Throughout our history mankind has relied on sticks in almost every facet of our culture and technology.
Our first hunting implements were undoubtedly sticks in the form of spears. We used sticks to create fire and to build shelters for our survival. Later, we developed sharp stone and metal points to top our sticks to make spearheads and arrowheads. So pivotal has the use of sticks been to human society the author contends their role should be recognized with the institution of a Stick Age; encompassing the Stone Age, through the Bronze Age to the Iron Age.
The Book of Sticks goes on to look at the role of sticks in construction, surveying, sport, hunting and leisure, warfare and punishment and their use as symbols of power and magic. It examines the function of this seemingly ordinary object from prehistoric times to the present; a spectrum ranging from ancient boomerangs through to Pooh Sticks. However this is not merely a catalogue of the use mankind has made of sticks. Instead it resonates with account of high drama where sticks have turned the course of history and with personal anecdotes, which evoke the serendipitous magic of sticks.
About
Alun G. Rees
Alun Rees was born and raised on the Bristol Channel coast in Wales and enjoyed a long career in journalism as a staff correspondent for the Daily Mail, Daily Express and Mail on Sunday covering wars, disasters and major crimes. His awards include UK Campaigning Journalist of the Year. Alun is an author of two military non-fiction best sellers and a historical non-fiction, The Book of Sticks: Ancient and Modern. He has lived near Stonehenge in Wiltshire for 45 years sharing time in the US with his American partner, and he’s a proud father of three adult children, respectively a publisher, an author and a soldier.
