Book Review:
_The Early Slavs: Eastern Europe from the Initial Settlement to the Kievan 
Rus_. Pavel M. Dolukhanov. (NY: Longman, 1996). ISBN: 0-582-23618-5.

Most history books say little or nothing about the Slavic groups prior
to their Christianization around the first millenium CE. This book, laden
with archaelogical material, may fill in a good deal of the background of
the history of human occupation of Eastern Europe. The author is by training
a geologist and a environmental scientist working in field archaelogy,
who participated in digs and research in the Soviet Union for many years
before emigrating to the West. This book is written based his research and
the research of other Russian archaelogists. However, the author is careful 
to keep a neutral tone, describing and labelling the theories of the competing 
schools and warning us about the Marxist and Slavophile schools of archeological 
analysis.

The book begins with a chapter on 'The Slavs and Archaelogy in Russia',
an overview of the academic field which I heartily recommend. With maps,
charts, and illustrations he then plunges into his story. When Dolukhanov says
Early, he means _EARLY_. The first 50 pages are full of glaciations. He traces
the people of the Russian plains from the Mesolithic onward, careful to present 
first the archaelogical evidence, then the theories drawn from thatevidence. 
Special attention is of course paid to agriculture and stockbreeding evidence, 
along with burials, and theories about the development of the Slavic, 
Finno-Ugraic, and Baltic language groups are discussed. When reaching 
historical time (1000 BC and onward) the author connects the archaelogical
data with the history of the Scythians as known to the Greeks, and continues
to do so onward. Of most interest to SIG readers will be the finalchapter,
"The Vikings and the Rus", which covers the second half of the first millenium.
The book is enhanced by excellent maps (though you may want a modernmap at
hand for comparison), illustrations of pottery, and diagrams of archaelogical
finds. There is a glossary, but it varies in coverage (Iron age is defined,
but not celt or BP [Before Present]). There is also an index, and anexcellent
list of sources.

While this volume is slow reading and will be of limited use to the recreationist, 
it is an excellent background to the history of the Slavic lands and peoples.

Jadwiga Zajaczkowa

Note: the author informs me that a newer, considerably revised version
of the text is being published in Russian (Istoki etnosa). Worth watching for,
and hoping that it will appear in English!