Forbidden Archeology: The Hidden History of the Human Race

This book could not have been completed without the varied services of Christopher Beetle, a computer science graduate of Brown University, who came to the Bhaktivedanta Institute in San Diego in 1988. He typeset almost all of the book, going through several revisions. He also made most of the tables, processed most of the illustrations, and served as a proofreader. He made many helpful suggestions on the text and illustrations, and he also helped arranged the printing.

For overseeing the design and layout, Richard and I thank Robert Wintermute. The illustrations opposite the first page of the introduction and in Figure 11.11 are the much-appreciated work of Miles Triplett. The cover painting is by Hans Olson. David Smith, Sigalit Binyaminy, Susan Fritz, Barbara Cantatore, and Michael Best also helped in the production of this book.

Richard and I would especially like to thank the international trustees of the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, past and present, for their generous support for the research, writing, and publication of this book. Michael Crabtree also contributed toward the printing cost of this book.

Finally, we encourage readers to bring to our attention any additional evidence that may be of interest, especially for inclusion in future editions of this book. We are also available for interviews and speaking engagements.

Correspondence may be addressed to us at Bhaktivedanta Book Publishing, Inc., 3764

Watseka Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90034.

 Michael A. Cremo Alachua, Florida April 24, 1995

Part I

Anomalous Evidence

 

 

The Song of the Red Lion

One evening in 1871, an association of learned British gentlemen, the Red lions, gathered in Edinburgh, Scotland, to feed happily together and entertain each other with humorous songs and speeches. Lord Neaves, known well for his witty lyrics, stood up before the assembled lions and sang twelve stanzas he had composed on “The origin of species a la Darwin.” Among them:

An Ape with a pliable thumb and big brain,

When the gift of gab he had managed to gain,

 As Lord of Creation established his reign

 Which Nobody can Deny!

His listeners responded, as customary among the Red lions, by gently roaring and wagging their coattails (Wallace 1905, p. 48).

1.1 Darwin Hesitates

Just a dozen years after Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species in 1859, growing numbers of scientists and other educated persons considered it impossible, indeed laughable, to suppose that humans were anything other than the modified descendants of an ancestral line of apelike creatures. In The Origin of Species itself, Darwin touched but briefly on the question of human beginnings, noting in the final pages only that “Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history.” Yet despite Darwin’s caution, it was clear that he did not see humanity as an exception to his theory that one species evolves from another.

Other scientists were not as hesitant as Darwin to directly apply evolutionary theory to the origin of the human species. For these scientists, Darwinism helped explain the remarkable similarity between humans and apes. Even before Darwin published The Origin of Species, Thomas Huxley had been investigating anatomical similarities between apes and humans. Huxley clashed with Richard Owen, who insisted that human brains had a unique feature—the hippocampus major. At a meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of science in 1860, Huxley presented evidence showing that brains of apes also had the hippocampus major, thus nullifying a potential objection to the idea that humans had evolved from apelike ancestors. Exuding his usual self-confidence, Huxley (Wendt 1972, p. 71) had written his wife before the British Association meeting: “By next Friday evening they will all be convinced that they are monkeys!”

Huxley did not limit himself to convincing scientists of this proposition. He delivered to working men a series of lectures on the evolutionary connection between humans and lower animals, and in 1863 he published Man’s Place in Nature, in which he summarized in popular form his arguments for human descent from an apelike creature by the mechanism of Darwinian evolution. In his book, Huxley presented detailed evidence showing the similarity of the human anatomy to that of the chimpanzees and gorillas. The book, intended for general readership, inspired violent criticism but sold well. Scientists continue to use the similarity between humans and apes as an argument in favor of the evolution of humans from apelike ancestors.