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Advanced Civilizations of Prehistoric America: The Lost Kingdoms of the Adena, Hopewell, Mississippians, and Anasazi
The examination of four great civilizations that existed before Columbus’s arrival in North America offers evidence of sustained contact between the Old and New Worlds
• Describes the cultural splendor, political might, and incredibly advanced technology of these precursors to our modern age
• Shows that North America’s first civilization, the Adena, was sparked by ancient Kelts from Western Europe and explores links between Hopewell Mound Builders and prehistoric Japanese seafarers
Before Rome ruled the Classical World, gleaming stone pyramids stood amid smoking iron foundries from North America’s Atlantic seaboard to the Mississippi River. On its east bank, across from today’s St. Louis, Missouri, flourished a walled city more populous than London was one thousand years ago, with a pyramid larger--at its base--than Egypt’s Great Pyramid. During the 12th century, hydraulic engineers laid out a massive irrigation network spanning the American Southwest that, if laid end to end, would stretch from Phoenix, Arizona, to the Canadian border. On a scale to match, they built a five-mile-wide dam from ten million cubic yards of rock. While Europe stumbled through the Dark Ages, a metropolis of weirdly shaped, multistory superstructures, precisely aligned to the sun and moon, sprawled across the New Mexico Desert.
Who was responsible for such colossal achievements? Where did their mysterious builders come from, and what became of them? These are some of the questions investigated by Frank Joseph in his examination of ancient influences at work on our continent. He reveals that modern civilization is not the first to arise in North America but was preceded instead by four high cultures that rose and fell over the past three thousand the Adena, Hopewell, Mississippian, and Anasazi-Hohokam. How they achieved greatness and why they vanished so completely are the intriguing enigmas explored by this unconventional prehistory of our country, Advanced Civilizations of Prehistoric America .
• Describes the cultural splendor, political might, and incredibly advanced technology of these precursors to our modern age
• Shows that North America’s first civilization, the Adena, was sparked by ancient Kelts from Western Europe and explores links between Hopewell Mound Builders and prehistoric Japanese seafarers
Before Rome ruled the Classical World, gleaming stone pyramids stood amid smoking iron foundries from North America’s Atlantic seaboard to the Mississippi River. On its east bank, across from today’s St. Louis, Missouri, flourished a walled city more populous than London was one thousand years ago, with a pyramid larger--at its base--than Egypt’s Great Pyramid. During the 12th century, hydraulic engineers laid out a massive irrigation network spanning the American Southwest that, if laid end to end, would stretch from Phoenix, Arizona, to the Canadian border. On a scale to match, they built a five-mile-wide dam from ten million cubic yards of rock. While Europe stumbled through the Dark Ages, a metropolis of weirdly shaped, multistory superstructures, precisely aligned to the sun and moon, sprawled across the New Mexico Desert.
Who was responsible for such colossal achievements? Where did their mysterious builders come from, and what became of them? These are some of the questions investigated by Frank Joseph in his examination of ancient influences at work on our continent. He reveals that modern civilization is not the first to arise in North America but was preceded instead by four high cultures that rose and fell over the past three thousand the Adena, Hopewell, Mississippian, and Anasazi-Hohokam. How they achieved greatness and why they vanished so completely are the intriguing enigmas explored by this unconventional prehistory of our country, Advanced Civilizations of Prehistoric America .
328 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2009
28 people are currently reading
152 people want to read
About the author
Frank Joseph
73 books48 followersFrank Joseph is the pen name of Francis Joseph Collin, a former activist with the American Nazi Party/National Socialist White People's Party and the founder of the National Socialist Party of America. In 1979, Collin was convicted of child molestation and sentenced to seven years in prison, and he lost his position in the party.
Upon his release from prison, Collin reinvented himself under the pseudonym of Frank Joseph, a New Age writer and a pagan worshiper. In 1987, he had his first New Age book published, The Destruction of Atlantis: Compelling Evidence of the Sudden Fall of the Legendary Civilization.
He wrote articles for the magazine Fate, and between 1993 and 2007 he was also an editor of Ancient American. This magazine focuses on what it considers to be evidence of ancient, pre-Columbian transoceanic contact between the Old World and North America, with the implication that all complex aspects of North America's indigenous cultures must have originated on other continents.
Upon his release from prison, Collin reinvented himself under the pseudonym of Frank Joseph, a New Age writer and a pagan worshiper. In 1987, he had his first New Age book published, The Destruction of Atlantis: Compelling Evidence of the Sudden Fall of the Legendary Civilization.
He wrote articles for the magazine Fate, and between 1993 and 2007 he was also an editor of Ancient American. This magazine focuses on what it considers to be evidence of ancient, pre-Columbian transoceanic contact between the Old World and North America, with the implication that all complex aspects of North America's indigenous cultures must have originated on other continents.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
May 24, 2013
This is exactly the sort of crank science I love to read - logically reasoned, plausible enough to get me looking at the mainstream sources, and gameable by virtue of spinning fabulous visions of The Truth rather than a more respectable Fortean presentation of only the facts as known. I did complain as I was reading this about the matter of fact, out-of-nowhere declaration of astral projection as "the only logical explanation" for something, and it kept nagging at me that in Mr. Joseph's theories none of the four great North American pre-Columbian civilizations were actually native to North America.
Mr. Joseph's explanation for the Adena fits together nicely with the facts presented, but ultimately seems a bit of a reach. His Hopewell explanation seems half-hearted after the effort he went into building his case for the Adena. His timelines for these civilizations disagree at a couple of key points with the mainstream timeline, and if there's one thing mainstream science does well, it's timelines. I found his explanation for the Mississippians to be compelling, but suspect a cherry picking of the facts to get there, while his Hohokam/Anasazi theory seems more compelling to me for some of the unanswered questions it leaves.
Any science reconstructing the past is going to have to have some element of storytelling to it, and sometimes the storyteller forgets that they *are* telling a story. Fringe and/or crank theorists remind us that there is no authoritative account of these people, and just because we've all agreed to tell a certain version of the story, that doesn't make that story infallible. Mr. Joseph gives several points of research that he claims would upset and contradict the Establishment stories of these four peoples, and argues well enough that if I had grant money to disburse, I'd certainly encourage someone to get out there and prove *somebody* wrong.
Mr. Joseph's explanation for the Adena fits together nicely with the facts presented, but ultimately seems a bit of a reach. His Hopewell explanation seems half-hearted after the effort he went into building his case for the Adena. His timelines for these civilizations disagree at a couple of key points with the mainstream timeline, and if there's one thing mainstream science does well, it's timelines. I found his explanation for the Mississippians to be compelling, but suspect a cherry picking of the facts to get there, while his Hohokam/Anasazi theory seems more compelling to me for some of the unanswered questions it leaves.
Any science reconstructing the past is going to have to have some element of storytelling to it, and sometimes the storyteller forgets that they *are* telling a story. Fringe and/or crank theorists remind us that there is no authoritative account of these people, and just because we've all agreed to tell a certain version of the story, that doesn't make that story infallible. Mr. Joseph gives several points of research that he claims would upset and contradict the Establishment stories of these four peoples, and argues well enough that if I had grant money to disburse, I'd certainly encourage someone to get out there and prove *somebody* wrong.
March 8, 2019
Author was a former leader of the American nazi party.
I was excited to read about ancient American cultures, but then learned more about the author and his beliefs.
I was excited to read about ancient American cultures, but then learned more about the author and his beliefs.
November 7, 2018
I'm eventually going to come back to re-visit this, but between strawman arguments and outright lies, this book is nothing but a desperate attempt to prove the white nationalist agenda of the myth of white culture bringers in America.
January 19, 2019
I got this from the library, expecting to read something that expanded my knowledge of North American Prehistory, with reasonable detail as to what is truly known. What I got was a lot of rambling, extrapolation, cultural projection, and story-telling. Plus, what I saw was a lot of the same style of language that argues for Intelligent Design instead of Evolution. I kinda want to shout 'absence of evidence is not evidence of absence' at the author.
When I glanced through to the two appendices that have cherry-picked comparison words between 'Keltic and Plains Indians' and 'Zuni Indian and Japanese', I was greatly disappointed. Comparative linguistics is not my field, but I'm pretty sure it would require a fair sight more rigorous analysis than 'oh, look, I can find 20 words of comparison'.
tl;dr - that's not how you do archaeology.
When I glanced through to the two appendices that have cherry-picked comparison words between 'Keltic and Plains Indians' and 'Zuni Indian and Japanese', I was greatly disappointed. Comparative linguistics is not my field, but I'm pretty sure it would require a fair sight more rigorous analysis than 'oh, look, I can find 20 words of comparison'.
tl;dr - that's not how you do archaeology.
January 23, 2018
I really enjoyed reading this. In school we all learn about the Inca, Mayans, and he Aztecs. But right here in the USA there is some wonderful prehistory that no one talks about. Most Americans probably have no idea. However, I did end up reading this with a grain of salt. The author seems too set on his own agenda - that “mainstream archeology” needs to wake up and catch up to the theories that are all too evident. But still? It was a great overview of the subject.
December 6, 2018
An important book on American archeology. I'll probably be re-reading it.
April 14, 2022
He wants it too much. Google his history before buying his books.
July 29, 2015
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.
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.
June 20, 2011
A fabulous look at the less known more mysterious lost cultures of North America, it never stops to amaze me that we have so much on our doorstep and so little is said. Written in his usual style (compiled articles) it covers so many sites and details your not left wanting. It can inspire you to explore your own back yard in a manner of speaking.
September 25, 2013
Frank Joseph hits a home run on this well researched work. Soon after reading this book, I made an archaeological trip to Cahokia Mounds, Illinois to investigate further details.
The author provides some compelling evidence for his theories.
The author provides some compelling evidence for his theories.
December 31, 2010
This was more like a three and a half. The author can't stay focused. It has some very good information on North American ancient cultures - The Adena and Hopewell civilizations.
January 22, 2015
Extremely interesting.
May 13, 2015
A fascinating account of advanced civilizations in the new world before Columbus. Much of it is backed by evidence, but some seems like archeologists' conjecture. Decided for yourself.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews