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1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus
by Charles C. Mann

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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39020.1491_New_Revelations_of_the_Americas_Before_Columbus?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus" border="0" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/photo.goodreads.com/books/1169231640m/39020.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39020.1491_New_Revelations_of_the_Americas_Before_Columbus?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/22004.Charles_C_Mann">Charles C. Mann</a> 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/19383197?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
 rating: 4 of 5 stars If your American paradigm includes an historical view of European settlers desecrating the "Forest Primeval," guess again! Recent archeological and anthropological discoveries have revealed that the Pre-Columbrian Americas were vastly more populated and civilized than we had previously believed. For example, Spanish explorers of the 1500s discovered a Mississippi River lined with villages trading up and down the river; French explorers of the 1600s, on the other hand, encountered a heavily forested and nearly deserted wilderness along this great river. What happened during the 16th Century to so alter what Archeology has discovered were numerous unique, populous, and incrediblely advanced civilizations? An enormous catastrophe, scientists have hypothesized, due in large part to European ignorance and a certain genetic predisposition common to Native Americans.
 
 J. K. Rowling's compilation of the current science concerning the Americas before 1491 reads like an anthropologist astronaut's logue chronicling advanced alien civilizations on a distant planet. Imagine structural engineers capable of designing suspension bridges over huge chasms and highways of masonry for thousands of miles through some of the most rugged terrain on the face of the earth. Picture a city larger than Paris in the middle of a huge lake built entirely on Venetian-like canals navigated by sail boats. Consider a civilization which converts the dense Amazon jungle into a vast Eden-like garden of exotic fruit bearing plants and trees. 
 
 Most Anthropology 101 college courses are excrutiatingly tedious. 1941, on the contrary, is an amazing adventure. 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/1052074?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

John's review
rating:
recommended for: History buffs and non-fiction fans

If your American paradigm includes an historical view of European settlers desecrating the "Forest Primeval," guess again! Recent archeological and anthropological discoveries have revealed that the Pre-Columbrian Americas were vastly more populated and civilized than we had previously believed. For example, Spanish explorers of the 1500s discovered a Mississippi River lined with villages trading up and down the river; French explorers of the 1600s, on the other hand, encountered a heavily forested and nearly deserted wilderness along this great river. What happened during the 16th Century to so alter what Archeology has discovered were numerous unique, populous, and incrediblely advanced civilizations? An enormous catastrophe, scientists have hypothesized, due in large part to European ignorance and a certain genetic predisposition common to Native Americans.

J. K. Rowling's compilation of the current science concerning the Americas before 1491 reads like an anthropologis...more

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