Fingerprints of the Gods
by Graham Hancock
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Book Summary Information
Author: Graham HancockEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1996-04-02
ISBN: 0517887290
Number of pages: 592
Publisher: Three Rivers Press
Book Reviews of Fingerprints of the Gods
Book Review: A Well Presented Theory
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm a big fan of ancient history. I remember when I went to a university open day toward the end of high school. I wandered over to the archaeology wing, and in a glass case they had a genuine Sumerian cuneiform, one of the oldest pieces of writing in known history. It was only a little one, but I remember being mesmerized by it. I'm also a big fan of alternative histories, because I do have a feeling there is more to prehistory than there appears, and have read quite a few of the "essential" reads.
Alternative history books are a bit of a mixed bag as a genre. Some of them are really good, exciting and well researched (like Charles Berlitz' "Mysteries of Forgotten Worlds"), while others (like Erick Von Daniken's "Chariots of the Gods") are nutty rants about ancient spacemen and UFOs, stuff that makes for a good unintentional science fiction, the way a bad film can be a good unintentional comedy. Graham Hancock's "Fingerprints of the Gods", a reasonably thick volume speculating about a lost, ancient civilization, is one of the really good ones. Though its theory and evidence is something fans of alternate history like myself have read time and time again in different forms throughout the genre, I have hardly ever seen a book of this type presented as well as this one.
Graham Hancock, over eight parts, discusses his theory. He has noticed that certain ancient peoples like the Mayans, Incas and Egyptians had a phenomenal understanding of mapmaking, mathematics and astronomy. Where had this knowledge come from, he wonders? Why were they so interested in this things? These same ancient peoples had also created great monolithic structures that even modern technology would struggle to reproduce. How had they done it? Hancock suggests a third party influenced all of these cultures, a third party hinted at through the various mythologies of the people. Also hinted at by worldwide myths is the idea of a global disaster, a deluge, a flood. Hancock believes in the worldwide flood, and connects it to the turbulence of what has been called the last Ice Age. It is this Ice Age, he says, that decimated a culture as intellegent and resilient as our own, a culture of which only remnants of their history exist, some remnants being some very famous ancient structures. Through references to the positions of the stars, he believes this civilization would have existed around 10,450 BC, several thousand years before the accepted dawn of civilization. Though Hancock is initially baffled as to where the hub of such a lost culture would have existed, he gets a little help from his friends, fellow alternate historians Rand and Rose Flem-Ath to be exact, and places the lost civilization's home in Antarctica, which they believe was once a little further north, a little more temperate, in times past.
Graham Hancock's writing style, for the most part, is pretty easy to understand. I say for the most part because a couple of the astronomical and mathematical parts went right over my head. Still, he provides plenty of diagrams, and his wife Santha Faiia provides plenty of glossy photographs to go with his wonderfully vivid descriptions of each nation and people he discusses. He seems very passionate about the subject matter, yet never goes over the top and always checks himself before he can go off track. He is a meticulous researcher and has a hefty 70 pages of footnotes for those like me who are interested (there's a few ancient texts I'd never heard of before I now want to read!) Though he questions conventional historians and archaeologists, you can tell that he really respects their work, which is more than you can say for some alternate historians. Though he subscribes to the theory of evolution and throws in the Bible into the category of myth, you can tell Hancock has something of a belief and respect in a Creator and of spirituality. For instance, the book concludes with an interview between him and a 90 year old Hopi elder, who is grieving over the state of today's society, which may disappear as suddenly as Hancock's lost civilization if it isn't careful. The author is clearly deeply moved by the Hopi's words.
Hancock's theory depends a lot on the procession of the zodiac, which, under various guises, was known by many cultures. One thing that bugged me was that he never actually explains who he believed thought up the zodiac, which I thought he would have done since it's such a cornerstone of his theory. Ah well, Jonathan Gray's book "Sting of the Scorpion" (which I've read) provided a very simple yet very eye opening history of its origins, so I'm not too fussed.
In his research, Hancock and his wife travelled to each place, and in parts it feels almost like an armchair travel book. I thought it was quite a nice touch, actually. I've always thought it would be nice to go to Peru and after reading Hancock's beautiful descriptions, looking at the delicious pictures and poring over his full map of the Nazca Lines from above, I'm thinking a bit more seriously of going over there and checking it out, when I have a bit of money to spare. Mind you, I wouldn't recommend some of the things Graham and his missus do to travellers (like bribing the guards of the Great Pyramid so they can climb to the top at 3 in the morning!).
This book has been, like many alternate histories, rather influential on certain works of science fiction that have followed. I have seen a couple of films which set a lost civilization buried under the ice Anarctica since this book was first published (The film "Alien Vs Predator", for example)
All in all, this is a great, interesting, eye opening book. If you're at all interested, I highly recommend you pick it up. If you're a newcomer to this sort of book, you'll be amazed, and if you're a regular reader of this sort of thing, while you'll see similar evidence you've seen before (The Piri Reis map, the Nazca Lines, etc), there are a few fascinating tidbits I haven't seen anywhere else. If you read this book and enjoyed it, I recommend you pick up "Dead Men's Secrets" by Jonathan Gray and "Mysteries From Forgotten Worlds" by Charles Berlitz, books which are just as fine as this one.
Summary of Fingerprints of the Gods
The bestselling author of The Sign and the Seal reveals the true origins of civilization. Connecting puzzling clues scattered throughout the world, Hancock discovers compelling evidence of a technologically and culturally advanced civilization that was destroyed and obliterated from human memory. Four 8-page photo inserts.Ancient Books
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