This book offers an analysis of archaeological imagery based on new materialist approaches. Reassessing the representational paradigm of archaeological image analysis, it argues for the importance of ontology, redefining images as material processes or events that draw together differing aspects of the world. The book is divided into three sections: ‘Emergent images’, which focuses on practices of making; ‘Images as process’, which examines the making and role of images in prehistoric societies; and ‘Unfolding images’, which focuses on how images change as they are made and circulated. Featuring contributions from archaeologists, Egyptologists, anthropologists and artists, it highlights the multiple role of images in prehistoric and historic societies, while demonstrating that scholars need to recognise their dynamic and changeable character.

'This is a wide-ranging volume, with papers coving images of Nile hippos in ancient Egypt to gold foil figures in Iron Age Scandinavia. The papers all discuss the creation and use of images and art. [...] Throughout
this volume there are informative observations and discussions of how we should understand and think about art and images in the past.'
Ulster Archaeological Society

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Ing-Marie Back Danielsson is Associate Professor of Archaeology at Uppsala University
Andrew Meirion Jones is Professor of Archaeology at the University of Southampton