Desolate Landscapes: Ice-Age Settlement in Eastern Europe (The Rutgers Series in Human Evolution)

Rating:
Summary: Highly scholarly treatment of an amazing tale of survival
Review: First of all, it should be clarified that John F. Hoffecker's version of what constitutes "Eastern Europe" is the land between the Carpathian Mountains on the west and the Ural Mountains on the east. (Compare this with my review of "The Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of Eastern Europe"). The imprecise title may cause disappointment to some readers expecting a wider geographical scope for the book.

While this book can be seen a follow-up to his mentor Richard G. Klein's 1973 work "Ice-Age Hunters of the Ukraine", Mr. Hoffecker brings to the subject his own unique expertise in the general study of the archeology of people living in cold environments and applies it to the specific case of these people who amazingly managed to survive in this highly inhospitiable environment during the height of the Ice Age.

The book is divided into seven chapters. The first discusses general anthropological principles and theories pertaining to human adaptation and development in cold environments. The second outlines the environmental conditions of the specific area under study in the book.

The next two chapters focus on Neanderthal finds in the area. The following two chapters discuss the replacement of the local Neanderthal population by the Cro-magnons, and the development of their way of life in the cold Loess Steppe environment. The final chapter summarizes the discussion and is followed by an extremely valuable and extensive bibliography, more than half of which consists of non-English (primarily Russian) sources.

In reading this work I was struck by the ingenuity of these people in the ways they adapted to survive (such as cutting "meat freezers" into the permafrost ground to preserve food for leaner months ahead), and felt that they were much more intelligent than we generally credit prehistoric people as having been. Given the same materials and conditions to survive under, I doubt that I could do half as well as they did.

In summary, this book makes an extremely worthy contribution to the dire lack of knowledge about this subject available in English. The author makes extensive use of the work of Russian and Ukrainian archeologists, as well as knowledge gained from his own participation in digs in the area and access to collections of finds previously closed to Western scholars during the Soviet era.

My only reason for giving this book 4 stars instead of 5 is due to some disappointment with the illustrations in the book. All of them are merely reproductions of drawings of artifacts from earlier Soviet-era publications. With his access to the jealously-guarded collections Mr. Hoffecker has written of, it would seem to have been desirable to include new photographs of at least some of these artifacts which have never been seen by Western eyes.

It is hoped that this oversight can be remedied in the future by some sort of companion volume which focuses more on providing a visual record of the artifacts and sites in question to supplement the excellent information the author has provided in the present work.

Rating:
Summary: Highly scholarly treatment of an amazing tale of survival
Review: First of all, it should be clarified that John F. Hoffecker's version of what constitutes "Eastern Europe" is the land between the Carpathian Mountains on the west and the Ural Mountains on the east. (Compare this with my review of "The Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of Eastern Europe"). The imprecise title may cause disappointment to some readers expecting a wider geographical scope for the book.

While this book can be seen a follow-up to his mentor Richard G. Klein's 1973 work "Ice-Age Hunters of the Ukraine", Mr. Hoffecker brings to the subject his own unique expertise in the general study of the archeology of people living in cold environments and applies it to the specific case of these people who amazingly managed to survive in this highly inhospitiable environment during the height of the Ice Age.

The book is divided into seven chapters. The first discusses general anthropological principles and theories pertaining to human adaptation and development in cold environments. The second outlines the environmental conditions of the specific area under study in the book.

The next two chapters focus on Neanderthal finds in the area. The following two chapters discuss the replacement of the local Neanderthal population by the Cro-magnons, and the development of their way of life in the cold Loess Steppe environment. The final chapter summarizes the discussion and is followed by an extremely valuable and extensive bibliography, more than half of which consists of non-English (primarily Russian) sources.

In reading this work I was struck by the ingenuity of these people in the ways they adapted to survive (such as cutting "meat freezers" into the permafrost ground to preserve food for leaner months ahead), and felt that they were much more intelligent than we generally credit prehistoric people as having been. Given the same materials and conditions to survive under, I doubt that I could do half as well as they did.

In summary, this book makes an extremely worthy contribution to the dire lack of knowledge about this subject available in English. The author makes extensive use of the work of Russian and Ukrainian archeologists, as well as knowledge gained from his own participation in digs in the area and access to collections of finds previously closed to Western scholars during the Soviet era.

My only reason for giving this book 4 stars instead of 5 is due to some disappointment with the illustrations in the book. All of them are merely reproductions of drawings of artifacts from earlier Soviet-era publications. With his access to the jealously-guarded collections Mr. Hoffecker has written of, it would seem to have been desirable to include new photographs of at least some of these artifacts which have never been seen by Western eyes.

It is hoped that this oversight can be remedied in the future by some sort of companion volume which focuses more on providing a visual record of the artifacts and sites in question to supplement the excellent information the author has provided in the present work.

Rating:
Summary: A very detailed overview of Ice-Age Eastern Europe...
Review: John F. Hoffecker gives us a book about Ice-Age settlement in Eastern Europe. Starting with the Neanderthals and moving on to modern humans, he writes about how both adapted to the cold climates with technology, social organization, language and even the use of, or lack of, symbols.
'Desolate Landscapes' is one of the most detailed, most complete record of archaeological information I have ever found in any book. Primary sources from Russian literature added greatly to the knowledge we already have about Neanderthals and early modern man. Not light reading, but it can be delightful reading if you enjoy books on early humans or history.

Rating:
Summary: A very detailed overview of Ice-Age Eastern Europe...
Review: John F. Hoffecker gives us a book about Ice-Age settlement in Eastern Europe. Starting with the Neanderthals and moving on to modern humans, he writes about how both adapted to the cold climates with technology, social organization, language and even the use of, or lack of, symbols.
'Desolate Landscapes' is one of the most detailed, most complete record of archaeological information I have ever found in any book. Primary sources from Russian literature added greatly to the knowledge we already have about Neanderthals and early modern man. Not light reading, but it can be delightful reading if you enjoy books on early humans or history.