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Eden in the East: Benua Yang Tenggelam Di Asia Tenggara
Buku menakjubkan ini secara radikal mengubah pandangan kita sebelumnya tentang prasejarah. Salah satunya, pada akhir Zaman Es, banjir yang disebutkan dalam kitab suci memang benar-benar terjadi dan menenggelamkan paparan benua Asia Tenggara untuk selamanya. Hal itulah yang menyebabkan penyebaran populasi dan tumbuh suburnya berbagai budaya Neolitikum di Cina, India, Mesopotamia, Mesir, dan Mediterania timur. Akar permasalahan dari pemekaran besar peradaban di wilayah subur di Timur Dekat Kuno, berada di garis-garis pantai Asia Tenggara yang terbenam.
Tahukah Anda bahwa orang-orang Polinesia tidak datang dari Cina, tapi dari pulau-pulau Asia Tenggara? Tahukah Anda, mula-mula penanaman beras yang sangat pokok bagi masyarakat tidak berada di Cina atau India, tapi di Semenanjung Malaya pada 9.000 tahun lalu?
Dan Anda pasti akan tercengang setelah mengetahui bahwa berbagai suku di Indonesia timur adalah pemegang kunci siklus-siklus bagi agama-agama Barat yang tertua? Buku ini penuh dengan catatan mengejutkan dan membalikkan fakta yang selama ini kita ketahui.
Tahukah Anda bahwa orang-orang Polinesia tidak datang dari Cina, tapi dari pulau-pulau Asia Tenggara? Tahukah Anda, mula-mula penanaman beras yang sangat pokok bagi masyarakat tidak berada di Cina atau India, tapi di Semenanjung Malaya pada 9.000 tahun lalu?
Dan Anda pasti akan tercengang setelah mengetahui bahwa berbagai suku di Indonesia timur adalah pemegang kunci siklus-siklus bagi agama-agama Barat yang tertua? Buku ini penuh dengan catatan mengejutkan dan membalikkan fakta yang selama ini kita ketahui.
860 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1998
42 people are currently reading
627 people want to read
About the author
Stephen Oppenheimer
7 books28 followersStephen Oppenheimer (b. 1947) is a British paediatrician, geneticist, and writer. He is a graduate of Balliol College, Oxford and an honorary fellow of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. In addition to his work in medicine and tropical diseases, he has published popular works in the fields of genetics and human prehistory. This latter work has been the subject of a number of television and film projects.
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
April 17, 2019
4/17/19 - quote from National Geographic ...
"A study published today in Cell adds a surprising new twist to their mystery: DNA from a large sampling of living southeast Asians suggests that the ghostly Denisovans may be not one, but three distinct kinds of human, one of which is almost as different from other Denisovans as they are from Neanderthals.
"What's more, while the Denisovans lived alongside humans for millennia, one group may have outlasted even the Neanderthals, who disappeared some 40,000 years ago. According to the study, these Denisovans co-existed and mixed with modern humans in New Guinea until at least 30,000 years ago—but perhaps as recently as 15,000 years ago—a date that, if confirmed, means Denisovans were the last known humans save ourselves to walk the Earth.
“'Suddenly it’s kind of crystalized that the center of diversity for archaic populations is in Islands Southeast Asia,” says study co-author Murray Cox of Massey University, New Zealand, referring to the Philippines, Malaysia, and the other archipelagos that make up the vast maritime region of the Asian subcontinent.'"
***
Five stars for times it comes to mind ... Imagining the now underwater East Asia as it existed for most human time on Earth. Exposing the land now covered by the China Sea, Yellow Sea, etc. Sundaland!
Five stars for providing a world view how the end of the Ice Age caused extreme increase in sea level, the civilization destroyed, and the diaspora ...
Depicts the now underwater world of East Asia, where I speculate Sapiens created the first Civilization, dating to the Great Flood ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundaland
Three stars for too much information ... find re-reading a challenge
Bought an "Eden in the East" for myself after reading a library copy. It now contains many "stickies" and notes written in margins. Some interesting "what if" material.
What potential for a fantasy : the three era sinking of the world's first civilization, a trip around the north Pacific by survivors. Oppenheimer's theories seem quite plausible and could provide useful world building blocks.
***
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen...
From the Wiki about Oppenheimer - "In his book Eden in the East: The Drowned Continent of Southeast Asia, published in 1998, Oppenheimer makes a case that the rise in ocean levels that accompanied the waning of the ice age—as much as 500 feet (150 m)—during the period 14,000–7,000 years ago, must be taken into account when trying to understand the flow of genes and culture in Eurasia. Citing evidence from geology, archaeology, genetics, linguistics, and folklore, he hypothesizes that the Southeast Asian subcontinent of Sundaland was home to a rich and original culture that was dispersed when Sundaland was mostly submerged and its population moved westward. According to Oppenheimer, Sundaland's culture may have reached India and Mesopotamia, becoming the root for the innovative cultures that developed in those areas. ..."
***
page 10 - "At the height of the Ice Age around 20,000-18,000 years ago, Southeast Asia formed a continent twice the size of India, and included what we now call Indo-China, Malaysia, and Indonesia. The South China Sea, the Gulf of Thailand and the Java Sea, which were then all dry, formed the connecting parts of the continent, Sundaland. The flat land area lost by Sundaland. Geologically, this half-sunken continent is termed the Sunda shelf, or Sundaland. The flat land area lost by Sundaland after the Ice Age was as large as India. Eventually only the scattered mountainous island of the Malay archipelago were left. A similar and vast swathe of land was also lost from the Pacific coast of Asia. Land that formerly stretched between Korea, Japan, China and Taiwan is now called the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea. Today's ports along the present south coastline of China, such as Hong Kong, were hundreds of miles inland during the Ice Age.
"This book discusses the possibility that when the final dramatic rise in water-level occurred between about 8000 and 7500 years ago, the last of a series of emigration routes went south towards Australia, east towards the Pacific, west into the Indian Ocean and north into the Asian Mainland. ... In their flight they carried their domestic animals and food plants with them ... Those in northern Sundaland fled north into Indo-China and Asia and founded sophisticated cultures in Southwest China, Burma and Tibet. Some of the splendid artefacts of these early civilizations are only now being unearthed."
***
page 62 - "Southeast Asia has the highest concentration of flood myths in the world. It is an area with few large river deltas and no recent reputation for flooding, but it lost more than 50 per cent of its landmass after the Ice Age."
***
For the serious science oriented reader, I could not get engaged with an attempted reread. The elements of speculation that appealed to me were lost in the vast of amount of questionable information. Would recommend, with little enthusiasm. A book to be skimmed.
"A study published today in Cell adds a surprising new twist to their mystery: DNA from a large sampling of living southeast Asians suggests that the ghostly Denisovans may be not one, but three distinct kinds of human, one of which is almost as different from other Denisovans as they are from Neanderthals.
"What's more, while the Denisovans lived alongside humans for millennia, one group may have outlasted even the Neanderthals, who disappeared some 40,000 years ago. According to the study, these Denisovans co-existed and mixed with modern humans in New Guinea until at least 30,000 years ago—but perhaps as recently as 15,000 years ago—a date that, if confirmed, means Denisovans were the last known humans save ourselves to walk the Earth.
“'Suddenly it’s kind of crystalized that the center of diversity for archaic populations is in Islands Southeast Asia,” says study co-author Murray Cox of Massey University, New Zealand, referring to the Philippines, Malaysia, and the other archipelagos that make up the vast maritime region of the Asian subcontinent.'"
***
Five stars for times it comes to mind ... Imagining the now underwater East Asia as it existed for most human time on Earth. Exposing the land now covered by the China Sea, Yellow Sea, etc. Sundaland!
Five stars for providing a world view how the end of the Ice Age caused extreme increase in sea level, the civilization destroyed, and the diaspora ...
Depicts the now underwater world of East Asia, where I speculate Sapiens created the first Civilization, dating to the Great Flood ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sundaland
Three stars for too much information ... find re-reading a challenge
Bought an "Eden in the East" for myself after reading a library copy. It now contains many "stickies" and notes written in margins. Some interesting "what if" material.
What potential for a fantasy : the three era sinking of the world's first civilization, a trip around the north Pacific by survivors. Oppenheimer's theories seem quite plausible and could provide useful world building blocks.
***
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen...
From the Wiki about Oppenheimer - "In his book Eden in the East: The Drowned Continent of Southeast Asia, published in 1998, Oppenheimer makes a case that the rise in ocean levels that accompanied the waning of the ice age—as much as 500 feet (150 m)—during the period 14,000–7,000 years ago, must be taken into account when trying to understand the flow of genes and culture in Eurasia. Citing evidence from geology, archaeology, genetics, linguistics, and folklore, he hypothesizes that the Southeast Asian subcontinent of Sundaland was home to a rich and original culture that was dispersed when Sundaland was mostly submerged and its population moved westward. According to Oppenheimer, Sundaland's culture may have reached India and Mesopotamia, becoming the root for the innovative cultures that developed in those areas. ..."
***
page 10 - "At the height of the Ice Age around 20,000-18,000 years ago, Southeast Asia formed a continent twice the size of India, and included what we now call Indo-China, Malaysia, and Indonesia. The South China Sea, the Gulf of Thailand and the Java Sea, which were then all dry, formed the connecting parts of the continent, Sundaland. The flat land area lost by Sundaland. Geologically, this half-sunken continent is termed the Sunda shelf, or Sundaland. The flat land area lost by Sundaland after the Ice Age was as large as India. Eventually only the scattered mountainous island of the Malay archipelago were left. A similar and vast swathe of land was also lost from the Pacific coast of Asia. Land that formerly stretched between Korea, Japan, China and Taiwan is now called the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea. Today's ports along the present south coastline of China, such as Hong Kong, were hundreds of miles inland during the Ice Age.
"This book discusses the possibility that when the final dramatic rise in water-level occurred between about 8000 and 7500 years ago, the last of a series of emigration routes went south towards Australia, east towards the Pacific, west into the Indian Ocean and north into the Asian Mainland. ... In their flight they carried their domestic animals and food plants with them ... Those in northern Sundaland fled north into Indo-China and Asia and founded sophisticated cultures in Southwest China, Burma and Tibet. Some of the splendid artefacts of these early civilizations are only now being unearthed."
***
page 62 - "Southeast Asia has the highest concentration of flood myths in the world. It is an area with few large river deltas and no recent reputation for flooding, but it lost more than 50 per cent of its landmass after the Ice Age."
***
For the serious science oriented reader, I could not get engaged with an attempted reread. The elements of speculation that appealed to me were lost in the vast of amount of questionable information. Would recommend, with little enthusiasm. A book to be skimmed.
August 14, 2007
This is kind of academic. But I was reading more for the subject matter: about the possibility of a South East Asian continent that was the original cradle of civilisation, before it was drowned by rising water levels at the end of the last ice age. The first part of the book which deals with data on the flooding is a bit of a long haul. The second part which dealt with comparisons of similar folklore between various cultures to see where the original story came from is much more interesting for me. I'd recommend this to anyone with a keen interest in South East Asian indigenous cultures or pre-colonial history.
February 9, 2019
After I read The Forgotten Exodus: The Into Africa Theory of Human Evolution in which Bruce Fenton presents his argument for the evolution of Homo sapiens from the Homo erectus population of Southeast Asia, his argument well-supported by archaeological and genetic evidence, I thought it a good idea to read Stephen Oppenheimer‘s Eden in the East: The Drowned Continent of Southeast Asia, though not strictly as a follow-on, since it was written some 20 years earlier.
In Eden in the East Oppenheimer sets out to prove that, displaced by a catastrophic flood ca.8,500 years ago, many of survivors from Southeast Asia, notably those from the drowned coastal lands of the former Sundaland, took to their sea-going canoes to find new homes, taking with them their myths, and their potentially more advanced technology. They settled in India, and Sumer (Mesopotamia), and possibly in South America. Note: Oppenheimer makes no mention of ‘Atlantis’.
But does he succeed in his argument? In my opinion, no.
The book can be divided into four sections:
1: The floods. He lists three. The first two, at 14,000 and 11,500 years bp, date to the end of the Older and Younger Dryas respectively. These were two brief returns to glacial cold and drought. However, Oppenheimer’s argument pertains only to the rapid rise in sea-level at the collapse of the Laurentide ice sheet ca.8000 years bp.
This collapse has been the subject of several recent geological studies which produced evidence not available when Oppenheimer was writing. Yet without this evidence, he still puts forward enough for me to accept that it happened, and to the extent said, i.e. a total rise in sea-level of 120 metres (500 feet) from the greatest low at the time of the last full glacial (20,000 years bp). However, I might question how much of this rise was due to the Laurentide collapse alone. Apparent sea-rise isn’t only a matter of more water, but with the weight of ice lifted from the land, that land rises while adjacent land sinks.
But disregarding the evidence used, in my opinion his argument would have been better supported with effective graphics; a complaint that surfaces throughout the book, but most notably in this next section.
2: Languages of Southeast Asia, and the need to account for the harlequin pattern of their spread. There are a confusing number of languages spoken across Southeast Asia, though these can be placed in just four phyla: Austro-Asiatic; Austro-Tai; Austronesian and Sino-Tibetan. There is a feeling amongst linguists of this region that to untangle this interwoven plaited pattern of languages will be to make clear the equally tangled pattern of migrations. Oppenheimer devotes considerable time in debunking his predecessor’s theories and an attempt to establish his own.
While I understand the underlying reason, I found his trail at times difficult to follow and can’t help thinking that effective graphics would have solved the problem.
And by now I was beginning to tire of this book. Yet I persisted.
3: Genetics. I have followed the past fifty years of discussions and arguments regarding the origin and spread of the Indo-European languages, then to watch the few gloat over the others when ancient genetics appeared to seal their case. So I was aware of the importance of genetics in his argument, but at the same time, I echo those archaeologists who stress that language doesn’t come with our genes. However, as an indication of migrations, ancient genes can tell us far more than our language. Alas for Stephen Oppenheimer, that he had no recourse to modern genetics, and certainly not to ancient genes. Yet he does his best with what was available. In that, I cannot fault him. Except to say … why must his explanations be so convoluted? As with the languages and the flood, my major complaint here is his lack of clarity.
4: Flood myths. Oppenheimer opens this section by naming his main source outside of the classical as the Scottish social anthropologist and folklorist, Sir James George Frazer (1854-1941). Frazer is famous for his Golden Bough, published in 1890, lesser known for his Great Flood. originally published in 1918 as chapter four of Folk-lore in the Old Testament, vol. I.
Frazer wasn’t the most honest of researchers. He had a theory and he wasn’t averse to misrepresenting the facts. Moreover, whence those ‘facts’? In his search for supporting myth, he wrote to ambassadors and governors, and particularly missionaries and asked them to mail him whatever they could regarding local myths.
Then is it a wonder that worldwide, we find myths recorded by Frazer that so closely resemble the Biblical myth. Though, I admit, there are a few myths in Frazer’s Great Flood that do not conform. Yet Oppenheimer relies on this source and even recommends his readers refer to Frazer for a wider view. I’d say a better resource might be Wikipedia.
In conclusion: This is a book review, it isn’t a critique or a counterargument. Moreover, it’s only one person’s view. Yet I find I can’t review it without calling attention to features I found disappointing. I am not an expert in genetics, linguistic or mythology. But I am well read and try to stay abreast of the latest developments. While I’m all in favour of breaking away from the rigid compartmentalism adhered to in academia, I lament that it’s now a fashion for scientists to wade into mythology with no real understanding of what makes a myth.
This year alone we’ve seen extraordinary incidents of extreme weather: earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, a year’s worth of rain descend in one day, scrub fires, mudslides, deaths, homes lost … one wonders what tales the survivors would tell if we still lived in a non-technological age?
In telling a tale, the inclination to embroider, to make more exciting, sticks as sure as the silt left from a flood. And that, in my opinion, is an overlooked fact in the work of Stephen Oppenheimer.
In Eden in the East Oppenheimer sets out to prove that, displaced by a catastrophic flood ca.8,500 years ago, many of survivors from Southeast Asia, notably those from the drowned coastal lands of the former Sundaland, took to their sea-going canoes to find new homes, taking with them their myths, and their potentially more advanced technology. They settled in India, and Sumer (Mesopotamia), and possibly in South America. Note: Oppenheimer makes no mention of ‘Atlantis’.
But does he succeed in his argument? In my opinion, no.
The book can be divided into four sections:
1: The floods. He lists three. The first two, at 14,000 and 11,500 years bp, date to the end of the Older and Younger Dryas respectively. These were two brief returns to glacial cold and drought. However, Oppenheimer’s argument pertains only to the rapid rise in sea-level at the collapse of the Laurentide ice sheet ca.8000 years bp.
This collapse has been the subject of several recent geological studies which produced evidence not available when Oppenheimer was writing. Yet without this evidence, he still puts forward enough for me to accept that it happened, and to the extent said, i.e. a total rise in sea-level of 120 metres (500 feet) from the greatest low at the time of the last full glacial (20,000 years bp). However, I might question how much of this rise was due to the Laurentide collapse alone. Apparent sea-rise isn’t only a matter of more water, but with the weight of ice lifted from the land, that land rises while adjacent land sinks.
But disregarding the evidence used, in my opinion his argument would have been better supported with effective graphics; a complaint that surfaces throughout the book, but most notably in this next section.
2: Languages of Southeast Asia, and the need to account for the harlequin pattern of their spread. There are a confusing number of languages spoken across Southeast Asia, though these can be placed in just four phyla: Austro-Asiatic; Austro-Tai; Austronesian and Sino-Tibetan. There is a feeling amongst linguists of this region that to untangle this interwoven plaited pattern of languages will be to make clear the equally tangled pattern of migrations. Oppenheimer devotes considerable time in debunking his predecessor’s theories and an attempt to establish his own.
While I understand the underlying reason, I found his trail at times difficult to follow and can’t help thinking that effective graphics would have solved the problem.
And by now I was beginning to tire of this book. Yet I persisted.
3: Genetics. I have followed the past fifty years of discussions and arguments regarding the origin and spread of the Indo-European languages, then to watch the few gloat over the others when ancient genetics appeared to seal their case. So I was aware of the importance of genetics in his argument, but at the same time, I echo those archaeologists who stress that language doesn’t come with our genes. However, as an indication of migrations, ancient genes can tell us far more than our language. Alas for Stephen Oppenheimer, that he had no recourse to modern genetics, and certainly not to ancient genes. Yet he does his best with what was available. In that, I cannot fault him. Except to say … why must his explanations be so convoluted? As with the languages and the flood, my major complaint here is his lack of clarity.
4: Flood myths. Oppenheimer opens this section by naming his main source outside of the classical as the Scottish social anthropologist and folklorist, Sir James George Frazer (1854-1941). Frazer is famous for his Golden Bough, published in 1890, lesser known for his Great Flood. originally published in 1918 as chapter four of Folk-lore in the Old Testament, vol. I.
Frazer wasn’t the most honest of researchers. He had a theory and he wasn’t averse to misrepresenting the facts. Moreover, whence those ‘facts’? In his search for supporting myth, he wrote to ambassadors and governors, and particularly missionaries and asked them to mail him whatever they could regarding local myths.
Then is it a wonder that worldwide, we find myths recorded by Frazer that so closely resemble the Biblical myth. Though, I admit, there are a few myths in Frazer’s Great Flood that do not conform. Yet Oppenheimer relies on this source and even recommends his readers refer to Frazer for a wider view. I’d say a better resource might be Wikipedia.
In conclusion: This is a book review, it isn’t a critique or a counterargument. Moreover, it’s only one person’s view. Yet I find I can’t review it without calling attention to features I found disappointing. I am not an expert in genetics, linguistic or mythology. But I am well read and try to stay abreast of the latest developments. While I’m all in favour of breaking away from the rigid compartmentalism adhered to in academia, I lament that it’s now a fashion for scientists to wade into mythology with no real understanding of what makes a myth.
This year alone we’ve seen extraordinary incidents of extreme weather: earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, a year’s worth of rain descend in one day, scrub fires, mudslides, deaths, homes lost … one wonders what tales the survivors would tell if we still lived in a non-technological age?
In telling a tale, the inclination to embroider, to make more exciting, sticks as sure as the silt left from a flood. And that, in my opinion, is an overlooked fact in the work of Stephen Oppenheimer.
January 10, 2023
This book sets out to prove an almost impossible thesis: that the drowned civilization of Sundaland contributed towards the civilizational milestones of Mesopotamia (and then towards the rest of the world) after their land had been engulfed by floods.
The scope of the book is gigantic, and most of the time are filled with jargon and technicalities that are so specific that it is almost hard to grasp by those who are not acquainted with hard geology or linguistics.
Oppenheimer tried to prove that there are three post-glacial floodings in the last 12,000 years ago that submerge the continent of Sundaland. Sundaland is one of many continental shelves that stood too level with the sea, thus exposing it to the mercy of Nature. But he has to prove that the rising sea level is severe, or drastic enough that it will propel its inhabitants to embark on an exodus out from their homeland. He also has to prove the sophistication of the civilization of Sundaland, that they offer enough attractive technology and cultural achievements that the people of the West emulate them.
In the outset, Oppenheimer insists on how the flood myths around the world are actually historiographical, instead of just mythical. Mythos is how people of the ancient tried to limit the delimited human experience. Even in our daily life, such reasoning provides some meaning to our daily tribulations. Also in the Mesopotamians annals, were recorded on “amphibious sages from the East” that taught them the civilizational mettles. According to Oppenheimer, the people of the Sundaland are those sages from the East.
Using geological analysis, Oppenheimer able to identify three post-glacial flooding for the past 12,000 years ago. Each of these flooding are associated with the dismantlement of mega ice caps, releasing hundreds of thousands of cubic kilometers of water, instantaneously increasing the world sea water level. Looking directly to today’s situation as in Jakarta, where the sea level is dangerously creeping to the level of the barrier erected throughout the coast, reminds us hauntingly on the suspense felt by the people of Sundaland at that time.
But reverse back to 100,000 years ago. Elsewhere in the review of the other book, we have summarized on the Out-of-Africa theory, the theory of migration of modern humans. And the modern humans reached Sundaland around 60,000 years ago, serving as a stopping-hub, just like in India 80,000 years ago. When the population blooming in India has almost been wiped up by the ashes of Mount Toba, it was the people living in Sundaland that filled up the vacant spots, as evidenced by genetic studies. It was also from Sundaland, where the ancients crossed to Australia through the Lesser Sundas, and towards China, Beringia and then onwards to America. The 9-bp deletion in our genome, ubiquitous in the people of Southeast Asia and the Native Americans indicate such relation quite starkly.
Oppenheimer is also a believer of the stay-at-home hypothesis on the origins of the people of Southeast Asia, instead of out-of-Taiwan, or out-of-Yunnan hypothesis. He believed that the Austronesian people originated in the Moluccas, in the heart of Southeast Asia instead of from Yunnan. Linguistically, the total devoid of basic Malayo-Polynesian vocabulary in the Formosan Aboriginal showed quite a high degree of improbability of them being the entire ancestor of the Austronesians. Archaeologically, the presence of rice remains in the Sakai Cave of Thailand a full 3000 years prior of any earliest record of rice-cultivation in China also showed the less probability of them being the ancestor. Genetically, the presence of all three variants of 9-bp deletion (the so-called Asian grandmother, mother and daughter) are highly concentrated in central Southeast Asia instead of Taiwan at its fringes.
The second part of the book focuses on the prevalence of flood myths in Southeast Asia and its relation to the rest of the world. In short, Oppenheimer tried to relate the dispersal of flood myths throughout the world with the migration of the Sundaland people post glacial floods.
The scope of the book is gigantic, and most of the time are filled with jargon and technicalities that are so specific that it is almost hard to grasp by those who are not acquainted with hard geology or linguistics.
Oppenheimer tried to prove that there are three post-glacial floodings in the last 12,000 years ago that submerge the continent of Sundaland. Sundaland is one of many continental shelves that stood too level with the sea, thus exposing it to the mercy of Nature. But he has to prove that the rising sea level is severe, or drastic enough that it will propel its inhabitants to embark on an exodus out from their homeland. He also has to prove the sophistication of the civilization of Sundaland, that they offer enough attractive technology and cultural achievements that the people of the West emulate them.
In the outset, Oppenheimer insists on how the flood myths around the world are actually historiographical, instead of just mythical. Mythos is how people of the ancient tried to limit the delimited human experience. Even in our daily life, such reasoning provides some meaning to our daily tribulations. Also in the Mesopotamians annals, were recorded on “amphibious sages from the East” that taught them the civilizational mettles. According to Oppenheimer, the people of the Sundaland are those sages from the East.
Using geological analysis, Oppenheimer able to identify three post-glacial flooding for the past 12,000 years ago. Each of these flooding are associated with the dismantlement of mega ice caps, releasing hundreds of thousands of cubic kilometers of water, instantaneously increasing the world sea water level. Looking directly to today’s situation as in Jakarta, where the sea level is dangerously creeping to the level of the barrier erected throughout the coast, reminds us hauntingly on the suspense felt by the people of Sundaland at that time.
But reverse back to 100,000 years ago. Elsewhere in the review of the other book, we have summarized on the Out-of-Africa theory, the theory of migration of modern humans. And the modern humans reached Sundaland around 60,000 years ago, serving as a stopping-hub, just like in India 80,000 years ago. When the population blooming in India has almost been wiped up by the ashes of Mount Toba, it was the people living in Sundaland that filled up the vacant spots, as evidenced by genetic studies. It was also from Sundaland, where the ancients crossed to Australia through the Lesser Sundas, and towards China, Beringia and then onwards to America. The 9-bp deletion in our genome, ubiquitous in the people of Southeast Asia and the Native Americans indicate such relation quite starkly.
Oppenheimer is also a believer of the stay-at-home hypothesis on the origins of the people of Southeast Asia, instead of out-of-Taiwan, or out-of-Yunnan hypothesis. He believed that the Austronesian people originated in the Moluccas, in the heart of Southeast Asia instead of from Yunnan. Linguistically, the total devoid of basic Malayo-Polynesian vocabulary in the Formosan Aboriginal showed quite a high degree of improbability of them being the entire ancestor of the Austronesians. Archaeologically, the presence of rice remains in the Sakai Cave of Thailand a full 3000 years prior of any earliest record of rice-cultivation in China also showed the less probability of them being the ancestor. Genetically, the presence of all three variants of 9-bp deletion (the so-called Asian grandmother, mother and daughter) are highly concentrated in central Southeast Asia instead of Taiwan at its fringes.
The second part of the book focuses on the prevalence of flood myths in Southeast Asia and its relation to the rest of the world. In short, Oppenheimer tried to relate the dispersal of flood myths throughout the world with the migration of the Sundaland people post glacial floods.
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May 10, 2014I wanna read this book so much , but i have no enough money to buy the book :-( do you all wanna borrow me ?
May 15, 2012
Very dense, took a long time to absorb it, but very important and opens up great wonderings.
February 18, 2023
"Ingatlah, kurangnya bukti prasejarah dari teknologi majulah yang menjadi dasar ejekan para pendukung orang bijak pada zaman prasejarah." -hlm. 447
Akhirnya bisa menyelesaikan buku tebal ini dalam waktu kurang lebih dua mingguan, di sela-sela aktivitas yang mulai memadat.
Buku ini dibagi menjadi dua bagian yang mana bagian pertama akan berfokus pada asal-usul penyebaran beberapa benua-benua yang kita kenal sekarang ini, dan teori-teori yang mendukung mengenai apa yang menyebabkan terpecahnya benua-benua tersebut.
Sementara di bagian kedua adalah lanjutan penyebaran benua tersebut di mana sejarah umat manusia mulai bermunculan, alias teori penciptaan. Well, di bagian kedua ini juga menyelipkan banyak sekali cerita rakyat, dongeng, mitos, bahkan pendekatan dari berbagai macam kitab mengenai teori penciptaan alam semesta dan manusia.
Buku ini juga sedikit banyak mengingatkanku dengan buku Charles Darwin yang sudah kubaca juga di bulan ini. Isinya tuh kayak saling berkesinambungan.
Sayangnya buku ini banyak banget typo bahkan sepertinya layoutnya tidak diatur dulu. Well, editornya pun kayaknya kelabakan mau ngedit buku 814 halaman ini. Dimaklumi.
Akhirnya bisa menyelesaikan buku tebal ini dalam waktu kurang lebih dua mingguan, di sela-sela aktivitas yang mulai memadat.
Buku ini dibagi menjadi dua bagian yang mana bagian pertama akan berfokus pada asal-usul penyebaran beberapa benua-benua yang kita kenal sekarang ini, dan teori-teori yang mendukung mengenai apa yang menyebabkan terpecahnya benua-benua tersebut.
Sementara di bagian kedua adalah lanjutan penyebaran benua tersebut di mana sejarah umat manusia mulai bermunculan, alias teori penciptaan. Well, di bagian kedua ini juga menyelipkan banyak sekali cerita rakyat, dongeng, mitos, bahkan pendekatan dari berbagai macam kitab mengenai teori penciptaan alam semesta dan manusia.
Buku ini juga sedikit banyak mengingatkanku dengan buku Charles Darwin yang sudah kubaca juga di bulan ini. Isinya tuh kayak saling berkesinambungan.
Sayangnya buku ini banyak banget typo bahkan sepertinya layoutnya tidak diatur dulu. Well, editornya pun kayaknya kelabakan mau ngedit buku 814 halaman ini. Dimaklumi.
December 25, 2017
Oppenheimer advances the thesis that rapid sea level rise about 8000 years ago forced people living on the Sunda Shelf in southeast Asia (then an extensive area of dry land) to migrate east and west, bringing much of their culture with them. The geology, genetics, and linguistics he rallies in support seem sound. When he gets to mythology, though, his ground becomes much shakier. He claims evidence to suggest that themes common to the Middle East and Europe (pretty much everything in Genesis 1-8, and a little more) originated in Sunda. But mostly his argument is that when a theme occurs in Sunda, it originated there, and there was a physical inspiration for it; when the same theme occurs elsewhere, it came via diffusion. In a couple places, he buttresses his case with statistical correlations of motifs occurring together, but those statistics are weakened by selective interpretation of the myths (e.g., any mention of vegetation becomes a tree) and by omission of South American myths (perhaps unknown to him at the time) which include several of the same motifs. His case is strong enough to merit further study, particularly regarding an early settlement of Polynesia, and the myths he discusses are interesting in themselves. But the section on spread of myths must remain in the "wild speculation" category at least until reliable methods are found to determine how and where myths spread.
September 30, 2013
A great study about the derivative of Southest-asia culture also the Chinese and Indian. It also issues an academic perspective on Southern advanced techniques which were belived originating from China.
April 14, 2023
Buku ini membahas tentang sejarah awal manusia dan perkembangan peradaban manusia di Asia Tenggara. Buku ini menawarkan teori bahwa Asia Tenggara pernah menjadi pusat peradaban manusia yang lebih awal daripada Mesopotamia atau Mesir kuno.
Menurut Oppenheimer, Asia Tenggara pernah menjadi sebuah benua yang disebut "Sundaland" atau "Sunda Shelf" pada masa lampau, yang kini sebagian besar telah tenggelam ke dalam laut. Benua ini diyakini menjadi tempat lahirnya manusia modern sekitar 75.000 tahun yang lalu, dan menjadi pusat peradaban awal manusia.
Buku ini membahas tentang berbagai bukti arkeologi, antropologi, genetika, dan linguistik yang mendukung teori bahwa Asia Tenggara adalah tempat lahirnya manusia modern, dan bukan Afrika seperti yang diyakini selama ini. Buku ini juga membahas tentang hubungan antara peradaban di Asia Tenggara dengan peradaban lainnya di dunia, seperti peradaban Mesir kuno, India, dan China.
Selain itu, buku ini juga mengupas tentang bagaimana benua Sundaland mengalami kepunahan massal, yang diyakini disebabkan oleh perubahan iklim dan aktivitas gunung berapi pada masa lampau.
Secara keseluruhan, buku "Eden in the East" memberikan pandangan yang menarik dan kontroversial tentang sejarah awal manusia dan perkembangan peradaban di Asia Tenggara. Buku ini sangat direkomendasikan bagi siapa saja yang tertarik untuk mempelajari tentang sejarah manusia dan peradaban, serta bagi yang ingin mengetahui teori-teori kontroversial tentang asal-usul manusia dan sejarah dunia.
Menurut Oppenheimer, Asia Tenggara pernah menjadi sebuah benua yang disebut "Sundaland" atau "Sunda Shelf" pada masa lampau, yang kini sebagian besar telah tenggelam ke dalam laut. Benua ini diyakini menjadi tempat lahirnya manusia modern sekitar 75.000 tahun yang lalu, dan menjadi pusat peradaban awal manusia.
Buku ini membahas tentang berbagai bukti arkeologi, antropologi, genetika, dan linguistik yang mendukung teori bahwa Asia Tenggara adalah tempat lahirnya manusia modern, dan bukan Afrika seperti yang diyakini selama ini. Buku ini juga membahas tentang hubungan antara peradaban di Asia Tenggara dengan peradaban lainnya di dunia, seperti peradaban Mesir kuno, India, dan China.
Selain itu, buku ini juga mengupas tentang bagaimana benua Sundaland mengalami kepunahan massal, yang diyakini disebabkan oleh perubahan iklim dan aktivitas gunung berapi pada masa lampau.
Secara keseluruhan, buku "Eden in the East" memberikan pandangan yang menarik dan kontroversial tentang sejarah awal manusia dan perkembangan peradaban di Asia Tenggara. Buku ini sangat direkomendasikan bagi siapa saja yang tertarik untuk mempelajari tentang sejarah manusia dan peradaban, serta bagi yang ingin mengetahui teori-teori kontroversial tentang asal-usul manusia dan sejarah dunia.
January 23, 2018
Presents an intriguing idea overall: a Neolithic civilization in southeast Asia 7000 years ago or more, spread its influences west to Egypt and Mesopotamia and east into the Polynesian islands through trade and, after post-Ice Age floods, through migrations. It examines archaeology, language, genetics, and myths in connecting these areas. But it is not well organized for such a large canvas and therefore the story cannot support the book’s length. Grounded in science, but not without some leaps is speculation.
November 24, 2017
Jika premis atau hipotesa buku ini benar, maka sejarah dunia harus diubah beserta turunannya, antropologi dll. Dan jika Atlantis ada di Asia Tenggara, sebagiannya di Indonesia, oh banyak mitos agama akan runtuh .. buku bagus yang harus dibaca dan kelak akan jadi sangat penting di antara tahun 2030-2050 ke atas saat trend antropologi sains politik ekonomi lingkungan dll mengarah ke Indonesia. buku yang harus dimiliki bersama dengan Atlantis: The Continent Finally Found dari Arysio Santos
May 30, 2018
A most excellent book. Read Bruce Kenyon's book Into Africa before you make your mind up.
Want to read
April 2, 2013kemarin sore nemu di perpus, katanya sih baru dateng. Langsung dipinjem, dan entah kapan selesainya. Tebel banget, apalagi abis sakit gini, agak2 nggak yakin kalo selesai, tapi..err dicoba dulu deh :p
November 5, 2013
Jadi kalau gitu cerita tentang terusirnya Adam-Hawa dan Bahtera Nuh itu berakar dari kebudayaan Austronesia alias Asia Tenggara? Trus secara genetis dan etnografis Adam dan Hawa tuh orang Asia Tenggara? Mungkin aja sih. Tapi kayaknya perlu baca teori2 yang lain dulu deh sebelum percaya.
December 6, 2010
I translated it :D
October 13, 2012
seems interesting.
January 24, 2012
baca yg terjemahan bhs Indonesia. amat sangat membingungkan krn terjemahannya yg dpt ngambil langsung dr google translate
November 15, 2013
Excellent
June 23, 2016
Another blowing mind theory. It could be true that South East Asia region was a great continent. The only way to dig more artefacts is to drain the area. Let's do it! lol.
January 25, 2017
One of the most enlightening non-fiction books about lost continents I've ever read. Credible in its science and cross-cultural studies.
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