, 1803's Northanger Abbey, comes a quote on the past from little miss Catherine Morland.
Adrian Praetzellis on Having Too Much Fun
This quote is from Adrian Praetzellis' book Dug to Death, in which he (in the guise of character Hannah Green) describes why fieldwork is just too much fun.
Timothy Kaiser on the Politics of Archaeology in the Balkans
From archaeologist Timothy Kaiser from his chapter "Archaeology and ideology in southeast Europe" in Nationalism, Politics, and Archaeology, published in 1994 by Cambridge University Press.
Shirley Jackson on Why There's Always Been a Lottery
A literary quote from the short story called "The Lottery" written by Shirley Jackson in 1948 and familiar to every high school English student in America.
Lord Acton on What Makes a Country Free
From John E. E. Dalberg, Lord Acton, in his adress to the Members of the Bridgnorth Institute, Frebruary 26, 1877, entitled The History of Freedom in Antiquity.
Maxine Singer on the Thread Holding Us Together
A quote from neuroscientist Maxine Singer, president of the Carnegie Institute, on what thread holds the sciences together.
Robson Bonnichsen and D. Gentry Steele on New World Entradas
A quote from archaeologists Rob Bonnichsen and Gentry Steele explains why one of the most interesting pieces of the American archaeology puzzle is who were the first Americans and when did they get here.
C. Loring Brace et al on the Chimerical Concept of Race
From an article on the scientific exploration of death in ancient Egyptian mummies, C. Loring Brace and a host of co-authors comments on how weird the concept of "race" really is.
John Berger on the Effects of Postmodernism
An archaeology-related quote from writer John Berger's 1991 book "Keeping a Rendezvous", if you believe post-modernism is related to archaeology, and god knows I do!
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