Augur"s Daughter

The brilliant, Hellenized Etruscan civilisation, which flourished in central Italy before Rome wrested the leading role from her hated rival, has been the subject of both illuminating scholarly research and of mystifying romantic speculation: but the former remains mostly inaccessible to the general reader, while the latter is usually confused and misleading. In her historical novel The Augur"s Daughter, Dr Sybille Haynes has succeeded in combining for the first time accurate archaeological knowledge with a carefully controlled imaginative sympathy. The changing fortunes of Larthi, the Augur"s daughter and her family reflect the fate of the entire Etruscan nation and in following the vicissitudes of the protagonist"s lives, the reader becomes familiar with a sophisticated civilisation which profoundly influenced that of Rome and thus of Europe.



Sybille Haynes - Dr Sybille Haynes is a classical archaeologist, specialising in Etruscan studies, who worked as a voluntary assistant in the British Museum from 1951-1976 and was awarded an MBE for services to Etruscan art. Her numerous publications include Etruscan bronze utensils and Etruscan sculpture (for the British Museum), a major work on Etruscan bronzes, an archaeological travel book on south west Turkey, Land of the Chimaera and an historical novel, Die Tochter des Augures, which she has now translated into English.