The Lost Civilizations of the Stone Age - Hardcover

In this book, Rudgley describes how the intrepid explorers of the Stone Age discovered all of the world's major land masses long before the so-called Age of Discovery. Stone Age man made precisely sized tools, and used proto-abacuses to count and measure. He performed medical operations including amputations and delicate cranial surgeries. Neanderthals not only domesticated fire for heat and light, but experimented with lichen and moss fuels. In the visual arts, the Paleolithic cave artists of western Europe used techniques forgotten until the Renaissance. Picasso himself is said to have remarked after visiting Lascaux, "We have invented nothing!" The Lost Civilizations of the Stone Age shows the greatness of the debt that contemporary society owes to its prehistoric predecessors. It is a rich introduction to a lost world that will redefine the meaning of civilization itself.

"The prehistory of humankind is no mere prelude to history, rather history is a colorful and eventful afterword to the Stone Age", asserts Richard Rudgley in a work that brings into question many assumptions about our cultural superiority.

Looking at all the major elements of the Stone-Age civilization -- writing, math, science, technology, art, and religion -- Rudgley argues that the evolution of what makes humans unique, our civilizing customs, reaches far back into the midst of prehistory. Indeed, the peoples of the Stone Age were astonishingly accomplished -- in some ways, more advanced than we are today. The Lost Civilizations of the Stone Age showcases the advances of these forward-thinking people, including:
-- Their vivid representations of constellations dating back more than 40,000 years ago
-- The invention of the first calculation devices, used to count lunar cycles
-- Examples of Stone-Age art that, in terms of both technique and aesthetics, is anything but primitive
-- Innovations in boat building that made Stone-Age peoples the greatest explorers in history.

A fascinating and rich introduction to a lost world.