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27-10-2007, 06:55 PM
Inside the Neolithic Mind: Consciousness, Cosmos and the Realm of the Gods
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This book explores Neolithic conceptions of the cosmos in the Near East, c.6500 BC and Britain, Ireland, and Brittany, c.3000 BC. It argues that these were manifested through art, architecture, and ritual practices from the settlements at 'Ain Ghazal and Çatal Höyük to the passage gravesat Newgrange and Knowth. It argues that similarities between these cosmologies are due to the structures and effects of the embodied human mind. The shared features of these cosmologies include a tiered or tripartite cosmos (e.g. underworld, earth, sky) and shamans or other ritual specialists who may transcend the planes of the cosmos during altered states of consciousness.
The authors mould numerous studies of Neolithic monuments and shamanic practices into a clear and compelling synthesis on the fundaments of Neolithic cosmology. The discussions of the relationship between cosmology and human interaction with animals, plants, and places in the Near East are fascinating. The role of relations with animals and plants is unfortunately diminished in the second half of the book, addressing northwest Europe. If this was due to the authors' focus on art and architecture (there being few representations of animals in megalithic art), then this lack should have been explored as a significant difference between the contexts in its own right. The authors argue persuasively that similar cultural ideas might have different material expressions, but could say more on what effect different cultural practices and material media have on conceptions of the world. More could be said about embodied experience, about what it was like to live in that Neolithic cosmos. The book does not discuss psychological states and emotional experience like anxiety or loss, or the relationship between memory and materiality. Neolithic cosmology is interpreted from a small number of selected sites and deposits.
As the authors acknowledge, the book takes shape around a lacuna: the vast stretch of time and space between Çatal Höyük and Newgrange. The authors do not examine cosmology in Neolithic central Europe. It is unclear to what extent Lewis-Williams and Pearce see the ‘Neolithic mind’ in northwest Europe developing as a result of contact with Neolithic things and practices, as a spreading ideology originating in the Near East, and/or as a pre-existing mindset which found new expression in Neolithic media. They not only compare Neolithic Near East and northern Europe with one another, but with many other cultural contexts where similar conceptions of a tiered cosmos negotiated by religious practitioners occur, and illustrate that certain materials (e.g. quartz) are understood as special in remarkably similar ways. The rich range of insightful comparisons (including European late Upper Palaeolithic cave art and Mayan religious centres as well as ethnographic studies) makes the reader wonder about the nature of the connection drawn between Çatal Höyük and northern Europe. The fact that Lewis-Williams and Pearce see the same features of this mindset extending across the world and throughout the human past suggests that the dimensions of the ‘Neolithic mind’ under study here are those shared with many cultures, Neolithic or otherwise. For instance, a tiered cosmos seems influential throughout other periods of European prehistory, such as the Scandinavian Bronze Age. The extent to which the mindset under discussion should be seen as specifically Neolithic therefore requires further discussion.
In the preface the authors warn against over-emphasis on cultural difference, and state that ‘what we need is a method that will help us to access knowledge about the universal foundations of diversity’ (p. 9). The great strength of the book lies in showing how certain recurring cosmological principles are located in the embodied human mind. The book does far less to understand diversity. Lewis-Williams and Pearce state that ‘[e]ach historical instance will be a unique product of an interaction between human neurology and culture’ (p. 46). Yet it is unclear what they mean by culture, why differing kinds of cosmologies exist, or why cultural changes occurred at specific times. This begs important questions. If domestication in the Near East was lead by religious change, as they argue, what brought about that change? If political struggle brought about changes in the monuments of the Boyne Valley, what was the basis of that struggle? How might shifting from using one type of monuments to others alter people's experiences and understandings of the world? More could be said about the roles different relations between humans, animals, plants, and landscapes play in nesting cosmology within specific spheres of activity. Lewis-Williams and Pearce's idea that a ‘consciousness contract’ and a ‘social contract’ frame belief, practice, and experience is opaque, but on the whole this book is a clearly written, provocative, and absorbing read.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/413RAN03NSL._AA240_.jpg
This book explores Neolithic conceptions of the cosmos in the Near East, c.6500 BC and Britain, Ireland, and Brittany, c.3000 BC. It argues that these were manifested through art, architecture, and ritual practices from the settlements at 'Ain Ghazal and Çatal Höyük to the passage gravesat Newgrange and Knowth. It argues that similarities between these cosmologies are due to the structures and effects of the embodied human mind. The shared features of these cosmologies include a tiered or tripartite cosmos (e.g. underworld, earth, sky) and shamans or other ritual specialists who may transcend the planes of the cosmos during altered states of consciousness.
The authors mould numerous studies of Neolithic monuments and shamanic practices into a clear and compelling synthesis on the fundaments of Neolithic cosmology. The discussions of the relationship between cosmology and human interaction with animals, plants, and places in the Near East are fascinating. The role of relations with animals and plants is unfortunately diminished in the second half of the book, addressing northwest Europe. If this was due to the authors' focus on art and architecture (there being few representations of animals in megalithic art), then this lack should have been explored as a significant difference between the contexts in its own right. The authors argue persuasively that similar cultural ideas might have different material expressions, but could say more on what effect different cultural practices and material media have on conceptions of the world. More could be said about embodied experience, about what it was like to live in that Neolithic cosmos. The book does not discuss psychological states and emotional experience like anxiety or loss, or the relationship between memory and materiality. Neolithic cosmology is interpreted from a small number of selected sites and deposits.
As the authors acknowledge, the book takes shape around a lacuna: the vast stretch of time and space between Çatal Höyük and Newgrange. The authors do not examine cosmology in Neolithic central Europe. It is unclear to what extent Lewis-Williams and Pearce see the ‘Neolithic mind’ in northwest Europe developing as a result of contact with Neolithic things and practices, as a spreading ideology originating in the Near East, and/or as a pre-existing mindset which found new expression in Neolithic media. They not only compare Neolithic Near East and northern Europe with one another, but with many other cultural contexts where similar conceptions of a tiered cosmos negotiated by religious practitioners occur, and illustrate that certain materials (e.g. quartz) are understood as special in remarkably similar ways. The rich range of insightful comparisons (including European late Upper Palaeolithic cave art and Mayan religious centres as well as ethnographic studies) makes the reader wonder about the nature of the connection drawn between Çatal Höyük and northern Europe. The fact that Lewis-Williams and Pearce see the same features of this mindset extending across the world and throughout the human past suggests that the dimensions of the ‘Neolithic mind’ under study here are those shared with many cultures, Neolithic or otherwise. For instance, a tiered cosmos seems influential throughout other periods of European prehistory, such as the Scandinavian Bronze Age. The extent to which the mindset under discussion should be seen as specifically Neolithic therefore requires further discussion.
In the preface the authors warn against over-emphasis on cultural difference, and state that ‘what we need is a method that will help us to access knowledge about the universal foundations of diversity’ (p. 9). The great strength of the book lies in showing how certain recurring cosmological principles are located in the embodied human mind. The book does far less to understand diversity. Lewis-Williams and Pearce state that ‘[e]ach historical instance will be a unique product of an interaction between human neurology and culture’ (p. 46). Yet it is unclear what they mean by culture, why differing kinds of cosmologies exist, or why cultural changes occurred at specific times. This begs important questions. If domestication in the Near East was lead by religious change, as they argue, what brought about that change? If political struggle brought about changes in the monuments of the Boyne Valley, what was the basis of that struggle? How might shifting from using one type of monuments to others alter people's experiences and understandings of the world? More could be said about the roles different relations between humans, animals, plants, and landscapes play in nesting cosmology within specific spheres of activity. Lewis-Williams and Pearce's idea that a ‘consciousness contract’ and a ‘social contract’ frame belief, practice, and experience is opaque, but on the whole this book is a clearly written, provocative, and absorbing read.