Advanced Civilizations of Prehistoric America: The Lost Kingdoms of the Adena, Hopewell, Mississippians, and Anasazi

Serendipitously I acquired and read this book on my first ever trip (on business) to Minnesota. I knew about the Mound builders but truly had not read in detail about the number of locations nor the details of remains and artifacts. I do wish the author had provided an appendix with a few maps related to the areas discussed. On the twin-prop flights home, I was glued to the window looking for geographical examples of the cultures described in the book.This book covers the origins of four ancient American cultures: Adena, Hopewell, Mississippians, and Anasazi. As a longtime student of the Anasazi and Chaco Canyon in NW New Mexico, I particularly enjoyed the information about their origins and those of the Hohokam. I can certainly understand why students of anthropology and archaeology keep on digging and researching until their last breaths. This is an absolutely fascinating body of knowledge which only in the last century (especially since 1970) has begun to be mined in earnest and represented increasingly in published research. Ample references are provided for further investigation. Photos are included which whet the appetite for closer views and additional perspectives. This book ties together the ancient Mound builders and the ancestors of the southwestern puebloans and other indigenous tribes of the high desert. Through correspondences in language, oral traditions, artifacts, and remains, an intriguing picture of how ancient mariners and traders from as far-flung homes as Scandinavia and Ireland, northern Japan, and South America left clues to who "really discovered" America. I recommend this book to anyone wanting to know more about the Americas prior to even the Olmec, Toltec, Maya, and Inca.

Frank Joseph presents a well researched and documented alternate thesis on the Archaic period. His points on the dichotomy between observed phenomenon as regards the Adena,Hopewell, and the Anasazi give one food for thought. I was especially taken with the observations on the linguistic similarity between the southwestern native Indians and the Japanese cultures such as the Yayoli. His premis of the migrations from mezzo america to the southwest US and back is particularly intriguing.He points out that much of the information he relys on comes from amateur archeoligist. This is something I agree with. The hubris of the academics that discount the observation of un-credentialed people rankles me. Valid observations can be made by anyone that is paying attention.Joseph weaves compelling arguments for the Adena as having a relationship with Kelts that came to the Americas long before the Siberian land bridge was available. I personally would like to see a definitive DNA result for Native Americans. With their assimilation in to the general population over the last century, it will get harder to differentiate the tribes.This was a good read. It is something that would interest any armchair archeoligist.

I"m not an archaeologist, nor anthropologist. I am a person of curiostiy; curiosity about things which interest me.I found Frank Joseph's presentation of information on pre-Columbia civilizations, very thought provoking. For me, many questions were answered, that were held over from my teenage years, when I visited the Cliff Dwellings; saw pictoglyphs and pertroglyphs; picked up pieces of Native American pottery in the northern Arizona deserts. There were designs on the shards, and the questions arose - who and why?What has fascinated me, is that reading this book, has lead me to other books on similar subjects; has lead me to research a bit more (on line) the Moche, the Inca, the Mound Builders.For me, its like opening up a whole new world to explore; to arrive at plausable answers never brought to the fore in any of my formative education - junior or senior high school.Apparently the material in this, and other books like it, are not what main stream academians would count worthy of any consideration. How wrong they are!

I found it to be kind of confusing to keep a lot of the names of places the people who inhabited America early on and the names of structures they inhabited. I got confused on the timelines mentioned and couldn't establish who exactly were were the original inhabitants of America before the ones that he mentioned came later on. Kind of confusing all the way around for me although some of the material was enlightening and interesting.

Frank Joseph makes a compelling case that the Adena, Hopewell, and Anasazi/Hohokam civilizations were really built by, respectively, the Celts (no idea why he insists on spelling it with a K when the Celts themselves use a C), the Japanese, and the Peruvians.He does present evidence in the form of cultural parallels, building styles, etc. I am not well versed enough in Celtic, Japanese, or Peruvian history to judge the accuracy of his evidence and interpretation, but it seems plausible. We need to beware of basing conclusions on preconceived ideas. Prior to 1960, mainstream scholars scoffed at the idea that Vikings could have visited North America. Then archaeologists unearthed their settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows. Certainly, the Celts, the Japanese, and the Peruvians had the technology to make it here. Could have happened.I'm also wary of making assumptions based on lack of evidence. Systematic searches such as those for King Tut's tomb or the city of Troy are the exception - most archaeological sites are happened upon by accident, and much has been destroyed by intervening generations, especially in regards to America's Mound Builders. The difficulty with saying that the native population could not have accomplished this because 1) the civilization appeared full-blown with no previous progression, and 2) the local population no longer had the same technology after the civilizations collapsed is that it ignores both common sense and history. 1) Lack of evidence is not evidence of lack. Whales and dolphins used to be cited by creationists as proof evolution could not have happened because there were no intervening organisms between land mammals and sea mammals. Until some were found. Oops. 2) The Maya still occupy the Yucatan. They speak the same language, and were still practicing the same religion at the time of the Spanish conquest, yet have given up building temples and living in cities. Stuff happens, civilizations regress.All in all, this is a fascinating read, and the theories are worth considering.