A classic study of the beliefs and institutions of mankind, and the progress through magic and religion to scientific thought, The Golden Bough has a unique status in modern anthropology and literature. First published in 1890, The Golden Bough was eventually issued in a twelve-volume edition (1906-15) which was abridged in 1922 by the author and his wife. That abridgement has never been reconsidered for a modern audience. In it some of the more controversial passages were dropped, including Frazer's daring speculations on the Crucifixion of Christ. For the first time this one-volume edition restores Frazer's bolder theories and sets them within the framework of a valuable introduction and notes. A seminal work of modern anthropolgy, The Golden Bough also influenced many twentieth-century writers, including D H Lawrence, T S Eliot, and Wyndham Lewis. Its discussion of magical types, the sacrificial killing of kings, the dying god, and the scapegoat is given fresh pertinence in this new edition. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Sometime around 1446 A.D., Cardinal Prospero Colonna commissioned engineer Battista Alberti to raise two immense Roman vessels from the bottom of the lago di Nemi, just south of Rome. By that time, local fishermen had been fouling their nets and occasionally recovering stray objects from the sunken ships for 800 years. Having no idea of the size of the objects he was attempting to recover, Alberti failed. For most of the next 500 years, various attempts were made to recover the vessels. Finally, in 1928, Mussolini ordered the draining of the lake to remove the vessels and place them on the lake shore. In 1944, the ships burned in a fire that was generally blamed on the Germans. John M. McManamon connects these attempts at underwater archaeology with the Renaissance interest in reconstructing the past in order to affect the present. Nautical and marine archaeologists, as well as students and scholars of Renaissance history and historiography, will appreciate this masterfully researched and gracefully written work.

Northrop Frye's Anatomy of Criticism (1957) is widely regarded as a masterpiece of literary theory. The product of years of reading and reflection, the book's value extends far beyond its impact on criticism as a whole; ultimately, it must be viewed as a synoptic defense of liberal learning by one of the twentieth century's most distinguished critics. In this, the twenty-third volume of the Collected Works, editor Robert D. Denham presents the notebooks to the Anatomy, blue-prints, as it were, for Frye's comprehensive account of literary conventions. Composed from the late 1940s to 1956, the notebooks document the struggle Frye underwent to provide a structure for his work. This involved incorporating previously published essays and developing new material that would maintain the continuity of his argument. This fully annotated volume contains seventeen holograph notebooks, each illuminating some aspect of the grand structure that eventually emerged. Altogether, the notebooks offer an intimate picture of Frye's working process and a renewed appreciation for his magisterial accomplishment.

Argues that thinking about sacred trees in Roman culture forces us to rethink how we understand Roman religion.

Explores how, after Nietzsche, Dionysus and the ancient Greeks would never be the same again.