The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art

Lewis-Williams, David

Thames&Hudson

A controversial exploration of the origin of religion in the neurology of the human brain. In this book the noted cognitive archaeologist David Lewis-Williams confronts a question that troubles many people in the world today: Is there a supernatural realm that intervenes in the material world of daily life and leads to the evolution of religions? Professor Lewis-Williams first describes how science developed within the cocoon of religion and then shows how the natural functioning of the human brain creates experiences that can lead to belief in a supernatural realm, beings, and interventions. Once people have these experiences, they formulate beliefs about them, and thus creeds are born. Forty thousand years ago, people were leaving traces in the archaeological record of activities that we can label religious, and Lewis-Williams discusses in detail the evidence preserved in the Volp Caves in France. He also shows that mental imagery produced by the functioning of the human brain can be detected in widely separated religious communities such as Hildegard of Bingen’s in medieval Europe or the San hunters of southern Africa. 100 b&amp;w illustrations

Conceiving God: The Cognitive Origin and Evolution of Religion

Religion & Spirituality

Goes to the heart of contemporary arguments about the "primitive" and the "modern" minds, and draws new social, anthropological, and ethnographic conclusions about the nature of ancient societies. How did ancient peoples―those living before written records―think? Were their thinking patterns fundamentally different from ours today? Researchers over the years have certainly believed so. Along with the Aborigines of Australia, the indigenous San people of southern Africa―among the last hunter-gatherer societies on Earth―became iconic representatives of all our distant ancestors and were viewed as either irrational fantasists or childlike, highly spiritual conservationists. Since the 1960s a new wave of research among the San and their world-famous rock art has overturned these misconceived ideas. Here, the great authority David Lewis-Williams and his colleague Sam Challis reveal how analysis of the rock paintings and engravings can be made to yield vital insights into San beliefs and ways of thought. This is possible because we possess comprehensive transcriptions, made in the nineteenth century, of interviews with San informants who were shown copies of the art and gave their interpretations of it. Using the analogy of the Rosetta Stone, the authors move back and forth between these San texts and the rock art, teasing out the subtle meanings behind both. The picture that emerges is very different from past analysis: this art is not a naive narrative of daily life but rather is imbued with power and religious depth. 29 color and 68 black-and-white illustrations

Deciphering Ancient Minds: The Mystery of San Bushmen Rock Art

Arts & Photography

Challis, Sam

History & Criticism

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 Çatalhöyük in Turkey have in common with the interlinked spirals carved on the monumental tombs at Newgrange and Knowth in Ireland? How can the concepts of “birth,” “death,” and “wild” cast light on the changes in relationships between people and animals? David Lewis-Williams and David Pearce examine the intricate web of belief, myth, and society in the Neolithic period, arguably the most significant turning point in 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 cult buildings and skull burials, and western Europe, with its massive stone monuments. They argue that neurological patterns hardwired into the brain help explain the nature of the art, religion, and society that Neolithic people produced. Drawing on the latest research, the authors skillfully link material on human consciousness, imagery, and belief systems to propose provocative new theories about religious motivation in ancient times. 29 color, 75 b&amp;w illustrations

Inside the Neolithic Mind: Consciousness, Cosmos and the Realm of the Gods

History

Pearce, David

Ancient Civilizations

Now in compact paperback, a compelling examination of how brain structure and cultural context interacted in the Neolithic period, 10,000 years ago, to produce unique patterns in belief systems. 
What do the headless figures found in the famous paintings at Catalhoyuk in Turkey have in common with the interlinked spirals carved on the monumental tombs at Newgrange and Knowth in Ireland? How can the concepts of “birth,” “death,” and “wild” cast light on the changes in relationships between people and animals? In the new compact paperback version of Inside the Neolithic Mind, David Lewis-Williams and David Pearce examine the intricate web of belief, myth, and society in the Neolithic period, arguably the most significant turning point in 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, and Western Europe. They argue that neurological patterns hardwired into the brain help explain the nature of the art, religion, and society that Neolithic people produced. In proposing provocative new theories about religious motivation in ancient times, 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. c. 104 illustrations

The breathtakingly beautiful art created deep inside the caves of western Europe has the power to dazzle even the most jaded observers. Emerging from the narrow underground passages into the chambers of caves such as Lascaux, Chauvet, and Altamira, visitors are confronted with symbols, patterns, and depictions of bison, woolly mammoths, ibexes, and other animals. Since its discovery, cave art has provoked great curiosity about why it appeared when and where it did, how it was made, and what it meant to the communities that created it. David Lewis-Williams proposes that the explanation for this lies in the evolution of the human mind. Cro-Magnons, unlike the Neanderthals, possessed a more advanced neurological makeup that enabled them to experience shamanistic trances and vivid mental imagery. It became important for people to "fix," or paint, these images on cave walls, which they perceived as the membrane between their world and the spirit world from which the visions came. Over time, new social distinctions developed as individuals exploited their hallucinations for personal advancement, and the first truly modern society emerged. Illuminating glimpses into the ancient mind are skillfully interwoven here with the still-evolving story of modern-day cave discoveries and research. The Mind in the Cave is a superb piece of detective work, casting light on the darkest mysteries of our earliest ancestors while strengthening our wonder at their aesthetic achievements. 87 illustrations, 26 in color

The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art (60th Anniversary Edition)

Book by Clottes, Jean, Lewis-Williams, David

The Shamans of Prehistory

Clottes, Jean

Harry N. Abrams Publishers

Discovering Southern African Rock Art (Southern African Archaeology series)

David Philip

Rock art images around the world are often difficult for us to decipher as modern viewers. Based on authentic records of the beliefs, rituals and daily life of the nineteenth-century San peoples, and of those who still inhabit the Kalahari Desert, this book adopts a new approach to hunter-gatherer rock art by placing the process of image-making within the social framework of production. Lewis-Williams shows how the San used this imagery not simply to record hunts and the animals that they saw, but rather to sustain the social network and status of those who made them. By drawing on such rich and complex records, the book reveals specific, repeated features of hunter-gatherer imagery and allows us insight into social relations as if through the eyes of the San themselves.

Image-Makers: The Social Context of a Hunter-Gatherer Ritual

Cambridge University Press

The work of David Lewis-Williams, as it has been developed through the Rock Art Unit at the University of the Witwatersrand, has been seminal in providing a paradigm which places the problems of the interpretation of South African rock art in an entirely new light. This volume brings together the work of a number of scholars in the field of rock art studies who engage the so-called "trance hypothesis" in terms of their own empirical data and theoretical interests. The consensus is that the hypothesis is basically correct, but questions are raised about points of detail and the applicability of the hypothesis to all paintings and engravings. Many of the chapters engage in wider issues that impinge on other disciplines, such as linguistics and folklore studies, and demonstrate the relationship between them and the art. The editors give an overview of the development of rock art studies which aims to provide a contribution to the epistomological problems of this type of research, showing how the approach has been modified in the light of criticisms and new insights.

Contested Images

Dowson, Thomas

Africa

Witwatersrand Univ Pr

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Lewis-Williams, David. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Lewis-Williams, David

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Lewis-Williams, David. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art

Conceiving God: The Cognitive Origin and Evolution of Religion

Deciphering Ancient Minds: The Mystery of San Bushmen Rock Art

Inside the Neolithic Mind: Consciousness, Cosmos and the Realm of the Gods

Inside the Neolithic Mind: Consciousness, Cosmos and the Realm of the Gods

The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art (60th Anniversary Edition)

The Shamans of Prehistory

Discovering Southern African Rock Art (Southern African Archaeology series)

Image-Makers: The Social Context of a Hunter-Gatherer Ritual

Contested Images