Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
List of Illustrations
Abbreviations
Chronology
1: Constructing Histories
Part 1: From Huts to Temples
2: The First Religious Buildings: 'Sacred Huts'
3: The Architecture of Early Shrines and Temples
4: The Decoration of Early Shrines and Temples
Part 2: Religious Monumentality in Context
5: Ritual Activation: Altars, Cult Statues, and Temples
6: Ritual Topographies: Landscapes, Cityscapes, and Temples
7: Accounting for Religious Monumentality
8: Conclusions
Appendix: The Archaic Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus in Rome
Catalogue
Bibliography
Index

About the Author

Charlotte R. Potts is the Sybille Haynes Lecturer in Etruscan and Italic Archaeology and Art at the University of Oxford and the Woolley Fellow in Archaeology at Somerville College.

Reviews

Well prepared (including a chronology), well written (explanatory, clear and jargon-light), an incisive re-examination of the hefty secondary literature, an engagement with theory and debates on urbanisation cultural contact/exchange, but always focused on the evidence (and on the people who used them as well as the buildings themselves), and well presented: two maps, 42 figures and 95 illustrations as plates, all clear.
*Gocha R. Tsetskhladze, Ancient West and East (AWE)*

A highly valuable reassessment and interpretation of the archaeological corpus which has wide-ranging implications for our understanding of early Italic history.
*Sinclair Bell (Northern Illinois University), The Journal of Roman Studies Vol.107*

a welcome and important work in the field of pre-Roman archaeology ... It is an internationally important achievement with a huge impact on the study of ancient architecture. Her book offers many new insights and urges the reader to reconsider established views. It is a rich, well-argued, and impeccably researched study, which will surely have a major impact on its field.
*Patricia S. Lulof, University of Amsterdam*

The special emphasis placed on the development of monumental religious architecture as a means of encouraging cross-cultural contact will also appeal to specialists interested in Mediterranean connectivity and urbanization. The value of the book lies primarily in the synthesis of an impressive amount of archaeological material in English, with an emphasis on the data recovered from the past fifty years or so of systematic excavation and study. The book's secondary value lies in the author's use of the archaeological evidence to challenge existing hypotheses concerning the identification of religious buildings and to propose new ways of understanding the role of monumentalization in the reconstruction of ancient societies.
*J. Marilyn Evans, Bryn Mawr Classical Review*