Understanding Archaeology- Field Methods, Theories and Practices by K. Rajan

The of my earlier book Archaeology: Principles and methods. It is designed to introduce the current knowledge in archaeological studies and to expose the basic field methods, theories and legal practices to the students of history and archaeology. It is merely a text book and high technical points are simplified or rather, say, generalized to meet the expectations of the general readers.

It explores and explains various methods and techniques presently used in archaeological explorations, excavations, conservation and the various theoretical and legal frameworks that are involved in archaeological investigations. Many excellent and authoritative books already exist on this subject. Those works are meant for advanced level scholars. The present work is written with the ideas and concepts drawn from those authoritative books. The syntheses of those ideas are easily accessible to the students of archaeology.

Archaeology is quite often making paradigm shift, both in theories and methods, due to advancements in science and technology. The present work is an attempt to present these changes and advancements to the student community.

Both the books Archaeology: Principles and methods and Understanding Archaeology are well-received and book quickly went out off-stock. The Tamil Nadu State Department of Archaeology came forward to reprint the book for the benefit of the students. I thank the Department and the present Commissioner of Archaeology Thiru.T.Udhayachandran, IAS for making this possible. I do hope the student community would welcome this effort and support such academic activities.