Hingley, R;
Sharpe, K;
Yarrow, T;
(2025)
Ancient Identities in Britain: Exploring heritage in the making.
[Book].
UCL Press: London, UK.
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Abstract
How are ideas about Iron Age and Roman pasts relevant to people in contemporary Britain? And how do the interests and ideologies of our own society shape the way we present, curate and understand these histories? This book is the first detailed study to explore these questions. It addresses how Iron Age and Roman heritage in Britain is conceived and understood today and sheds new light on the continued social significance of these ancient histories. Ancient Identities in Britain investigates how ideas about the Iron Age and Roman past remain socially relevant: how they are studied in UK classrooms and presented in the media, and how they are projected by ancient monuments, open-air museums, re-enactments, living history exhibits and community projects across England, Scotland and Wales. Adding to this survey, fieldwork and interviews at five heritage venues, including Vindolanda, Castell Henllys and Butser Ancient Farm, reveal the principles and motivations of professional staff and the different styles of presentation for the public. An engaging and nuanced account of everyday practices, this study sheds new light on the processes through which heritage has been made. Throughout, Ancient Identities in Britain explores the actions, ideas and material conditions through which these periods become, and have become, heritage in the present, and investigates how contemporary social practices are transformed through encounters with material traces and conceptual legacies.
| Type: | Book |
|---|---|
| Title: | Ancient Identities in Britain: Exploring heritage in the making |
| ISBN-13: | 9781800089426 |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.14324/111.9781800089426 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.14324/111.9781800089426 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © Authors, 2025 Any third-party material in this book is not covered by the book’s Creative Commons licence. Details of the copyright ownership and permitted use of third-party material is given in the image (or extract) credit lines. Every effort has been made to identify and contact copyright holders and any omission or error will be corrected if notification is made to the publisher. If you would like to reuse any third-party material not covered by the book’s Creative Commons licence, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright owner. This book is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC 4.0), https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by-nc/4.0/. This licence allows you to share and adapt the work for non-commercial use providing attribution is made to the author and publisher (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work) and any changes are indicated. Attribution should include the following information: Hingley, R., Sharpe, K. and Yarrow, T. 2025. Ancient Identities in Britain: Exploring heritage in the making. London: UCL Press. https://doi.org/10.14324/111.9781800089426 Further details about Creative Commons licences are available at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ |
| Keywords: | Heritage, Iron Age, Roman, origin myths, ethnography |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10215081 |
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