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Copyright Julian Richards.
Books by Julian Richards
Both Meet the Ancestors and Blood of the Vikings are now out of print. So, if you have no luck with Amazon, I usually have the odd second hand copy for sale at my talks.
This started off as an idea for ’10 years
of Stonehenge from the air’ to commemorate the centenary of
the first aerial photograph of Stonehenge – supposedly taken
from a balloon in 1904. However, it was quickly realised that this
wouldn’t be a very interesting book and it soon changed its
scope and took in all photographs of Stonehenge. This pushed the
starting point back to 1853 and the resulting pictures now take
in restoration, excavation, vandalism, the changing face of the
stones, some aerial photographs and celebration in all its forms,
from Druids and Morris dancers to a very cold naked lady.
I have tried to make this more than just
a picture book, more than disjointed images with captions, and have
instead used the pictures to tell the story of the last 150 years
of Stonehenge’s long life. This is the social history of Stonehenge.
All the questions that you’ve always wanted
to ask – and some of the answers. This will be out around
Easter and is aimed at 6 – 8 year olds, although there should
be something in it for all ages. Stonehenge pops up, there are stones
to drag and lift, a skeleton to discover and the function of the
stones is explained with a little help from some mobile sheep.
The book is brought to life by Linda Birkinshaw’s
wonderful pictures and paper engineering. History is fun! (and led
on to some interesting ideas – see odds
and sods)
Last year English Heritage launched their new
guidebook series for which I wrote Stonehenge.
This is the replacement for Stonehenge and neighbouring monuments and is the up to date introduction to Stonehenge in its landscape
setting. It contains some great reconstructions by Peter Dunn of
the different stages in Stonehenge’s development. The Spanish
and Japanese versions are already available
This is the ‘big book’ that explains our current understanding of Stonehenge, based on centuries if antiquarian speculation and investigation and the results of all the 20th century excavations, finally analysed and available. The title is deliberate; we will never know all the answers, never understand Stonehenge fully, but this is the most up to date account available, written from my perspective of twenty-five years of involvement with the stones and the landscape.
It is, as they say, ‘copiously illustrated’, not just with the old favourite Stonehenge pictures but some fascinating but obscure images that
I went to a lot of trouble to find.
