History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03

Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.

Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19

Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

Portrait of a Priestess: Women and Ritual in Ancient Greece

Average customer rating:

Equal opportunity temples
Portrait of a Priestess, scholarly merits and popular appeal

Portrait of a Priestess: Women and Ritual in Ancient Greece
Joan Breton Connelly
Manufacturer: Princeton University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0691127468

Book Description

In this sumptuously illustrated book, Joan Breton Connelly gives us the first comprehensive cultural history of priestesses in the ancient Greek world. Connelly presents the fullest and most vivid picture yet of how priestesses lived and worked, from the most famous and sacred of them--the Delphic Oracle and the priestess of Athena Polias--to basket bearers and handmaidens. Along the way, she challenges long-held beliefs to show that priestesses played far more significant public roles in ancient Greece than previously acknowledged.

Connelly builds this history through a pioneering examination of archaeological evidence in the broader context of literary sources, inscriptions, sculpture, and vase painting. Ranging from southern Italy to Asia Minor, and from the late Bronze Age to the fifth century A.D., she brings the priestesses to life--their social origins, how they progressed through many sacred roles on the path to priesthood, and even how they dressed. She sheds light on the rituals they performed, the political power they wielded, their systems of patronage and compensation, and how they were honored, including in death. Connelly shows that understanding the complexity of priestesses' lives requires us to look past the simple lines we draw today between public and private, sacred and secular.

The remarkable picture that emerges reveals that women in religious office were not as secluded and marginalized as we have thought--that religious office was one arena in ancient Greece where women enjoyed privileges and authority comparable to that of men. Connelly concludes by examining women's roles in early Christianity, taking on the larger issue of the exclusion of women from the Christian priesthood.

Customer Reviews:

Equal opportunity temples.......2007-08-07

The status of women in the ancient world has long been a controversial issue. The traditional view of male historians has been that it was always a male-dominated world. Some feminists have countered this with arguing, on rather fragile evidence, in favor of prehistoric matriarchy and mother goddesses and so forth. Ancient Greece, in particular, has always been a kind of blank screen on which thinkers project their own image of what it was like. Most of the written evidence has suggested that women in ancient Greece were subordinate and secluded. Against this has been the fact that some powerful Greek gods were female and served by female priests. What these priestesses did,, and what their place was in society, has been somewhat mysterious because what we got from the historians and poets and playwrights was scanty. Connelly supplements this by a careful and scholarly (perhaps too scholarly for the general reader) examination of epigraphs and images.
The text is pretty hard going for the non-specialist but the pictures are great and it will make a handsome addition to a feminist coffee table although it will be a shame if it stays there. I think the large format is justified on more than esthetic grounds because Connolly's argument depends on her ability to bring to bear on the subject her abilities as an art historian and therefore adequate illustrations are needed. These are more than adequate; they are magnificent. It would be presumptuous to pronounce on the strength of her case without more expert knowledge than mine. No doubt other academics will be on the attack and it will be fun to see the fur fly in the Times Literary Supplement etc.
At the risk of quibbling I must break a lance in my ongoing battle against publishers who transcribe Greek inscriptions into lower case. Greek lower case was unknown before the Byzantines. I noticed that she does not mention the triple bronze serpent in the Hippodrome at Istanbul in her discussion of the Pythian oracle at Delphi. Is it authentic?

Portrait of a Priestess, scholarly merits and popular appeal.......2007-05-07

Portrait of a Priestess: Women and Ritual in Ancient Greece is a book I'd recommend to scholars. It is well researched and well composed. However, the topic is also of interest to those who enjoy exploring the ancient world and a woman's place in it. Women's lives in this historical period are difficult to access but Connelly has done so in a way that is both useful to those who work in the field and accessible to those who have a general interest and curiosity about the women who acted in and acted out the roles of priestess. An impressive collection of images is of interest to both groups of readers. RD Anderson

Rome: An Oxford Archaeological Guide (Oxford Archaeological Guides)

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If you're wondering what all of those ruins are in Rome, this is fantastic!
None better.
The perfect companion when touring Rome
Invaluable
Excellent Guide to Ancient Rome

Rome: An Oxford Archaeological Guide (Oxford Archaeological Guides)
Amanda Claridge , Judith Toms , and Tony Cubberley
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0192880039

Amazon.com

The city of Rome is the largest archeological site in the world. If your idea of a good Roman holiday is uncovering the archeological mysteries of the Roman Empire, then Oxford Archeological Guides: Rome is your ideal guidebook.

For such a detailed guide, this book is remarkably readable. Of the Field of Mars (Campus Martius), Claridge writes,

It is the one part of Rome which continued to be quite densely inhabited after the C9 AD, becoming the center of the late medieval and Renaissance city, and is still densely inhabited today, an extraordinary blend of past and present even for Rome. The Stock Exchange occupies a Roman temple, the boiler-rooms of the offices of the Senate are set in the ruins of Roman thermal baths, a modern theatre nestles in the shell of a Roman theatre. Many of the streets are on the lines of ancient streets, and the walls of the buildings on either side of them are often balanced directly on top of Roman walls.

Among this Oxford guide's special features are 200 site plans, maps, diagrams, and photographs; a cultural and historical overview; a chronological overview; and a glossary of essential terms. It uses star ratings to help you plan your days and divides Rome into 12 main areas: the Roman Forum, Upper Via Sacra, Palatine Hill, Imperial Forums, Campus Martius, Capitoline Hill, Circus Flaminius to Circus Maximus, Colosseum Valley and Esquiline Hill, Caelian Hill and the Via Appia, other sites, museums, and catacombs.

Shaded sidebars add anecdotal interest, covering issues such as the Seven Hills, Jupiter's Dining Room, Tomb of Bibulus, the "Province" Reliefs, Madam Lucretia, Nero's New Palace, and Gladiatorial Shows. --Kathryn True

Book Description

Capital and showcase of the Roman Empire and the center of Christian Europe, the city of Rome is the largest archaeological site in the world. Here, Amanda Claridge presents an indispensable guide to all significant monuments in Rome dating from 800 BC to 600 AD. Included are such
breathtaking structures as the Capitoline Hill, the Roman Forum, the Colosseum, the Mausoleums of Augustus and Hadrian, the Circus Maximus, and the Catacombs.
Divided into twelve main archaeological areas in central Rome, and four in Greater Rome, this accessible guide provides a detailed overview of the sites, as well as historical reference tables listing archaeological periods, emperors, and principal surviving buildings. The introduction offers an
assessment of Roman achievement along with its status as the capital of the Roman Empire, and explains Rome's survival as the world's most complex archaeological site.

Customer Reviews:

If you're wondering what all of those ruins are in Rome, this is fantastic!.......2007-09-24

I took this book, along with a plethora of touristy guidebooks, and this one got read the most! We spent hours and hours in the Forum and the Palatine, and really delighted in uncovering the mysteries of so many building foundations. I left Rome wishing I had an archaeologist as a personal tour guide, but this book was an excellent substitution! It can be read at home, but I found infinitely more meaning when I sat at the site and read about where I was. Take this to Rome if you are interested in the ancients!

None better........2007-09-09

I had the fortune or misfortune of buying this book prior to my first visit to Rome. It is such a well-organized, well-written, and concise guide to ancient Rome that you could make the mistake that I made upon completing it and my first visits there. You might search a long, long time and spend a lot of money trying to find something better. Based upon my experience, a university-level seminar or a three semester hour course is the only thing that could surpass this guide.

Don't be put off by simplified plans shown in the pages. You need clear, simple ideas of what the stuff once was to understand what you're looking at. When you're in the ruins, you will be surrounded by other tourists, any changing weather conditions, and you will be viewing the architectural remains of a previous civilization from many different standpoints. You can't do that successfully without a clear, simple concept already in your mind.

Fodor's Holy Rome, 1st Edition: A Millennium Guide to Christian Sights (Fodor's Holy Rome)

The perfect companion when touring Rome.......2007-04-05

You can't really understand Rome without this companion. It looks deeply into the very heart of the city, into its foundations and the stories they tell. This is practical archaelology at its best, presenting us with the lessons that history can teach us.

Invaluable.......2006-12-15

I used this book for my second trip to Rome and it was absolutely invaluable. I wish that I had it for my first trip. I am a person who only cares about the Ancient Roman artifacts and this book literally has ever one listed by region that you have access to. If you decide to use this book bring along a highlighter and check off the sections that you complete, by the end of the day you will be amazed at how much you have seen. I cannot recommend this book enough.

Excellent Guide to Ancient Rome.......2006-05-10

I just returned from Rome, using this book as my primary guide. We were able to identify almost every random bit of ancient archaelogy sticking out of the ground as we walked about the city, and if you've been to Rome, you'll understand how impressive that is.

A major shortcoming that I noticed is that the book treats the ancient-era churches very lightly: while the myths of gods such as Pollux and Castor are frequently referenced in relation to the ancient sites, the C1 AD story of Saint Clement is inexplicably left out of the section on the church of San Clemente constructed by Constantine. Also, as the author states in the beginning, the intent of this guide is to detail ancient Rome only. If you are interested in medieval, Renaissance, or ecclessiastic history, you will certainly need a supplemental guide.

Now, for the advantages... The guide systematically presents every ancient structure in Rome (we were never disappointed), providing a very good map at the beginning of each chapter for a major area (e.g. the Palatine, Field of Mars) to help you identify what you are looking at. The site is laid out in a sort of walking tour format and if you begin at the point suggested, you can follow the chapter page by page as it logically guides you through the region. We did find that writing in page references for each location on the map at the beginning made the book much easier to use. For more complicated buildings, additional diagrams are provided in the appropriate subsection where it is further detailed. The Baths of Caracalla are a superb example of this.

While Claridge delves a bit too thoroughly into the exact type of marble used in the facing and floors of each building, you find yourself recognizing the materials and envisioning the baths, basillicas, and forums as they might have looked clad in Phyrgian red and Numidian yellow marbles. With frequent referencing, we soon became familiar with Caracella, Domitian, and Nerva as we viewed the great construction projects they enacted. The author presents quite clearly the historical origin and significance of each site as well as its original appearance (if known) and the many refurbishments it went through with the frequent fires of Rome.

For our trip, we opted out of taking any tours, and we didn't feel we missed anything. We were often surrounded by tours and gained more information from our book than the guide was sharing with his group. You never know how reliable a guide really is, and with this book, you can be assured of Amanda Claridge's credentials. The trip became a bit of a mystery adventure for us as we excitedly reconstructed the ruins around us into the elegant structures they once were.

Even if you do decide to go with a more mainstream guide book for your trip to Rome, you will find this one to be an invaluable supplement for all those tidbits that the major guides just don't have time to cover.

The Jesus Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?

Average customer rating:

A book that cannot be ignored
The Jesus Mysteries/ Jesus and the Lost Goddess
Pseudo scholarship
The fascinating truth behind Christianity's grand claims
More than I thought

The Jesus Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?
Timothy Freke , and Peter Gandy
Manufacturer: Three Rivers Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0609807986
Release Date: 2001-09-25

Book Description

“Whether you conclude that this book is the most alarming heresy of the millennium or the mother of all revelations, The Jesus Mysteries deserves to be read.”
-- Fort Worth Star -Telegram

What if . . .
* there were absolutely no evidence for the existence of a historical Jesus?
* for thousands of years Pagans had also followed a Son of God?
* this Pagan savior was also born of a virgin on the twenty-fifth of December before three shepherds, turned water into wine at a wedding, died and was resurrected, and offered his body and blood as a Holy Communion?
* these Pagan myths had been rewritten as the gospel of Jesus Christ?
* the earliest Gnostic Christians knew that the Jesus story was a myth?
* Christianity turned out to be a continuation of Paganism by another name?

Customer Reviews:

A book that cannot be ignored.......2007-10-15

I read this book about five years ago, and it stunned me. Up until then, I had basically assumed John Dominic Crossan's view was correct. I came to view the conclusions of Freke and Gandy as the most sophisticated and honest assessments available of what probably occurred. I considered Christianity to be of limited life-expectancy; a dying religion based on a mythical man who never lived. I truly thought this book had dealt a death-blow to Christianity.

However, a rather strange thing happened to me some months ago which I find hard to explain. I came to understand that even in the dark night of the soul there can dawn a spiritual light. One can accept Freke and Gandy's premise that there may have been no historical Jesus as one possibility. But that doesn't need to destroy your faith. One can also view the Christ-event as an impenetrable mystery, a Mystery that will never be solved. I refer you to Nichole Nordeman's beautiful song 'Who You Are', which basically makes the same point.

What Freke and Gandy and the other mythicists tend to neglect is the sheer spiritual beauty of the gospel story. Of course, someone with a mature spirituality does not take the various gospels (canonical and non-canonical) to be a literal record of historical events. For the most part, they are symbolic of spiritual truths. Of course there will always be people who naively believe that Jesus was literally born of a virgin, walked on water, etc. For those who understand the underlying mythology of the Christ-event, and still can profess a belief in the Son of God, this wonderful book cannot ultimately damage their faith.

In summary, this book presents one of several alternative hypotheses about the Christ event. Other possibilities exist: Crossan's masterful study, 'The Historical Jesus', and the fascinating book by Alvar Ellegard: 'Jesus One Hundred Years Before Christ'. But the bottom line is, the Christ event is and always will be just as the title says: Mystery.

The Jesus Mysteries/ Jesus and the Lost Goddess.......2007-10-07

My psychic elucidated my poignant odysseys of The Jesus Mysteries and Jesus and the Lost Goddess. Freke and Gandy compare history to fiction in these books. There was an historical Jesus; there was never an historical Osiris/Dionysus. The mythology of the Greeks and Romans was designed by the ancients to explain the unexplainable in their physical world. How could a serious student of ancient mysteries be impressed by this rambling? The authors have compared apples to oranges by placing side by side-- as though equivalent in value--the historical Jesus and the mythological fiction of the ancients as though both bear the same validity. This is ludicrous and not serious literature. It is also misleading to customers who are genuinely searching for answers and knowledge.

Pseudo scholarship.......2007-09-28

The authors have lots of books on their shelves - the book contains 89 pages of footnotes and seven pages of bibliography. Not one of the cited works is in French, German,Italian or any other modern language. I cannot see even one reference to an article in a learned journal. There is no discernible evidence that the authors can read Greek and precious little that they can read Latin. Some works have been read in translation, but most citations are re-quotes from secondary sources. The sources used most commonly used include hoary old stuff - S. Angus - Mystery Religions, 1925; Fraser - The Golden Bough, 1922; Cumont - The Mysteries of Mithras, 1905. Some of the most interesting statements - eg 'The Cross was a sacred symbol to the ancients. Its four arms represent the four elements of the physical world - eath, water, air and fire' have no citations at all.

The one good thing about this book is that it might annoy fudamentalist bible bashers. It seems one step up, maybe one and a half steps up, from 'The Da Vinci Code'. Like that awful book, this is one where I find myself littering the margins with query marks, exclamation marks, and interjections of 'Prove it!'

The fascinating truth behind Christianity's grand claims.......2007-08-16

This book is a well-written description of the truth behind the Jesus story. It's hardly a new revelation, and Arthur Findlay in books such as The Curse of Ignorance or The Rock of Truth provided all the same info plus more back in the 30s and 40s, filling in some other details. And he didn't make this stuff up, but based his book completely on books such as Pagan Christs by J.M. Robertson, Mithraism and Christianity by Patterson, even Gibbon's classic Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. These people were all serious, academic historians. Interestingly, he comes to the conclusion that on the basis of cause and effect, Jesus must have existed for a new religion to have evolved. But that's the only argument in favour of Jesus' existence. We've all heard about the forgeries in Josephus, and the reviewer who claimed that some scholars accept its truth must mean some Christians. They cannot be unbiased scholars because the interpolation was accepted by Theologians as a forgery even in Findlay's day in the 1940s. The interpolation is competely unconnected with the material both before and after it where it appears in his text, and is written in a style completely unlike that which both precedes and follows it in the book. And to top it all, Josephus was a practicing Jew who Origen, the church father, himself said did not believe Jesus to be the Christ, as no Jew does or did, and is extremely unlikely to have proclaimed the truth of something he is on record as saying he didn't believe in in his greatest literary work. Thus, of 40 historians who covered the events of Palestine during the life of Jesus, in great enough detail to cover the rise of various Messiahs and many other obscure events, not one wrote a single word on Jesus! Thus, Jesus may have existed as a minor character who did not attract anyone's attention, but the events in the Bible, such as the whole of Jerusalem in uproar for example, or Jesus' dramatic trial and execution, can then only be gross exaggerations or more likely, fabrications.

16 Christs are known to history, The Jewish one being the last and only surviving one, all having the same basic elements to their life stories.
For example, a Babylonian tablet from circa 2000BC reveals the life story of the Babylonian Christ, Bel, or Baal to the Hebrews, (who when fighting the Philistines had thus been fighting supporters of the Babylonian Christ) in the instructions for the scenes of their mystery play, performed by them at our Eastertime. Nobody believed this stuff had ever actually occurred, and they would have doubted the sanity of anyone who thought that the various scenes of what was an obvious myth had really taken place.
Babylonian Legend:
Bel is taken Prisoner
Bel is tried in the Hall of Justice
Bel is smitten
Bel is led away to the Mount
With Bel are taken two malefactors, one of whom is released
After Bel has gone to the Mount the city breaks out into tumult
Bel's clothes are carried away
Bel goes down into the Mount and disappears from life
A weeping woman seeks him at the gate of burial
Bel is brought back to life

Thus, the Christian legend merely has different names and takes place in a different country.

Of the 16 Christs that existed in history, why has only the Jewish one remained? Well, if the Romans had not invaded Palestine, there would be no Christianity today. Simple as that. Christians would in all likelihood now be worshipping Mithras or Dionysius, or another of the Mediterranean Jesuses. Importantly, if the Romans had not destroyed Jerusalem in 72AD, there would have been no Jewish refugee Christians in Rome to start the religion and it would have died out in Israel like the 15 other 'Christianities' died out in their countries over the centuries. And perhaps most importantly, if the Barbarian hordes who sacked Rome in the 5th century hadn't been Christians themselves, converted just a few centuries before, the religion would have ended there and then. Thus, Christians should be eternally grateful both to the Roman Empire and the Barbarians (two supporters of the religion I certainly wouldn't want on my team), without whom their religion would not exist. The claims by another reviewer that Christian atrocities are exaggerated in this book are simply not true. On the contrary, the book downplays these atrocities, for the account of Hypatia's murder in Alexandria (Archbishop Cyril's punishment for criticizing him for murdering 30000 Jews) tells the story of just one of Christianity's 25 million victims, many of whom died in equally or more excruciating ways than she did. To deny Christianity's atrocities is no better than denying the Holocaust, and numerically speaking, far worse. This book is seriously recommended for the open-minded Christian or those interested in religious history.

More than I thought.......2007-06-21

This book is more than I thought it would be. It appears that the authors were looking to find the truth and didn't have a preconceived idea and then tried to make it fit. It appears that they just followed where the information took them. The thing I was most interested in is the myths and I was most satisfied in what I found. There are alot of booknotes,four pages of Bibliographies and an index,plus more. It certainly doesn't look like this book was just thrown together I think they tried to be very thorough with their research which is one of the reasons I gave it 5 stars.

Unearthing Atlantis: An Archaeological Odyssey

Average customer rating:

Very important subject, but sketchy writing
Simply the Best
Most informative
Well researched, masterfully presented and fascinating!
Facinating and convincing!

Unearthing Atlantis: An Archaeological Odyssey
Charles Pellegrino
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0394575504
Release Date: 1991-11-19

Book Description

In a synthesis of historical and literary, archaeological and paleontological detective work, Charles Pellegrino transfixes us with his exploration of the origins of Atlantis.

From the Trade Paperback edition.

Customer Reviews:

Very important subject, but sketchy writing.......2001-11-16

YES: this book is about the real Atlantis. It really did exist, but not in the literal way that Plato described it, and certainly not in the way that New Age speculation "theorists" want it to.

I really wanted to give this book a perfect five-star rating, as the subject matter is immensely important, and the author's enthusiasm makes this book a truly exciting experience. The long story made short is that "Atlantis" was in reality a small island in the east Mediterranean way back around 1600 BC. Thera was a part of the Minoan Empire, and, being a group of islands between Egypt and Greece, had not only the world's first navy, but aquaducts (long before the famous Roman water systems) and a surprisingly highly-evolved culture. Then one day, the volcano at the center of Thera exploded with as least six times the power of Krakatoa (the 1883 eruption that was heard over 2000 miles away), and within seconds 2/3 of the island was in the stratosphere.

This was all before even the Greeks became the dominant force in the region, and so the sudden disappearance of the Minoans (who dominated trade between Europe and Africa) not surprisingly became various stories passed down through the generations, which is where Plato heard it. Plato's description of an entire continent all the way out in the Atlantic that sunk into the sea turned out to be an embellishment on what was, by then, just a myth. He was essentially trying to make a point about how quickly even the most powerful civilization can crumble, and what he said was passed down through the ages, in one form or another, to us. This is how and why these Art Bell "experts" have hijacked this subject and nailed it onto their "theories" of other subjects that have been blown completely out of proportion, such as the Bermuda Triangle, life on Mars, Bigfoot, etc. Case in point: just because Atlantis was advanced by ancient standards, NO: THEY DID NOT HAVE AIRPLANES OR LASERS. Sorry to burst anyone's bubble, but REAL history isn't "Spear of Destiny" garbage: it's how real people really lived, not whatever garbage you want it to be.

Of course, this book was an emotional one to read: an ancient culture creating such high technology (a millenium ahead of its time), only to be totally annihilated in just seconds. If the downfall of Rome and the unsuing loss of knowledge and the onset of the Dark Ages is considered to be historically tragic, this story is then the most epic catastrophe EVER. The author points out that if they were doing what took another 1000 years for the Romans to figure out (such as running water through pipes), who knows what these people might have managed to do? Maybe we would have been on the moon 2000 years ago. We'll never know.

The downfall of this book that I hinted at earlier is that 90% of everything important is said immediately: none of what I've said here is a "big mystery" that gets unravelled through the course of the book. It's like getting hit from all sides with amazing (and very enthusiastic) information about who the Therans might have been, how the world was at the time, and the excitement that Atlantis did exist after all. As great as all of that is, the book suddenly takes a left turn into endless archaeological stories and theories that simply don't have much of anything to do with the subject. At first, it's the author trying to put Theran history into perspective (he says that people have a hard time comprehending what happened over 2000 years ago, and he's right), but he just starts beating this idea to death. He'll occasionally get back to Thera and the ongoing excavations, and then he'll launch back into a whole list of other things that become more and more distracting. By the last 100 pages of the book, it becomes a chore to get through to the end, in the increasingly dismal hope that he'll say more than just one or two things about Thera itself.

This book isn't written as much badly as just way off target. The author's enthusiasm will make you picture him as a kid playing in a sandbox for the very first time (which is probably how he'd actually describe himself), but unfortunately, he runs out of steam when he runs out of things to really say. On the other hand, this subject is fascinating and important, and I would, of course, still highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to find a huge missing piece of history, or to anyone trying to scrape that layer of filth known as "New Age speculation" off of some really solid history: the real thing is far more interesting than the National Enquirer version.

Simply the Best.......2001-03-26

This is simply the best book I have read about archaeology since Gods, Graves, and Scholars. And it is the first book about the scientists who search for the past (actually written by one of them) that teaches us how to actually think in terms of deep time. Read this book and you will emerge from the "Mediterranean Genesis" chapter never viewing your own town, or anyplace on Earth, quite the same, ever again. The story of Atlantis itself, following the Frost/Marinatos hypothesis about the Minoan catastrophe of 1628 B.C. (a date finally fixed in stone by the Pellegrino synthesis), fitering down through history as the "kernel of truth" behind Plato's cautionary tale, is really the first book ever to approach this unsinkable subject from a purely archaeological and geological perspective, with no particular ax to grind. One learns why not even a small island, much less a continent, could have plunged through the ocean floor without leaving a significant and very easily seen geologic trace. Either Plato's Atlantis was based on an (only marginally) embellished and poorly understood account of history's largest known volcanic explosion (Thera/Santorini), or, according to Pellegrino, Atlantis did not exist at all. And to top all: the whole archaeological adventure is wrapped in some of the most elegant prose I have ever read.

Most informative.......1999-06-26

This book makes me want to catch a plane to Thera and help with the excavation. Lots of history and PLENTY of concrete evidence to turn the hardened cynic into a believer. It's a complete journey through time back to the dinosaurs and more. Like the author stated, the brain is a 3-pound time machine. This book is only 1 pound.

Well researched, masterfully presented and fascinating!.......1999-04-05

I'm a history buff with a better than average knowledge of the Eastern Mediterranean, but I was astounded by Pellegrino's extraordinary ability to integrate and analyze data from seemingly disparate sources and disciplines. His argument for Thera as Atlantis is totally convincing and captivating - you won't want to put it down. He skillfully recreates the advanced civilization that flourished there and truly moves the reader - this book will haunt you long after you finish it. I loaned my copy to a friend who was going there on vacation - all I got back was a postcard of the excavations! If anyone hears of a pending reprint please let me know.

Facinating and convincing!.......1998-12-10

I have always had a general interest in Atlantis and lost civilizations, but I never expected to be so facinated with the topic. Thanks to Pellegrino, I came away with a much richer understanding of historical events in the Mediterranean than I had ever hoped. His theories on Atlantis are totally believable, overlaying some interesting new twists for historians to consider.

Athenian Agora: Excavations in the Heart of Classical Athens (New Aspects of Antiquity)

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A time machine, between two paper covers.
Magnificent Overview of the Heart of Classical Athens

Athenian Agora: Excavations in the Heart of Classical Athens (New Aspects of Antiquity)
John Camp
Manufacturer: Thames & Hudson
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0500276838

Book Description

The great public square known as the Agora was the living heart of ancient Athens, where citizens met formally to administer civic affairs, and informally to trade or discuss politics or to take part in religious processions and athletic displays. In the fifth and fourth centuries B.C., the Agora was the scene of some of the finest political, philosophical, and artistic achievements in the first flowering of Western civilization. John M. Camp brings together the results of sixty years' work by the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. Drawing on the wealth of excavated evidence, richly supplemented by literary and inscriptional references, Professor Camp tells the story of the Agora from Neolithic to medieval times.

Customer Reviews:

A time machine, between two paper covers........2005-12-20

I have had the pleasure of excavating in Greece (as volunteer slave labor). I spent a good deal of time in the Athenian Agora. I felt that I had come to understand a lot of the layout and history of the location. But this book greatly magnified my understanding of what I had seen. For me, it was WONDERFUL to finally get the full story on the site that I thought I knew. The history of the Agora is very rich. This book will bring it to life for you. I'd give it twenty stars if it were possible.

Magnificent Overview of the Heart of Classical Athens.......2000-10-02

Just as much as the Acropolis was the religious center of ancient Athens, the Agora was its commercial, governmental, and cultural heart. Camp and Renfrew's book finally gives this crucial site the attention and analysis it deserves.

The authors draw on the results of over a half-century of archaeological investigation to relate 1500 years of the city's history. From Athens' rise from obscurity in the days of Homer to its flowering as a military/cultural powerhouse in the 5th century, to the Hellenistic Age and the days of the Roman Empire, to the city's slow decline to the status of Byzantine backwater, this book reveals the evolution of the Agora in hundreds of color and black-and-white illustrations which truly breathe life into the ancient stones and the people who knew them.

The illustrations are sumptuous, and are the true centerpiece of the book. Scores of photographs illustrate the surviving walls and foundations of the Agora's buildings, and careful, clearly-rendered site plans and architectural elevations enable the reader to readily relate disparate elements of the structures and artifacts to their historical and cultural contexts. Accompanying the illustrations is a clear and lucid text which explains the history and the society that the Agora reflected and served.

Book Description

Explores the uses Greeks made of myth and the uses to which we can put myth in recovering the richness of their culture. Sheds light on many aspects of Greek history and culture - including war, religion and sexuality.

Customer Reviews:

Helps you understand our own time, too.......2007-06-15

The author argues in case ofter case how Greek myth was used to justify a certain political situation, so as to gain acceptance for otherwise immoral situations of dominance, to take one example. This is a very different way of approaching myths than, e.g., geomythology, or psychoanalysis. There is no single origin for all myths, but understanding different mechanisms for how they originate and are manipulated and promoted, can be a tremendous help in understanding both ancient and modern myths. Warning: The book may make you understand that some things that you thought of as fact in reality are modern myths, and that these same principles are active today. He does not discuss these issues, but once your senses are on the alert, you may look at the daily flow of information in a new way. I know I did.

good social and political understanding.......2000-05-16

Dowden provides the reader with a good social and political basis and evaluation of mythology in the ancient world, focusing on the ancients themselves instead of falling into the trap of modern theory and belief. If one is working on anything involving classical myth, I highly recommend reading this book at some point. You'll disagree at times, but it will make you think.

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The Mycenaean Feast (Hesperia)

Manufacturer: American School of Classical Studies at Athen
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Book Description

The large-scale, formal consumption of huge quantities of food and drink is a feature of many societies, but extracting evidence for feasting from the archaeological record has, until recently, been problematic. Now new techniques of scientific analysis are being combined with greater theoretical sophistication to shed exciting new light on this conspicuous social practice. This collection of essays, also published as a special issue (73.2) of the journal Hesperia (ISSN 0018-098X), investigates the rich evidence for the character of the Mycenaean feast. While much of the evidence discussed comes from the Palace of Nestor near Pylos, the authors also discuss new material from Tsoungiza near Nemea, and from other Bronze Age sites on mainland Greece and Crete. Textual evidence (from Linear B tablets) for the collection of raw materials, and the stocktaking of equipment, is complemented by discussions of the faunal and artifactual assemblages feasts left behind. Specially commissioned papers put Mycenaean practice in context by comparing it to contemporary activities on Cyprus and in Minoan Crete, while a final chapter compares Bronze with Iron Age Greece, especially as seen through the lens of Homeric epic. While not claiming to be a comprehensive survey of the practice of feasting, this volume offers, nonetheless, a rich and detailed collection of evidence, from a variety of sources, for conspicuous consumption in the Mycenaean period. As well as being core reading for Aegean prehistorians, it will be of interest to students of later Greek culture, anthropologists, and other scholars interested in the wider social aspects of eating and drinking.

The Aegean Bronze Age (Cambridge World Archaeology)

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Oliver Dickinson is extraordinary
First rate
well documented review of Aegean Bronze Age archaeology
Good Solid Survey Book

The Aegean Bronze Age (Cambridge World Archaeology)
Oliver Dickinson
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521456649

Book Description

Oliver Dickinson has written a scholarly, accessible and up-to-date introduction to the prehistoric civilizations of Greece. The Aegean Bronze Age saw the rise and fall of the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations. The cultural history of the region emerges through a series of thematic chapters that treat settlement, economy, crafts, exchange and foreign contact, and religion and burial customs. Students and teachers will welcome this book, but it will also provide the ideal companion for amateur archaeologists visiting the Aegean.

Customer Reviews:

Oliver Dickinson is extraordinary .......2007-09-04

The Aegean Bronze Age by Oliver Dickinson is an extraordinary story of how civilization first came to Europe, 3600 years ago. It started in Germany when robbers unearthed a find of a lifetime. It was a small bronze disc that depicted the sun, the moon and the stars. Oliver Dickinson suggests that the Nebra Bronze Disc shows a level of understanding the heavens far greater than that of the first great civilizations, like Egypt. Could it be possible? After a team of scientists declared it to be genuine, they sought to unlock its secrets. The Nebra Bronze Disc, it seemed, is a Bronze Age Bible, combining an advanced understanding of the stars with some of the most sophisticated religious imagery of the age. By intellectual standards and also age, it surpasses anything yet found in Egypt or Greece. It showed that civilization had already dawned in Europe over 3600 years ago.

First rate.......2005-05-18

A well written book using up to date discoveries in archeology. Indeed the archeological evidence presented in this book is quite good focusing not only on man made artifacts but burial customs.
To my mind the subject of trade is key to this book.
It is written a scholarly fashion yet is approachable. From the archeological evidence theories are offered but the authors do not force any one position but offer them all in a level headed fashion.
You will find yourself reading it from cover to cover but cherishing it as a reference.

well documented review of Aegean Bronze Age archaeology.......2001-10-01

I found this book very helpfull while studing Aegean Prehistory in University. Comprehensive and well documented with some very helpfull plates gives a summary of Aegean Bronze Age archaeological data. Enters not so mutch in details but covers many aspects of the vast Bronze Age data of Aegean. I would strongly suggest this book for archaeology students interested in the Aegean region

Good Solid Survey Book.......2000-01-31

This was an excellent overall survey of the material, and a great reference work that can be return to again and again, to harden up on the facts, and to get titles of other books and journal articles on each of the specific subject areas. It can at times get a little confusing, with the avalanche of place names and the vagueness with which he describes many of the artefacts, but you still come out knowing a heck of alot more than you did before going in. Also, he has no particular axe to grind--no big theories that can be so annoying in this field. Overall, an excellent book.

The Archaeology of Ancient Greece (Cambridge World Archaeology)

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Tell me more !! Tell me more !!

The Archaeology of Ancient Greece (Cambridge World Archaeology)
James Whitley
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Ancient & Classical | Schools, Periods & Styles | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0521627338

Book Description

The Archaeology of Ancient Greece provides an up-to-date synthesis of current research on the material culture of Greece in the Archaic and Classical periods. Its rich and diverse material has always provoked admiration and even wonder, but it is seldom analyzed as a key to our understanding of Greek civilization. Dr. Whitley shows how the material evidence can be used to address central historical questions for which literary evidence is often insufficient, and he also situates Greek art within the broader field of Greek material culture.

Customer Reviews:

Tell me more !! Tell me more !!.......2006-08-09

This book is mainly a general synthesis of the state of archaeological knowledge and research on the Greek Archaic and Classical periods, with some great explanation of the most important controversies (such as the gender division in society, the continuity of religion from the Dark Age, or the Orientalizing influence, etc) to be found in the study of this culture and period. However, the author takes great pains with his writing, so as not to have another dry accademic book with piles of extremely interesting information buried under tones of arid sentences.

As a result, you soon find yourself immerse in a fascinating, colourful world, so different from what many classicists want to give as as "Classic Greek Culture" as to really be a totally "New World". Here, temples and stoas are painted in bright colours, fire-eaters and dancers perform in the Agoras next to philosophers who discuss ethics. This is not, however, a way to make Greek culture look less important than it was. I think the author succeeds in communicating to his readers what the archaeologists have known for some time. These very same archaeologists, though, had to first overcome the reticence shown by the "Classicist Establishment" to consider the overwhelming evidence that Ancient Greece had very little to do with what they had been teaching at Western universities for decades (if not centuries).

Thus, the author begins his book by making the point that much of the vision of "Classical Greece" that we have inherited is really a 18th-century-cum-Victorian Eurocentrist construct, a somewhat imperialistic (one could even say [...]?)ideal of what a "perfect society" should be, and an excuse to model many typical western institutions on.

But don't get the wrong idea that this is the aim of the book. As I said before, the author just intends to give an up-to-date synthesis on what archaeologists have to say. Of course, when the subject is one so dear to,and near, the very core of European identity, controversy is unavoidable. Whitley just states the most important of these controversies, but sometimes, and although he doesn't seem keen on taking positions, his own views show through.

On the whole, the world glimpsed through the pages of this book is so fascinating that I found I needed to know more about some of the issues, so I went to the "Further reading for each chapter" section, and now have a nice pile of books to read on the subjects of Greek Sanctuaries (a truly fascinating topic, especially once you've visited Delphi).

I recomend this book for people who are intersted in the subject and want to have up-to-date information, but also as a well-written, never boring introduction to the wonders of Ancient Greece, a culture that, even if we don't know it, is part of ourselves and does not deserve the many clichés we have attached to it.....It needs to be better known....just as we need to know it better

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