Download or read book Shamans of Prehistory written by Jean Clottes and published by . This book was released on 1998-10 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The universality of shamanistic power and practice among today's hunter-gatherers - along with the similarity of rock art found in varied sites around the world - has led Jean Clottes and David Lewis-Williams to suggest in this new book that the great art of paleolithic caves can be best understood through the lens of shamanism. Indeed, this is not a monograph on a particular site, but a general discussion of the art of painted caves and their shamanistic meaning. Through the authors' revealing words and the abundant full-color illustrations, we follow shamans into their trance states, and we watch as they carefully paint and engrave on rock surfaces the shapes of animals whose power they seek. As we learn how drawings and rituals were likely modes of shamanistic contact, we understand best the actions, accomplishments, and traces left behind by prehistoric shamans.
Download or read book Wayward Shamans written by Silvia Tomášková and published by University of California Press. This book was released on 2013-05-03 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wayward Shamans tells the story of an idea that humanity’s first expression of art, religion and creativity found form in the figure of a proto-priest known as a shaman. Tracing this classic category of the history of anthropology back to the emergence of the term in Siberia, the work follows the trajectory of European knowledge about the continent’s eastern frontier. The ethnographic record left by German natural historians engaged in the Russian colonial expansion project in the 18th century includes a range of shamanic practitioners, varied by gender and age. Later accounts by exiled Russian revolutionaries noted transgendered shamans. This variation vanished, however, in the translation of shamanism into archaeology theory, where a male sorcerer emerged as the key agent of prehistoric art. More recent efforts to provide a universal shamanic explanation for rock art via South Africa and neurobiology likewise gloss over historical evidence of diversity. By contrast this book argues for recognizing indeterminacy in the categories we use, and reopening them by recalling their complex history.
Download or read book Shamans of Prehistory written by Abrams and published by Harry N. Abrams. This book was released on 1998-09-01 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The universality of shamanistic power and practice among today's hunter-gatherers - along with the similarity of rock art found in varied sites around the world - has led Jean Clottes and David Lewis-Williams to suggest in this new book that the great art of paleolithic caves can be best understood through the lens of shamanism. Indeed, this is not a monograph on a particular site, but a general discussion of the art of painted caves and their shamanistic meaning. Through the authors' revealing words and the abundant full-color illustrations, we follow shamans into their trance states, and we watch as they carefully paint and engrave on rock surfaces the shapes of animals whose power they seek. As we learn how drawings and rituals were likely modes of shamanistic contact, we understand best the actions, accomplishments, and traces left behind by prehistoric shamans.
Download or read book The Shamans of Prehistory written by Jean Clottes and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Prehistoric Belief written by Mike Williams and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2011-11-08 with total page 519 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Unlike modern people, those in prehistory were adept at entering trance; what we now call shamanism. This gave access to alternative realms where people met and befriended entities that they thought of as spirits. To the people of the past, the otherworld of trance, and the spirits that resided there, were as real to them as anything else they encountered. Until recently, this otherworldly realm was closed to archaeology; there was no way to reconstruct ancient thought. This changed with the advent of modernneurology. For the first time we can now enter the minds of those who lived thousands of years ago and begin to unravel their lives: the world as they would have believed it to be. In this bold and groundbreaking book, Dr Williams tackles all the big subjects in archaeology: the spread of humans from Africa, the rise of social groups, the adoption of agriculture, the construction of monuments, the emergence of metal, and the fall of the Celtic tribes. Showing that belief was central to these epic changes, as well as influencing the most mundane, everyday task, a new understanding of our prehistoric past emerges. Whilst being extensively researched, a fast-paced and engaging narrative makes this a page-turning read. Evocative vignettes supplement the text and take readers back in time to experience for themselves the sights, smells, and sounds of the past. This is a new way to approach prehistory, putting people and the beliefs that they held centre stage. For without understanding people's beliefs, we will never comprehend their world. Mike Williams has an MA and PhD from the University of Reading and is a shamanic practitioner and teacher, having studied with indigenous shamanic teachers in Siberia and Lapland. He has written many academic and popular articles and is the author of: Follow the Shaman's Call: An Ancient Path for Modern Lives, which was published by Llewellyn Worldwide in January 2010. He lives in a secluded valley in Wales with his wife and various animals
Download or read book The Archaeology of Shamanism written by Neil S. Price and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No Australian Aboriginal content.
Download or read book Shamans Sorcerers and Saints written by Brian Hayden and published by Smithsonian Institution. This book was released on 2018-12-26 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Historians of art or religion and mythologists, such as Joseph Campbell and Mircea Eliade, have written extensively on prehistoric religion, but no one before has offered a comprehensive and uniquely archaeological perspective on the subject. Hayden opens his book with an examination of the difference between traditional religions, which are passed on through generations orally or experientially, and more modern “book” religions, which are based on some form of scripture that describes supernatural beings and a moral code, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. He attempts to answer the question of why religion developed at all, arguing that basic religious behaviors of the past and present have been shaped by our innate emotional makeup, specifically our ability to enter into ecstatic states through a variety of techniques and to create binding relationships with other people, institutions, or ideals associated with those states.
Download or read book Shamans of the Lost World written by William F. Romain and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2009 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Shamans of the Lost World bridges the gap between recent work in the cognitive sciences and some of humankind's oldest religious expressions. In this detailed look at the prehistoric shamanism of the Ohio Hopewell, Romain uses cognitive science, archaeology, and ethnology to propose that the shamanic world view results from psychological mechanisms that have a basis in our cognitive evolutionary development. The discussions in this volume of the most current theories concerning how early peoples came to believe in spirits and gods, as well as how those theories help account for what we find in the archaeological record of the Hopewell, are of interest to archaeologists and cognitive scientists alike.
Download or read book Shamanism History and the State written by Nicholas Thomas and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nine case studies of shamanic practice in widely different cultures
Download or read book Inside the Neolithic Mind Consciousness Cosmos and the Realm of the Gods written by David Lewis-Williams and published by Thames & Hudson. This book was released on 2005-10-01 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exploration of how brain structure and cultural content interacted in the Neolithic period 10,000 years ago to produce unique life patterns and belief systems. What do the headless figures found in the famous paintings at Catalhoyuk in Turkey have in common with the monumental tombs at Newgrange and Knowth in Ireland? How can the concepts of "birth," "death," and "wild" cast light on the archaeological enigma of the domestication of cattle? What generated the revolutionary social change that ended the Upper Palaeolithic? David Lewis-Williams's previous book, The Mind in the Cave, dealt with the remarkable Upper Palaeolithic paintings, carvings, and engravings of western Europe. Here Dr. Lewis-Williams and David Pearce examine the intricate web of belief, myth, and society in the succeeding Neolithic period, arguably the most significant turning point in all human history, when agriculture became a way of life and the fractious society that we know today was born. The authors focus on two contrasting times and places: the beginnings in the Near East, with its mud-brick and stone houses each piled on top of the ruins of another, and western Europe, with its massive stone monuments more ancient than the Egyptian pyramids. They argue that neurological patterns hardwired into the brain help explain the art and society that Neolithic people produced. Drawing on the latest research, the authors skillfully link material on human consciousness, imagery, and religious concepts to propose provocative new theories about the causes of an ancient revolution in cosmology and the origins of social complexity. In doing so they create a fascinating neurological bridge to the mysterious thought-lives of the past and reveal the essence of a momentous period in human history. 100 illustrations, 20 in color.
Download or read book Shamanism 2 volumes written by Mariko Namba Walter and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2004-12-15 with total page 1088 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A guide to worldwide shamanism and shamanistic practices, emphasizing historical and current cultural adaptations. This two-volume reference is the first international survey of shamanistic beliefs from prehistory to the present day. In nearly 200 detailed, readable entries, leading ethnographers, psychologists, archaeologists, historians, and scholars of religion and folk literature explain the general principles of shamanism as well as the details of widely varied practices. What is it like to be a shaman? Entries describe, region by region, the traits, such as sicknesses and dreams, that mark a person as a shaman, as well as the training undertaken by initiates. They detail the costumes, music, rituals, artifacts, and drugs that shamans use to achieve altered states of consciousness, communicate with spirits, travel in the spirit world, and retrieve souls. Unlike most Western books on shamanism, which focus narrowly on the individual's experience of healing and trance, Shamanism also examines the function of shamanism in society from social, political, and historical perspectives and identifies the ancient, continuous thread that connects shamanistic beliefs and rituals across cultures and millennia.
Download or read book The Wisdom of the Shamans written by Don Jose Ruiz and published by . This book was released on 2019-05-07 with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For generation after generation, Toltec shamans have passed down their wisdom through teaching stories. The purpose of these stories is to implant a seed of knowledge in the mind of the listener, where it can ultimately sprout and blossom into a new and better way of life. In The Wisdom of the Shamans: What the Ancient Masters Can Teach Us About Love and Life, Toltec shaman and master storyteller don Jose Ruiz shares some of the most popular stories from his family's oral tradition and offers corresponding lessons that illustrate the larger ideas within each story. Ruiz begins by explaining that contrary to the stereotypical image of "witch doctor," the ancient shamans were men and women who fulfilled several roles within their communities: philosopher, spiritual guide, medical doctor, psychologist, and friend. According to Ruiz, their teachings are not primitive or reserved for a chosen few initiates but are instead a powerful series of lessons on love and life that are available to us all. To that aim, he has included exercises, meditations, and shamanic rituals to help you experience the personal transformation these stories offer. The shamans taught that the truth you seek is inside of you. Let these stories, lessons, and tools be your guide to finding the innate wisdom that lives within.
Download or read book Plato Shamanism and Ancient Egypt written by Jeremy Naydler and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 46 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Lands of the Shamans written by Dragos Gheorghiu and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Shamanism' is a term with specific anthropological roots, but which is used more generally to cover a set of interactions between a practitioner or 'shaman' and a spiritual or religious realm beyond the reach of most members of the community. It has often been considered from an anthropological viewpoint, but this book gathers the most recent studies on a subject which has not been comprehensively studied by archaeologists. By putting together experts from two continents who have studied the phenomenon of shamanism, Lands of the Shamans through carefully selected case studies uses the archaeological evidence to construct the shamans' worldview, landscape and cosmology. Recent interdisciplinary studies support the idea of the existence of shamanistic representations as long ago as the Middle/Upper Palaeolithic, but at the same time, do not follow developments during the history of humankind. As ethnographic evidence shows, shamanistic activity represents a complex phenomenon that is extremely diversified, its spiritual activity possessing a large variety of expressions in the material culture. In other words, shamanism could be defined as a series of differing spiritual world views which model the material culture and the landscape. Throughout the archaeological record of all prehistoric and historic periods, there is a series of visual representations and objects and landscape alterations that could be ascribed to these differing world views, many thought to represent shamanistic cognition and activity. The shaman's landscape reveals itself to the world as one of multifaceted spiritual and material activity. Consequently, this first book dedicated completely to the shamanistic landscape presents in fresh perspective the landscapes of the lower and upper worlds as well as their phenomenological experience. Case studies come from Europe, North America and Asia.
Download or read book The Quest for the Shaman written by Miranda Jane Aldhouse-Green and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exploration of shamanism and ritual behavior in ancient Europe draws on recent archaeological research to identify the roles and techniques of shamans from multiple periods and civilizations, in a history that also features numerous photographs of elaborate ritual objects.
Download or read book Archaeological Approaches to Shamanism written by Dragoş Gheorghiu and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2018-04-18 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This long awaited book discusses both ancient and modern shamanism, demonstrating its longevity and spatial distribution. The book is divided into eleven thought-provoking chapters that are organised into three sections: mind-body, nature, and culture. It discusses the clear associations with this sometimes little-understood ritualised practice, and asks what shamanism is and if tangible evidence can be extracted from a largely fragmentary archaeological record. The book offers a novel portrayal of the material culture of shamanism by collating carefully selected studies by specialists from three different continents, promoting a series of new perspectives on this idiosyncratic and sometimes intangible phenomenon.
Download or read book The White Shaman Mural written by Carolyn E. Boyd and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2016-11-29 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Folded plate (1 leaf, 39 x 61 cm, folded to 19 x 16 cm) in pocket.
