Briefly Noted

Brick: A World History

James W. P. Campbell, Photographs by Will Pryce (New York: Thames & Hudson Inc., 2003) 320 PP., $70

Starting with the 10,000-year-old bricks (the world’s oldest) uncovered by the British archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon at Jericho, this beautifully illustrated book winds up with a survey of buildings erected by such modern architects as Louis Kahn and Alvar Aalto. Along the way, readers are introduced to 7,000-year-old fired bricks from Mesopotamia, mid-second millennium B.C. Theban frescoes depicting brickmakers at their craft, colorful glazed brickwork reliefs from the first-century B.C. palace of Susa in modern Iran and ancient Roman baths and basilicas.

Egypt: Stones of Light