Ancient Traces Mysteries in Ancient and Early History

Michael Baigent's review of the evidence relating to a dozen of the most puzzling questions in ancient and early history ranges from the nature of the pyramids in Egypt to the fossil record and evolution.

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LibraryThing member David.Alfred.Sarkies

This is one of those books that it is difficult to put into a specificl category. In a sense it would be non-fiction if you actually believe anything Baigent writes, and in the same sense it could also be considered history. The problem is that Baigent's writings tend to sit at the fringe of

accepted academia (if in fact he is considered academia) and in turn his evidence, or at least his interpretation of the evidence, is dubious at best. This does not necessarily mean that what he writes is wrong, but a lot of it is based on opinion, and in parts, it is based on a belief that cannot be measured scientifically.
Now, the theme of this book is the question of whether there was a significantly advanced society that has been lost in the mists of pre-history, of which only small clues and 'ancient traces' remain. He then further goes onto explore the possibility of some world wide catastrophe that destroyed this civilisation and pretty much wiped all but the smallest of evidences of its existence from the face of the planet. Now while a lot of people, both from the scientific and religious communities, would consign this book to the rubbish heap, I do actually believe that he does raise some very interesting points.
It is very clear that Baignet is not a Christian: his book Holy Blood Holy Grail is the book that the idea of The Da Vinci Code was borrowed from (I will not use the word stolen as others used because authors always borrow their ideas from other writers, or even history itself: nothing can truly be considered new or original) however he opens his book outlining the problems with evolution. While I myself am a creationist, I do not consider evolution to be a major issue within Christianity. Some Christians believe in evolution, others (like myself) do not (though my views on creation are nowhere near extreme as some are, and I do believe that there is some merit in Darwin's theory). Unfortunately, some kick up such a fuss over this minor issue that it causes rifts and creates huge amounts of dissension within and outside of the ranks. To me, it is actually refreshing to see a non-Christian write about problems with evolution, which to me, goes to show that this theory has quite a lot of unanswered questions.
The next thing that I wish to discuss is the belief in a long lost ancient civilisation. Now, most of us will immediately think of Atlantis, however the earliest indication of the existence of this lost continent is from Plato, and one of the dialogues on the subject is unfinished. Now the accepted belief is that Plato was using Atlantis as an example of his perfect society, and it is suggested that the reason the dialogue on Atlantis is unfinished is because he decided to discard the idea of using Atlantis as an example of his society and wrote 'The Laws' instead, which (at this time I have not read) is simply a rundown on how his society should be constructed without any reference to some mythical place.
Plutarch gives a bit more of a background on the origins of the story, and though Plutarch wrote some 500 years after Plato, the sources that he would have had available to him were much more significant than what we have available to us. In short, while we have Plutarch, the sources that Plutarch uses we do not have, so we are pretty much relying on second or even third and forth hand accounts of the story of Atlantis. Plutarch suggests that the story came to Greece after the Athenian Lawgiver, Solon, travelled to Egypt where he learnt of this lost continent from the priests. Where the priests learnt this, and whether it was actually written down, is lost to us (as far as we know), though it is highly likely that between the priests, and Plato writing the legend down, at lot has been changed.
There is, ironically, another possible source for this information, though in this source Atlantis is not actually named. This source is the Bible. The reason I raise this is because in Genesis there are at least two pre-historic societies mentioned in passing, one being the Tower of Babel, and the second being the antediluvian civilisation. I suspect that this ancient society is likely to the the antediluvian one. The reason I suggest this is because straight after the account of the fall we have Cain's genealogy. This genealogy, after three generations, indicates that humanity had developed ironworking technology and musical instruments. To suggest that this society did not grow much beyond this, I believe, is to ignore the evidences before us. Further, Genesis was complied over the time period between the Flood and the Exodus, with Moses putting it into its final form. It is highly unlikely that Moses, or even Abraham, living in the societies that they did, would have been able to expound on a technological society that was in essence greater that the society in which they were living. While they could understand the concept of ironworking, I doubt they would have been able to understand anything beyond that.
I won't go into details of the world wide catastrophe that destroyed this civilisation beyond mentioning that the world wide flood is not something that is confined to the Bible. The flood narrative appears in cultures as distinct as the Greeks and the Australian Aboriginies. This is evidence that our collective memories knows of a disaster that destroyed all civilisation with the exception of a handful of people. If one wonders how such an event could have happened, the evidence that I generally point to are the two crater like gulfs on the east coast of North America. One of them is Hudson Bay, the other is the Gulf of Mexico. If these two locations are actually the impact points of ancient meteorites, then the destruction that the impacts (both of them) would have had on the world would have been extensive indeed.
There are a number of other books that I have read on this topic, so I think I should leave this until such a time as I get around to reviewing those books. However, I will point out that the conclusion of this book was a little disappointing. The reason is that it concludes with a chapter on reincarnation. While Baigent has every right to believe this, I do find the concept of reincarnation to be very subjective, and a little strange. First of all, people seem to always be reincarnated from famous (or wealthy) people, and never from poor peasants. Further, it is very subjective, and while a lot of the aspects of this book are difficult to test, some of the theories that I have outlined above can be tested with evidence. Unfortunately, reincarnation cannot. However, once again, this is a topic that I will leave for another time.

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LibraryThing member wyvernfriend

I've read it before, no real new stuff, but well written. Would be interesting if you're a science student cause it asks about stuff that is assumed in science. It describes itself as Mysteries in Ancient and Early History. Questions accepted timelines. Interesting.

LibraryThing member thf1977

No where near the best books of this genre, Ancient Traces may still be of some value, especially to readers who hasn't previously been introduced to pseudoarchaeology and alternative interpretations of hitherto accepted history.

It is evident that Baigent knows much less about the subjects he

explores in this book, than he does about subjects such as freemasonry and early christian history, about which he wrote in the Massonic Legacy and Holy Blood, Holy Grail.

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LibraryThing member xanax025

I found this book utterly boring. I had to put it down halfway through. Definitely one of the worst books I ever read.

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