Uruk is the ancient name of the great ruin-field of Warka, which is situated near the station of El Khidr on the Irak railway, about 20 kilometres north of the Euphrates. It is now in the heart of a desert region almost exactly in the middle of the land of Sumer (the Shinar of the Old Testament).

Uruk is the ancient name of the great ruin-field of Warka, which is situated near the station of El Khidr on the Irak railway, about 20 kilometres north of the Euphrates. It is now in the heart of a desert region almost exactly in the middle of the land of Sumer (the Shinar of the Old Testament).

This statement, made by Curajod some years ago during the introduction to a course of lectures at the Louvre, is definitely provocative, for, however true it may be and however much we can learn from a study of ornamental forms and systems of decoration with regard to trade and intercourse, it has in general proved extremely difficult to correlate the movements of designs with those of definite groups of people, still more with those of definite races. We can, for instance, assert quite definitely that the neolithic pottery of China is closely related to that of the black-earth region of south Russia, but we find it by no means easy to associate the invention or transportation of this pottery with any particular group of peoples, and we cannot even say for certain that the fact that we find it in two so far separated regions can be regarded as proof of any very considerable racial migration. Such a migration does, indeed, seem the most satisfactory way in which to explain the relationship, but it can also quite satisfactorily be accounted for by the conquest of one region by a small minority from the other, or of both by a small minority from some common centre, who imposed the imported style on the new possession.

Of their kind there are few things more beautiful than the field-walls in a stony country. They are constructed, as a rule, without mortar, and for that reason are called ‘dry stone walls’; the term is useful, as a distinction, and will serve, but many of them are reinforced by an admixture of earth, or of a kind of daub that sets fairly hard. The walls of the moister West Country are the most beautiful of all, for innumerable plants take root in the earthy crevices and enrich the lovely grey stonework with a natural ornament that is entirely pleasing. Vivid green splashes of pennywort, yellow stars of celandine, clusters of violet, and the twisted white cords of ivy are Nature's version of carved vine-scrolls and interlaced designs, with the added beauty of colour. Far be it from me to institute odious comparisons between the works of Man and of Nature; both are good to look upon, and I yield to none in admiration of the masterpieces of Anglian sculpture. But these, alas, are few and far between; they are not always accessible or easily seen; whereas there are, by way of compensation, hundreds of miles of most enchanting field-walls in Cornwall alone. I began my study of them without fully realizing their aesthetic qualities; when my eyes were opened I found it difficult to look at anything else.

‘Time’, wrote Sir Thomas Browne, ‘which antiquates antiquities, and hath an art to make dust of all things, hath yet spared these minor monuments’. The Nile Valley is full of major monuments—pyramids, tombs and temples; each expedition which goes into the Libyan Desert learns that it is well-filled with minor ones and remarkable among these are paintings and gravings on rocks.

The twin towers of Reculver, a far-seen monument on the northeast coast of Kent 3½ miles east of Herne Bay (PLATE I), have long been recognized as a sea-mark of great antiquity. They were for many years maintained solely for the benefit of mariners using the shoal-beset inshore channels on the southern side of the Thames Estuary, but with the general disuse of these channels during the last decade such a guide-mark is no longer required.

Recent research has thrown considerable light on the history of the domestic sheep; and even though much still remains obscure, we now have a good general idea of the region in which sheep were first domesticated, besides extensive knowledge of the original wild breeds.