Customer Reviews

Scotland: An Oxford Archaeological Guide (Oxford Archaeological Guides)

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I've used this book extensively on two trips to Scotland. It provides information (including directions to get to the sites) on a wide range of interesting subjects. It was one of the primary sources for planning six weeks of travel. For anyone even slightly interested in Scottish antiquities, this is THE place to start.

I've travelled to Scotland twice now and O how I wish I'd had this book with me during those trips. I love exploring historical sites when I'm vacationing, especially the ancient ones ... and this guide would have been so helpful, both in terms of trip planning AND in terms of helping me learn as much as possible about the sites I visited.

With well over 1000 castles alone, Scotland is a land VERY rich in archaelogical sites ranging from stone aged to Roman to WWII ... so rich, in fact, that you often don't realize when you're driving or walking right past something interesting. This book will definitely help you determine what potential points of interest lie along the path of your travels and evaluate which one are likely to be of greatest interest to you. I used this book after my trips to learn about places we went (which was fun) and was surprised to learn how much we didn't even know we'd missed. The map coordinates and general location information will help you find some of the "less obvious" sites (many such sites don't have big signs that direct you to them from the road) and the write ups will give you at least some information about the site itself.

I've also found that using this sort of guide (Scotland or other countries) in conjunction with other historical resources (web sites, maps, other books, etc.) was particularly useful. The OAG helped me figure out a "long list" of sites I might want to visit and my other resources then provided more in depth information about these places so I could narrow my list down to a final selection.

If you enjoy traveling to and visiting ancient sites, the OAG's are definitely a tool you'll want to keep handy.

I bought a 1998 edition used. The archaeological sites don't change much, so that was fine. It contains site plans, drawings and other information helpful in interpretation of sites. The Oxford series of Archaeological guides are well known as authoritative.

I found this guide very useful in trip planning. Each site description included directions. This could be encouraging or discouraging about actually getting to some ancient sites. We're talking remote, in many cases. This guide is not about objects in museums, but about actual physical locations.

The book has excellent lists of sites by region and by archaeological period. I found these features very helpful in trip planning.

This book is a keeper. Will use for any future trips to Scotland.