The Litaniae maiores and minores in Rome, Francia and Anglo-Saxon England: terminology, texts and traditions

It has been noted that there are Frankish and Anglo-Saxon texts in which the three days before Ascension are designated as the Major Litanies, a practice generally regarded as an inexplicable deviation from the established norm of designating 25 April as the Major Litany and the three days before Ascension as the Minor Litany. This article shows, however, that this contrastive terminology was not in use in the Anglo-Saxon and Frankish churches and that the pre-Ascension litany days – more firmly established than the Roman tradition of 25 April – were commonly designated as the Litaniae maiores in authoritative contexts.     

Rainforests,Agriculture and Aboriginal Fire‐Regimes in Wet Tropical Queensland,Australia

This paper challenges the hypothesis that Aboriginal fire‐regimes in the coastal wet tropics of north Queensland have been responsible for significant rainforest decline in the past, and rejects the narrative that recent rainforest expansion is the result of the disappearance of Aboriginal people and their fire practices from the area. Mapping of vegetation in the Mossman district in c. 1890 from surveyors’ plans, and in 1945 and 1991 from aerial photography demonstrates that the expansion of rainforest since 1945 represents a recovery following extensive rainforest destruction associated with sugar cane cultivation in the first 70 years of European occupation. Kuku‐Yalanji Aboriginal people continued to occupy their traditional lands, and participated in the sugar industry, throughout this period. They adapted their fire management practices to the changed economic and social circumstances. Management of fire by the Kuku‐Yalanji people prior to European occupation ensured the presence of extensive rainforest cover, whilst also providing access to fire‐prone forests and their cultural resources.     

The Pre-Roman Iron Age in Britain and Ireland (ca. 800 B.C. to A.D. 100): An overview

Those communities that lived in Britain and Ireland ca. 800 B.C. to A.D. 100 represent particularly well-researched examples of the complex agrarian, nonurban, societies with high population densities that characterize the Pre-Roman Iron Age across temperate Europe. This paper provides a critical introduction to the extensive recent literature on the Pre-Roman Iron Age in Britain and Ireland. Evidence from the large number of salvage excavations and surveys, the application of a wide range of analytical techniques, and important changes in interpretative frameworks are transforming understandings of this period. After reviewing these developments, a chronological account of the period is outlined which attempts to integrate these new results. This suggests that current interpretations of social processes across Iron Age Europe in terms of state formation, urbanization, and core-periphery relations with Mediterranean civilization need revision.     

The un‐reconstructed republic

Al Grassby, The Australian Republic (Leichhardt, NSW: Pluto Press, 1993) pp.315 $24.95 ISBN 0 04013 894 0.

Alan Atkinson, The Muddle‐Headed Republic (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1993) pp.145 $16.95 ISBN 0 19553 638 X.

George Winterton (ed.), We, the People: Australian Republican Government (St Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 1994) pp.209 $19.95 ISBN 1 86373 640 9.

David Headon, James Warden and Bill Gammage (eds), Crown or Country: The Traditions of Australian Republicanism (St Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 1994) pp.197 $24.95 ISBN 1 86373 599 2.

Geoffrey de Q. Walker, Suri Ratnapala and Wolfgang Kasper, Restoring the True Republic (St Leonards, NSW: The Centre for Independent Studies, 1993) pp.74 $n.p. ISSN 0726 3635.