Roman London's First Voices. Writing tablets from the Bloomberg excavations, 2010–14, by Roger S.O. Tomlin , 2016. London: Museum of London Archaeology; ISBN 978-1-907586-40-8 hardback £32; xv+309 pp., 144 b/w and colour illus.

Abstract

A criticism that can be made of the volume is that some of the chapters are published in a more complete form elsewhere, including, in some cases, in an open access form with accompanying code and data where appropriate. Nonetheless, for those new to network perspectives, The Connected Past provides an invaluable benchmark for how to think and do research with networks. For the 'old guard' familiar with applications network science in archaeology, there is somewhat less novelty here. In some ways, the book can be considered a victim of the success of network perspectives in archaeology: the sheer number of publications and projects employing networks at the time of writing makes a panoramic view of current research nearly impossible. The book may also have been served by having a summarizing, reflexive chapter, written either by the editors, or other recognized experts. Nonetheless, by drawing attention to the grand challenges of network science for archaeologists and historians, the editors have succeeded in producing a stimulating and tightly focused volume that advances the agenda of quantitative and formal approaches to the past.