Alexandra Sanmark is Reader in Medieval Archaeology at the Centre for Nordic Studies, University of the Highlands and Islands. She specialises in The Viking Age in Scandinavia and the Viking expansion in the west and the North Atlantic, with a particular focus on landscape archaeology. She is also a specialist in the Christianisation of Europe and Scandinavia as well as Viking-age religion and ritual.

• List of Figures; List of Tables; Abbreviations; Acknowledgement; Preface 1. Assembly Research: Past and Present2. Early Germanic and Norse Assembly Organisations3. Introducing the Assembly Sites of Scandinavia 4. Elite Rituals at Scandinavian Assemblies 5. Assembly Sites in Scandinavia: Activities and Rituals of the Community 6. Centralisation of Power: Christianity and Urbanisation 7. Norse in the North Atlantic: Iceland, Faroe Islands and Greenland 8. Norse in Scotland: Assembly and New Ancestors 9. Assemblies in the Longue Durée Glossary; Bibliography; Index

This is an impressive work of true scholarship, multidisciplinary in its handling of archaeological, geographical, linguistic and much later written material, and representing a real advance in academic understanding.